Prague’s art nouveau credentials are based around one man: Alphonse Mucha. Ironically, he barely set foot in his Czech homeland until the style was waning. Mucha’s sassy artwork was used to advertise cigarette papers, champagne and Sarah Bernhardt plays, and propelled him (reluctantly) to the forefront of the movement. While Mucha was away in Paris and the US, it was left to architects, Ohmann, Bendelmayer and Dryák to promote Prague’s art nouveau and they did so by combining floral motifs and looping metalwork with a more traditional neo-baroque look. The Hotel Central (rooms from €125 a night) was one of the city’s first art nouveau structures and is still open for business today. As for Mucha, there’s a museum dedicated to him in the Kaunicky Palace, his symbolist murals adorn the Municipal House, and the Zbiroh castle nearby is where he painted a series of giant works about the Slav people.