My favourite Battleship, especially from aesthetical standpoint, are the italian Littorio's:
Best Battleships?: Without doubt, Yamato & Musashi. They both took a lot of damage so their protection was obviously not bad. Firepower was massive and they had huge and excellent optics.
Vanguard must have been also a pretty good ship: A very reliable armament with the overall excellent 18 inch guns which were improved and developed over 30 years - all in combination with a well-protectected and balanced hull and armour system built with the experience of two world wars and many fought battles.
Bismarck is a beautiful and famous ship - it was a good balanced design. But it had several weaknesses especially a protection scheme based on the latest WWI designs with lower fighting distances. It didn't feature an all-or nothing armour concept - by using that some weight could have been saved and used for a stronger horizontal protection instead.