AS A TEENAGER, MERYANNE LOUM-MARTIN was given some sage advice from her West Indian mother: “Open your eyes, open your ears, and remember everything.” Growing up in Paris, Accra, Moscow, and London, Meryanne nurtured her senses and developed the kind of photographic memory befitting an artist. “At age 13, I already had subscriptions to architecture magazines, and I was obsessed with art history,” she says over our video call, as birdsong fills the marigold-colored courtyard of her home. Reinvigorated from hosting a group of mothers and daughters at Jnane Tamsna, the hotel she founded in Marrakesh, Loum-Martin appears elegant on-screen, with pulled-back silver hair and gleaming layers of pearl necklaces.

Loum-Martin’s architecture career was initially a dream deferred, one that seemed impossible due to the rigorous math and physics courses it required. So she went to law school instead, following in the footsteps of her parents, who founded a corporate law firm before her father became a diplomat for his home country of Senegal.

“Since I was a kid, I knew that I wanted to build and design,” she explains. “It was very hard to move on. I was totally depressed for a whole year, which I spent traveling and learning languages.” Once back in Paris, she worked toward a master’s degree in international law, though she didn’t intend to take the bar exam. “I just needed an education,” she adds. “I thought, ‘After that, we'll see.’”

Friends from Europe who had chosen India’s five-star hotels couldn’t relate to the experiences she sought. “I discovered that, for me, the essence of adventure and luxury is an authentic experience,” she says. “It was certainly not about staying at a branded hotel in a big city. It’s about understanding the connection to people's lives and to history. You travel for a real experience, which will have an impact on how you see the world or how you can be useful in it.”

After that month in India, her days in Paris were filled with corporate cases. She became successful in her reluctant legal career, even representing France in international eloquence contests. At the same time, Loum-Martin longed for faraway India, the colors and the familial energy. She began talking to her parents about building a family holiday home somewhere between Senegal and France. Morocco stuck out on the map and seemed like it could be “an India close to Europe,” so in 1985 she went to Marrakesh, looking for land.

“I fell in love the moment I set foot on the tarmac,” remembers Loum-Martin, who went back and forth from Paris to Marrakesh before finding the right place to build. “With each visit, I could feel there was a niche market,” she says, “to create a property and turn it into a business, one which would meet all expectations of superb service, superb style, and feeling free.” She could recreate the authentic experience she had in India, along with the nostalgia of European holiday homes, in a way that celebrated the existing culture in Marrakesh.

One vacation home for her family turned into two villas ready for guests, completed in 1989. Named Dar Tamsna, the property emphasized the area’s natural greenery. “By the time we finished everything, we immediately opened as a business,” she recalls. “The idea was that if it didn’t work out, we'd sell one house and keep the other one, as planned. Instead, it was packed all the time.” Even celebrities waited months to secure their reservations. “I did not expect the success,” says Loum-Martin. “I did not expect that it would enchant such famous people, people who could stay anywhere yet became loyal guests. I realized it was totally innovative, but at the same time, it was very simple.”

Loum-Martin continued her law career in Paris by day and marketed the hotel by night. Legally, she was not supposed to have a side business while being a full-time lawyer in France. After five years of quietly managing both jobs and becoming a mother, she and her family finally moved to Marrakesh full-time. In 1999, she opened Ryad Tamsna, a combined restaurant, shop, and gallery in Marrakech’s Medina, and in 2001, she opened Jnane Tamsna, comprising five houses and five pools on nine acres of Marrakesh’s northern palm grove, known as the Palmeraie.

“We built and designed everything from scratch,” says Loum-Martin of her holistic approach to interior and exterior architecture, which was forged in collaboration with her husband, who designs the gardens. In each project, one sees Meryanne’s keen respect for the region’s Moorish aesthetic, combined with her global sensibilities and Gary’s ecological and organic farming expertise. Her properties have inspired commissions for other family homes, which she takes on selectively: “The key thing is to feel comfortable about the future of what I'm putting together.”

Loum-Martin’s own future includes continued promotion of her newly released Rizzoli New York book, “Inside Marrakesh: Enchanting Homes and Gardens,” as well as permitting for a 50-bedroom property focused on sustainable innovation. While sustainability has come to evoke things like green roofing, farm-to-table food, and wastewater gardens, for Loum-Martin, it also means rethinking how to support local communities. “Luxury should be used as a tool to interrupt the cycle of poverty in a sustainable and permanent way,” she explains. “A lot of things can be made in Morocco by people who are extremely talented with their hands and the younger generation who understands technology. The moment you give people a market, they can have a lasting family business.”