With a rate of $1190 for the cheapest room, New Orleans emerged top of the rankings.
14.12.2023 - 17:59 / thepointsguy.com / Best New
There is no question about it: 2023 has been a tremendous year for hotel openings, not just in the U.S. but spanning some of our favorite destinations across the globe. Now, it's time for the travel experts at TPG and our global network of contributors to share our annual list of the best new hotels of 2023, with recommendations for where you should spend your hard-earned money, points and free night certificates.
This past year, we saw major chains introduce new concepts, like Hilton's wellness-forward lifestyle label, Tempo, which made its debut in Times Square, while legacy luxury brands — like Raffles and St. Regis — staked their claim in new-to-them markets like Boston, London and Chicago.
Part of what we do best here at TPG is to keep every type of traveler in mind. While you'll certainly find over-the-top luxury lodgings, you'll also find hotels that go easy on your wallet, as well as plenty of options for hotel loyalists to redeem their points (and save some money!).
This list shines light on those ground-up projects while also celebrating the year's most exciting refinements and reintroductions, like Regent's return to Hong Kong and the reimagining of Kona Village, A Rosewood Resort, in Hawaii. Our list also nods to hip brands geared toward younger travelers, budget-friendly options perfect for families who need to stretch every dollar further, a tented safari lodge in the wilderness of Kenya's Masai Mara National Reserve and an all-inclusive resort you have to see to believe.
After spending hours assessing hundreds of new properties, our team visited dozens of hotels over the course of the last 12 months (including all but eight of our finalists) and whittled the list down to 37. They represent the most groundbreaking openings for today's hospitality industry based on a range of factors that include location, amenities, service, design, food and beverage, innovation, accessibility and more.
So, join us as we share how you can spend the perfect day at each of the most exciting new hotels of 2023. Hopefully, it'll inspire you to make some travel plans of your own.
— Ellie Nan Storck, Tanner Saunders and Eric Rosen
The latest luxury resort on Kauai takes locally inspired spa experiences, sunset watching and rainbow peeping to a whole new level.
First impressions: After you pull up to 1 Hotel Hanalei Bay on a winding, private drive, you'll enter an open-air lobby alive with plants, water features and a take-what-you-wish farmer's stand stocked with fresh produce. And if that's not enough to set the tone of the stay, you'll be welcomed with a local rum-infused drink, too.
Wake-up call: Start the day taking in stunning views from your generously sized room. Then, grab a free Hawaiian-blend
With a rate of $1190 for the cheapest room, New Orleans emerged top of the rankings.
£28, Hardie GrantThe second cookbook from food writer Dina Begum is a love letter to Bangladesh. Alongside the selection of tempting recipes are detailed ingredient notes, explanations of distinctive spice blends and advice on traditional preparation and serving, all accompanied by evocative photography of busy street-sellers, verdant landscapes and market produce. Some recipes do feature fish and vegetables native to Bangladesh that might be harder to find in the UK, but the author suggests accessible substitutions for those unable to find a Bangladeshi grocery store.
Junkanoo, a polychromatic burst of music, dance, storytelling, and parades practiced in the Bahamas, was recently inscribed on the 2023 UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. It’s the first intangible—a practice, skill, tradition, or craft—in the island nation recognized by the international cultural organization.
It is often said that the world is a great book, and those that do not travel only read one page. What if you read books as well as travel? You would be quite the literary sort, indeed. Here at Condé Nast Traveler, our journeys take us to places near and far, and we don't always have other humans along for the ride with us—but books are good friends to keep in our suitcases for company.
This fall, international air traffic reached 98.2 percent of what it was prepandemic, according to the latest data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA). In other words, global citizens are traveling the world with almost the same fervor as they were in 2019.
Of the many conveniences that hotels offer, few are as welcome as the in-house breakfast. Whether you’re raring to go or still slumped over after that early morning wake-up, there’s no better reward for having made it out of bed at all than the sumptuous spread that awaits. Here, we’ve rounded up the most sublime hotel breakfasts our editors have enjoyed this year, comprising national dishes, pastry repasts, snow-day bread baskets, and so much more.
If we adopted a child’s-eye view of the world, how would we choose to have fun? It’s likely to be about more than the usual incentives, such as an ice cream, suggests research from Nature Communications. According to the journal, children as young as four seek experiences that deliver positive results, guide action, answer questions about the world — and are just plain fun. Whether it’s getting up-close with crustaceans on a rockpooling adventure, diving into a good book at a literature festival, learning to surf, taking to the stage or gazing at the stars, these 12 UK-based experiences deliver hands-on learning and creativity.
Alaska Airlines is paring back service from one of its key focus cities.
“More people seem to have discovered Hāna,” explained the staff member of Hāna-Maui Resort in this eastern Maui town. “They used to go to Lahaina but lately they’ve been coming here.” Since the wildfire that destroyed the historic town in West Maui, tourism has been filtering back to the island even to West Maui after it reopened on November 1st. But this town: serene, remote, one of the few remaining vestiges of old Hawaii surrounded by swaths of stunning nature uninterrupted by large developments has become even more of a draw.
It’s been a busy year for the capital’s luxury hotel scene. A string of high-profile, and often high-priced, openings was crowned this autumn when the long-anticipated Raffles London at the OWO flung open its doors, taking over the building that once housed the Old War Office. Beyond such headline-grabbing launches, the accommodation offering in the city remains in rude health, with plenty of character available for travellers looking beyond the very top end of the market. There are boutique hotels squirrelled away in Georgian townhouses, budget pads in the midst of Piccadilly and huge complexes offering a world of bars, restaurants and entertainment across multiple floors.
The Gilded Age, depicted brilliantly in the HBO Max hit television show of the same name, was characterized by economic growth for the wealthy, who spent lavishly and unabashedly, but extreme poverty for the working classes. The era’s time frame occurred between the Civil War, which ended in 1865, and the turn of the 20th century.
With its expansive views, vast national parks and small towns that offer a glimpse into local life and culture, Kenya is the perfect place to take a road trip.