If you want a beautiful art object, a restored older instrument is about the best you can do. The difficulty is in determining whether it was restored well or not, and that's a bit subtle.
A grand has a somewhat different action than an upright, and it slightly more pleasing to play I find. The sound quality of a small grand is actually worse than that of a really big upright, though, and you pay a fair premium for the less convenient shape. Baby grands are arguably a ripoff, you pay thousands more for a piano that simply doesn't have good tone in the lowest registers, over the largest available uprights. On the other hand, they LOOK terrific, and there is the action to consider. You get the nice action.
Yamaha, Kawai, Steinway all build superb instruments in both grand and upright shapes. You pay a premium for the Steinway name. Ten years ago there were several second-tier manufacturers that were coming along quite well, well. Petrof comes to mind, they seemed to be building excellent pianos 10 years back. If money is no object, Boesendorfer is a good name to keep in mind as well. They have a somewhat different approach to building pianos, which yields a subtly different sound.
Ongoing maintenance is a real thing to consider. You should get the thing tuned at least twice a year, up to perhaps four times a year depending on how much humidity swing you have in your home. I personally have a good Yamaha stage piano (a digital instrument) which has an action which feels pretty close to a grand piano's action. I spent something like $2500 on it, new, and it's served me well. No tuning, it's incredibly tough, and the sound is a close enough simulation of an actual piano for my purposes. It is not a beautiful piece of art, however. Not even close.
Whatever you do, get a good stool. The benches the give away with pianos are universally too short. Get an adjustable stool, and set it quite high.
I'm not a pro, but I've owned and played badly for decades, and taken a lot of lessons!
