Places to stay Explore our selections for city.
Sowaka
HotelAsia, Japan
From $1,050
Sowaka is a 23-room luxury hotel in Gion, Kyoto’s historic geisha district, a two-minute walk from Yasaka Shrine. Its main building is a restored ryotei from the Taisho era, built in the sukiya style and more than a century old, joined by a modern annex added in 2019. The renovation kept the decorated ceilings and windows, patterned timber, clay walls and sliding paper screens, while each room is individually designed, some with tatami and garden views. Dining centers on seasonal kaiseki-inspired cooking at Gion Loka, and the hotel also has a bar and a courtyard garden lounge. The name comes from a Sanskrit word meaning “may happiness be with you.”
Experimental Roma
HotelEurope, Italy
From $415
Experimental Roma is the Experimental Group’s first hotel in the Italian capital, set in a historic ochre building on Via Veneto, a short walk from Villa Borghese and the Spanish Steps. Its 82 rooms and suites were designed by French interior architect Rodolphe Parente, who layered rich color, marble, velvet and brass with contemporary art and sculptural lighting. The restaurant, Ludovisi e Cadore, is led by chef Giovanni Passerini, while the group’s signature Experimental Cocktail Club brings its intimate, after-dark atmosphere to Rome. On the roof, La Terrasse pairs a suspended pool with sweeping views over the city.
Casa Polanco
HotelNorth America, Mexico
From $600
Casa Polanco is a 19-room boutique hotel in Mexico City’s Polanco district, set directly across from Parque Lincoln and a short walk from Avenida Presidente Masaryk and the city’s best restaurants. It joins a restored 1940s Neocolonial mansion, recognized by Mexico’s National Institute of Fine Arts, with a contemporary building designed by architect Claudio Gantous. Rooms feature walnut floors, custom furniture and, in many cases, balconies over the park or the inner courtyard. Rates include breakfast at La Veranda, a guests-only restaurant, as well as daily afternoon tea and an honor bar in the library, and the hotel also has a spa, a fitness room and e-bikes for getting around.
Capella Sydney
HotelOceania, Australia
From $750
Capella Sydney occupies the former Department of Education building, an Edwardian Baroque sandstone landmark designed by government architect George McRae in 1912, a short walk from Circular Quay and the Sydney Opera House. After a seven-year restoration by Make Architects and BAR Studio, a modern glass extension now crowns the historic facade, and the 192 rooms and suites pair heritage details with contemporary comfort. Works by Australian artists, including Judy Watson, fill the public spaces, and a cultural program covers Aboriginal history, art and the harbor. On level six, the Auriga Spa and a 20-meter indoor pool occupy the old gallery, while Brasserie 1930 and the ground-floor Living Room set the pace downstairs.
Shila
HotelEurope, Greece
From $250
Shila occupies a neoclassical mansion from the late 1920s on Mantzarou Street, a quiet pedestrian lane in Kolonaki, Athens’ most cultured neighborhood, a short walk from the Benaki and Cycladic Art museums. The original terrazzo floors, high ceilings, wrought iron and marble details have been kept, and the house is imagined as the world of a fictional hostess named Shila. Its six suites each have their own character, from 1960s-inspired rooms with fine art photography to bohemian suites under the roof, all furnished with vintage pieces and works by Greek artists. There is a garden courtyard, a library that doubles as a gallery, breakfast baskets of Greek specialties delivered to your suite, and a roof terrace lined with banana trees.
Hotel Palazzo Guadagni
HotelEurope, Italy
From $262
Hotel Palazzo Guadagni occupies the upper floors of a palazzo built in the early 16th century by architect Il Cronaca, on Piazza Santo Spirito in Florence’s Oltrarno, a few minutes’ walk from Palazzo Pitti and the Ponte Vecchio. Its loggia was the first in Renaissance Florence to face Brunelleschi’s Basilica of Santo Spirito, and has hosted artists and scholars since the building became a guesthouse in 1912. The 15 rooms are individually furnished, some with frescoed ceilings, antique fireplaces or views of the Duomo and Palazzo Vecchio. Today the loggia is a rooftop bar serving Tuscan wines at sunset, above one of the city’s most lived-in neighborhoods, known for its artisans and antique shops.
The Greenwich Hotel
HotelNorth America, United States
From $550
The Greenwich Hotel opened in 2008 on a cobbled corner of Greenwich Street in Tribeca, co-owned by Robert De Niro and built to blend into the neighborhood’s classic brick façades. Its 88 rooms are each designed differently, with Carrara marble, Moroccan tiles and handmade details, and many overlook a quiet Tuscan-style courtyard. Below ground, the Shibui Spa holds a lantern-lit pool under the roof of a 250-year-old Japanese farmhouse, transported from Kyoto and reassembled by Japanese craftsmen, along with treatment rooms and a lounge where matcha is whisked to order. Andrew Carmellini’s Italian restaurant Locanda Verde occupies the ground floor.
The Standard, High Line
HotelNorth America, United States
From $240
The Standard, High Line rises 18 stories above Washington Street in the Meatpacking District, lifted on concrete stilts so that it straddles the High Line, the elevated rail line turned public park. Designed by Polshek Partnership, now Ennead Architects, and completed in 2009, the concrete-and-glass tower draws on the language of Le Corbusier. Its 338 rooms all have floor-to-ceiling windows facing the Hudson River or the city skyline. At street level, The Standard Grill and a beer garden sit beneath the park, the plaza becomes an ice rink in winter, and on the roof, Le Bain pairs DJs and sunset views with a seasonal plunge pool.
Aman New York
HotelNorth America, United States
From $2,800
Aman New York occupies the Crown Building, a 1921 Beaux-Arts tower at the corner of Fifth Avenue and 57th Street that once housed the first home of the Museum of Modern Art. Restored and redesigned by Jean-Michel Gathy of Denniston, it brings Aman’s Asian minimalism to Midtown, with rice-paper paneling, oak, walnut and marble. Guests arrive through a double-height atrium on the 14th floor, and all 83 suites, starting at around 750 square feet, have working fireplaces and freestanding tubs. The three-floor Aman Spa holds a 65-foot indoor pool lined with daybeds, and the hotel also has a year-round garden terrace, two restaurants and a jazz club.
