SPANISH SERIES ‘VELVET’ SULTRY IN ANY LANGUAGE

With much of the arts moving to online and streaming platforms, here’s a look at a weekly standout:

My pick: “Velvet”

Why: Two years ago, I bingewatched a Spanish period drama “Gran Hotel,”which first aired on Antena 3 in Spain in 2011. If memory serves me right, I had just finished binge-watching “Downton Abbey,” and this had the same feel. It’s also set at the turn of the century, only in Spanish.

My two semesters of college-level Spanish weren’t enough to be able to watch without subtitles, but I quickly got the hang of watching and reading at the same time. Recently, I wanted to rewatch “Gran Hotel” — starring Yon González and Amaia Salamanca — but discovered that it left Netflix on Jan. 1. Searching for it on Netflix yielded another result: “Velvet,” also a Spanish drama, this one about a fashion house in 1950s Spain.

Love, intrigue, jealousy — all set against a beautiful art deco backdrop and a mostly English-language soundtrack? You had me at “te quiero.”

Turns out, there was a reason I was quickly pulled in by “Velvet,” which aired on Spain’s Antena 3 for four seasons. It, too, was the brainchild of the geniuses behind “Gran Hotel”: Ramón Campos and Gema R. Neira. The pace — both in plot development and conversations — is sometimes so fast I have to rewind to catch up, but it’s a beautifully produced drama (and a generous dose of comedy) with well-developed characters, all wearing distinctive midcentury fashion. It stars Paula Echevarría and Miguel Ángel Silvestre, who went on to star in “Sense8” and “Narcos,” both on Netflix.

I’m still working my way through Season 3 and already dreading that it has only four seasons. But luckily, the show did produce a spinoff series called “Velvet Colección.” It has two seasons, and a made-for-tv movie. I love that. Or perhaps I should say: eso me encanta.

Find it: Streaming on Netflix

NETFLIX “Velvet,” a Spanish-language series, is streaming on Netflix