If you've planned a vacation recently, you'll haven’t any trouble believing the staggering figure from Virtuoso – a consortium of around 20,000 luxury travel agents – that luxury hotels are 85% costlier this summer than in 2019. In Paris alone, prices have risen exponentially, 300% higher than last summer, as hoteliers attempt to capitalize on the Olympics.
This latest world order has made it normal to spend $1,000 an evening for a low-end room in most major cities—not to say the associated fee of a five-star stay in a seasonal resort just like the Amalfi Coast or the South of France. In the previous, iconic hotels like Belmond's Caruso can charge last-minute rates of $3,250 for an ordinary 41-square-meter room.
Our tackle that is that the costliest resorts are sometimes essentially the most luxurious, but that doesn't necessarily make them one of the best alternative.
If you're searching for value for money – a stay where you'll be appropriately pampered, enjoy exquisite decor, and feel secluded from the gang and even in a position to exhibit – it is advisable to avoid the highest spots altogether.
In most major destinations today, boutique hotels offer style and class comparable to their more luxurious counterparts—though often with a less favorable staff-to-guest ratio—at a fraction of the associated fee and for an often cooler crowd. If you're already resigned to spending over $1,000 an evening, you'll probably feel more like royalty in a big suite at certainly one of these more intimate hotels than you’d in an entry-level room at a bigger and more well-known resort. And even when there's less staff there to cater to your every need, you'll be an enormous fish in a small pond.
Here are 4 case studies that show how well this strategy works: You can expand your property without impacting your budget.
The fantasy of a flaneur in Paris
The city's chicest hotels have state-granted “palace” status. There are 12 of them, including Le Bristol, Hôtel Plaza Athénée, Hotel Lutetia and Cheval Blanc.
They're fabulous. But midweek in June, an entry-level superior room on the Plaza Athénée costs $2,986 an evening. For that price, you get 325 square meters and a view of the leafy courtyard.
At LVMH-owned Cheval Blanc, which is positioned on the Seine overlooking the Pont Neuf, prices are similar: $2,823 per night for an entry-level “deluxe” room measuring 45 square meters.
Half that quantity—$1,400—will cost you a corner suite at the brand new and already hip Château des Fleurs, just across the corner from Plaza Athénée within the eighth arrondissement. Both the common areas and the 37 rooms have an Art Nouveau vibe with a touch of surrealism: think trippy curved doors within the hallways and oblong cutlery on the Korean-French restaurant Oma, whose mirrored ceiling is streaked with playful, spherical moldings.
Further into the Sixteenth arrondissement is the St. James, said to be the one “chateau hotel” in Paris. Rooms on this majestic mansion start at $2,500 an evening – lower than the palaces, though not by much. But for that quantity, you get your personal little villa overlooking the estate's manicured gardens, with a personal hot tub and sauna. It's a taste of the French countryside, but only a 20-minute walk from the Arc de Triomphe.
An exclusive retreat in Madrid
For all the thrill surrounding the Paris Olympics, Madrid has emerged as this summer's hottest city. (See our fastidiously curated guide to the town here.) On the sting of the luxurious Salamanca district, you possibly can sleep off your tapas and tintos on the Rosewood Villa Magna, where the most cost effective deluxe room offers 30 square metres for $1,500 an evening. That's the identical price you'd pay slightly further south on the Paseo del Prado on the recently refurbished Mandarin Oriental Ritz, whose opulence has a Midas touch.
Alternatively, stay on the Hotel Santo Mauro, which is exclusive for other reasons. It's certainly one of Madrid's more discreet properties, the previous palace of the Duke of Santo Mauro and a part of Marriott's Luxury Collection. Its 49 opulent rooms within the elegant but understated Almagro neighborhood near the Museo Sorolla feel like urban oases, and king suites, nearly twice the dimensions of Rosewood's entry-level rooms, start at about $1,340.
