Leslie Barrie travel tips

While luxury boutique hotels have always appealed to a certain set, Small Luxury Hotels of the World is trying to create more converts. In October, it launched a marketing campaign around a so-called “private collection” to amplify the message that “smaller is better.”

The Portrait Milano debuts December 1 in the heart of Milan’s fashion district. The location makes sense, given that the 73-room property belongs to the Lungarno Collection — a group of Italian boutique hotels founded by the family of Italian loafer king, Salvatore Ferragamo.

When guests walk into Jams Music Hotel in Munich, Germany, they encounter a floor-to-ceiling mural of Prince and a chance to pick out albums from the hotel’s vast collection of vinyl to play on the record player in their room.

Earlier this month, Roseate Hotels and Resorts said it is buying yet another luxury hotel in the United Kingdom — this time, a five-star boutique called The Dunstane Houses located in Edinburgh, Scotland. As with the three other UK properties Roseate has acquired, the brand will attempt to keep the decor and service practices localized.

A five-year anniversary would be a big deal for any new boutique hotel brand. But for Pillows Hotels, a luxury boutique hotel chain with locations in the Netherlands and Belgium, hitting this five-year mark might mean even more, considering the brand launched just a few years before the pandemic. 

When planning a trip to Italy, most people put historic, charming cities like Venice, Florence, and Rome on the itinerary. But Oasy Dynamo, a new luxury, wilderness retreat nestled in the Pistoia mountains of upper Tuscany, is hoping travelers want a taste of nature, too.

When international travelers visit Portugal, some may look for a big chain you’d find in, say Phoenix. But AlmaLusa, a boutique hotel brand founded in 2016, is banking on travelers looking for something more authentic.

It’s trendy for hotels to try to create a live-like-a-local experience for travelers, but Sommerro House in Oslo, which launched in September 2022, will prompt its rivals to level up their games.

Few stories are more romantic than Romeo and Juliet, and few places embody the tragic love story more than the courtyard with Juliet’s balcony.

When Frances Kiradjian started the Boutique Lifestyle Leaders Association (BLLA) in 2009, her friends seriously questioned the idea.

When guests drive up to Marina Riviera, a boutique hotel in Big Bear, California that opened in the autumn of 2022, they won’t see a big sign for Casetta, the parent company that founded the hotel portfolio in 2019. Nor will they see its Casetta floral logo splashed on every corner of the lobby (look closely on the bath products and robes, though, and you’ll find it).

Some hoteliers take a stand-back approach, outsourcing most of the concept creation and design. Then there’s Palisociety’s founder and CEO Avi Brosh — who’s involved in every last detail.

One of the more interesting U.S. innovators of boutique hotels had humble origins. Atit Jariwala is today the founder and CEO of Bridgeton, a New York real estate development group managing $1 billion in assets, including hotels. But Jariwala got his first taste of the hospitality industry living in an EconoLodge motel that his parents managed in Bridgeton, Missouri.

A boutique hotel opening in July in the historically Black neighborhood of Haughville, Indianapolis, aims to tap into a few trends percolating in hospitality broadly: helping guests feel a sense of place and reducing the carbon impact of hotel operations. Tiny Urban Escapes will strive to bring a small, green oasis into the middle of a bustling Indiana city with luxury touches.

The Postcard Hotel is a brand with momentum behind it. It was named Asia’s leading boutique hotel brand at the World Travel Awards in 2022. Even though the India-based brand only launched in 2018, it already has nine properties open, with another 23 under development.

When the Gansevoort hotel first opened back in 2004, the boutique property had no competition in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District. “We were the only game in town, and it was just the right moment in time,” said Michael Achenbaum, the president and founder of the Gansevoort Hotel Group. That gave the boutique hotel a distinct advantage, as the neighborhood became arguably the nightlife capital in the aughts. The hotel — as well as other players, such as the restaurant Pastis and the lounge Lotus — helped speed up the growth of the Meatpacking District. But there was a tipping point. “I think there was a moment where it became too much, and the term ‘jump the shark’ was appropriate at the time,” Achenbaum said. Almost 20 years later, the neighborhood has morphed. More luxury shops like Gucci and Hermès have entered the space, Lotus is long gone, and packing plants are nowhere to be found — though Achenbaum believes there are still one or two left on the fringes of the district.

Of the 70 team members at the Martigny Boutique-Hotel in the Valais region of Switzerland, 40 come from a foundation supporting people with intellectual disabilities.

When Phil Hospod started his hospitality firm, Dovetail + Co, back in 2018, he was coming off some pretty big wins as part of the Sydell Group, helping launch the Freehand New York and The Line DC. Still, he knew he wanted to go out on his own.

The idea behind the family-owned boutique hotel brand, Maisons Pariente, when it launched in 2019, was to create intimate luxury hotels — each in extraordinary places. “Rather than build vacation homes, we designed homes that have everything to make you feel like you’re invited to a friend’s house,” said Kimberley Cohen, co-founder of Maisons Pariente.

At first glance, Faraway Nantucket, a 62-room boutique hotel created by the real estate investment and development firm Blue Flag Partners, may seem like just another shingle-clad property on the Massachusetts island. But take a step inside, and the interiors seem anything but traditional or ordinary.

When Jennifer May and her father Michael Stevenson remodeled their restaurant in Sedona, they couldn’t get over how much people loved the view, which overlooks some of the most iconic red rock formations in Arizona.