Palacio de las Dueñas

Las Dueñas is the antidote to monument fatigue: a 15th-century Mudéjar-Gothic palace that never became a museum because the House of Alba never left. The late 18th Duchess of Alba — Cayetana, grandee of Spain forty times over, flamenco-loving, gloriously eccentric, arguably the most titled person on Earth — used it as her favourite home until her death in 2014, and her heirs opened it largely as she kept it: family photographs beside Riberas, her fan collection, the football shirts of her beloved Betis framed near tapestries. It's aristocratic Seville as a living habit rather than an exhibit.

The architecture alone would justify entry — a chain of patios in carved plaster and azulejo tile around a main courtyard that's among the loveliest in Andalusia, all draped in the bougainvillea that has become the palace's signature (the gardeners' purple cascade over lemon trees is the most photographed wall in the quarter). But the resident ghost is literary: Antonio Machado, one of Spain's greatest poets, was born here in 1875 when his family rented rooms overlooking the courtyard, and his lines about "the lemon tree' s dusty branches" in that patio are printed where he saw them. Between Alba and Machado, the audio guide has better material than palaces triple its size.

It sits ten minutes north of the cathedral crowds near the Setas, takes ninety unhurried minutes with the (included) audio app, and rarely queues — which makes it the perfect second-day slot when the Alcázar and cathedral are done and you want Seville at conversation volume. Spring visits during orange blossom or the April Fair dressing are the jackpot; the courtyard café isn't much, so exit to the Alameda's terraces instead.