There are certainly perks to staying at a luxury chain like the Four Seasons or the Ritz-Carlton, but on the whole, we prefer boutique hotels that are more unique, local-centric, and intimate.
Here, eight upstarts in the hospitality industry that prioritize style over size and well-being over high-living.
The Line Hotels
The Line Hotel in D.C. is housed in an 110-year-old church. Managed by the Sydell Group, Line Hotels has three locations: Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and its newest in Austin, which opened its doors this past summer.
Lokal Hotels
Photograph by Heidi’s Bridge for Lokal Hotels.
The sleek kitchen in one of the units in Lokal Fishtown, which opened earlier this month. The Lokal group has three hyper-local outposts, two of them in the Philadelphia area and all of them equipped with a kitchen.
A guest room in Eaton Hotel D.C., which opened last year; a location in Hong Kong also debuted a few months ago.
Eaton Hotels
La Neta Restaurant in the 119-room Hoxton Portland, which opened just a few months ago.
Hoxton Hotels
The British-owned hotel conglomerate, which already has four European locations, recently crossed the Atlantic, first landing in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, where it’s quickly established itself as the cool place to stay.
Moxy Hotels
Moxy’s newest hotel opened this past fall in the Chelsea neighborhood of New York City.
We deliberated the inclusion of Moxy Hotels on our list because of its mass-market roots (it’s owned by hospitality behemoth Marriott), but it does budget, no-frills, small-space design so well that it feels like a fresh upstart.
The public lounge area at the Carpenter Hotel in Austin. And now they’ve added another hotel to their resumé: the Carpenter Hotel in Austin, which opened this past November.
Mighty Union
Proper Hotels aim to bridge the gap between the luxury hotel and the indie boutique markets.
Proper Hotels
The 67-room Maison de la Luz is across from the original Ace Hotel New Orleans.
Atelier Ace
Graduate Hotels
The color purple features heavily in the Graduate Seattle’s color palette, a nod to the University of Washington’s school colors.
The hospitality chain will grow its empire of collegiate campus-based hotels to 12 more locations by 2020 (it currently has 13 locations open), including a foray into the Ivy League this year with openings in Providence and New Haven.