All rooms were recently renovated by famous Spanish interior designer Lorenzo Castillo, who added wealthy fabrics and colourful wallpaper to make you’re feeling just like the guest of a duke. No two suites look the identical, but all feature a well-stocked minibar with Spanish wines and snacks, marble bathrooms, and turndown service with treats from La Pajarita, a virtually 200-year-old candy maker.
Rule over London
London has long been known for hotels with eye-watering nightly rates, and the brand new Raffles London at OWO continues that tradition. Here, prices start at slightly below $1,000 for rooms as small as 31 square metres. Few places on the earth have the popularity of the Connaught, but a 35 square metre Contemporary Deluxe Room costs $1,992 an evening in mid-June. Starting prices are even higher on the just-opened The Emory, but there, prices starting at $2,000 at the very least guarantee a set (and many extras).
Further east, on a cobbled street in Shoreditch, is certainly one of the town's most eccentric and popular boutique hotels – Batty Langley's. The whole experience on this 18th-century mansion, with its tapestries, velvet upholstery and antique furniture, appears like something out of a maximalist period drama. In the 29 rooms, modernity is commonly hidden – TVs and minibars are hidden in wardrobes and a few bathrooms behind bookshelves.
In the deep blue, 700-square-foot Earl of Bolingbroke Suite, you possibly can sleep in an enormous gold-trimmed four-poster bed originally built for a bishop and loosen up in an antique Tuscan bathtub carved from a single block of marble. The two-story suite is on sale in July for $896, a bargain while you spot the terrace, which offers views east to the Olympic Park.
Doing business in Manhattan
Across the pond in New York City, hotel prices have soared, partly on account of a crackdown on short-term rentals. At the brand-new Fifth Avenue Hotel, a kaleidoscopic gem by star designer Martin Brudnizki, a 26-square-meter king room cost $1,045 an evening in mid-June. A room on the Aman New York, slightly below Central Park, costs $2,475 an evening. And a Premier King on the Carlyle easily costs over $1,000.
In Lower Manhattan, Nine Orchard is certainly one of the best hotels to open lately. The Swan Room cocktail lounge, a former bank, is a great place to people-watch later within the week. The 37-square-meter Supreme View King Suites, named for the skyline views from the hotel's upper floors, cost $850 in the summertime. A rare feature in New York, the sort of room encompasses a bathtub in a marble alcove stocked with expensive Takamichi hair products. And all guests have access to the East Room, a shocking urban oasis with a hearth and coffered ceiling.
A breezy holiday on the Balearic Islands
Since United Airlines launched direct flights from New York last summer, Mallorca has perfected the one-two punch of glamour and luxury. Paradise-like Deia on the north coast stays probably the most magical places within the Mediterranean. It can be known amongst celebrities as the house of La Residencia, a part of the Belmond group. Here on this complex of golden ochre stone with pale green shutters, a 35-square-metre double room with a queen-size bed starts at $2,214 an evening. Up within the hills southwest of Deia, in a restored Sixteenth-century estate, lies Son Bunyola, a brand new jewel within the crown of Richard Branson's Virgin Hotels. Here, a charmingly rustic 30-square-metre room with mountain views costs $1,200 an evening.
Yet just a brief ferry ride or connecting flight from almost any major European airport lies the much lesser-known island of Menorca. On its south coast, not removed from the traditional town of Ciutadella, Vestige Son Vell, which opened last fall, is about in a neoclassical country villa on a whole bunch of acres of grounds and features multiple pools, sprawling, flower-filled gardens and 34 elegantly restored rooms.
Most importantly, on this era of overcrowding, at the tip of the long drive south is a secluded sandy cove, a singular plus on an island where luxury accommodation is usually within the countryside. Here there's a 46-square-meter Garden Junior Suite, carved out of a former outbuilding, with an enormous Balinese bed, private walled garden and temperature-controlled wide brick floors. The price? $1,100.
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