The Best Hotels and Resorts in Europe and the UK: The Gold List 2024
Consider the Gold List the answer to the question our editors get asked more than any other: What are your favorite places to stay? Our 30th list of the world’s greatest hotels and cruises captures nearly a year’s worth of work. This collection represents hundreds of hours of researching, scouting, and impassioned debating by our team of editors in seven cities across the globe. But more than that, it reflects our ongoing love affair with the places where we stay, which often become our gateways to entire destinations. Read on for the best hotels in Europe and the United Kingdom to inspire your next trip.
See the full Gold List here.
All listings featured on Condé Nast Traveler are independently selected by our editors. If you book something through our links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
Courtesy Badrutt’s PalacehotelBadrutt's Palace – St. Moritz, Switzerland
$$$ |
Gold List 2018, 2024 
Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023There are few places quite as iconic as this grande dame in St Moritz. Perched among the clouds at 6,000 feet, Badrutt’s Palace is set against a backdrop of craggy, snow-capped mountains with cascading views to the winding valleys and mirror-like lakes below. The hotel has, for years, been the go-to spot for those looking for a sophisticated Alpine escape (it opened in 1896) and it keeps going from strength to strength. At its core, it’s still the magnificent palace it’s always been, complete with turrets and twisting towers. But guests now have more choice to ensure that their stay features all their personal creature comforts. There are 11 restaurants, two bars, the oldest nightclub in Switzerland, a spa, a series of shops and, naturally, plenty of winter-sports opportunities. It’s mountainside glamor at its most extravagant, a palatial fairy tale hidden in the Swiss Alps and surrounded by endless landscapes for hiking, trekking, skiing and even lake swimming in the warmer months. From $794. —Betsy Blumenthal
Courtesy Maybourne Hotel GrouphotelClaridge's — London
$$$ | Gold List 2019, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023Founded in 1812, frequented by Queen Victoria and listed by 1878’s influential Baedeker’s guide as “the first hotel in London,” Claridge’s could easily rest on its storied laurels. But it has always kept ahead of the rest, enlisting the likes of Guy Oliver and Diane von Furstenberg for face-lifts over the decades to ensure it bestrides the classic and modern in a way few hotels manage. The lobby captures the Art Deco glamor of the Jazz Age, when flappers hobnobbed with royalty. Its checkered-floor expanse buzzes with an international motley crew of Hollywood stars, brides, and business types catching up over zesty Ginger John cocktails in the 1930s-style Fumoir bar. The pick of the new suites is the Georgian, an impeccable meld of English heritage and subtle chinoiserie. There’s a Steinberg baby grand piano, silk de Gournay panels in the dining room, and a kitchen with a 24-hour butler. The hotel’s expansion into the next door building created space for suites such as the Mayfair, where designer Bryan O’Sullivan (The Berkeley Bar) has ingrained modernity through scalloped mohair furniture in coral and pastel-green palettes. Claridge’s has also dug deep to impress guests with its subterranean spa. Designed by André Fu (the Maybourne Bar in Beverly Hills), its limewood and stone textures and dreamy peachy hues are the backdrop for bamboo-stick massages and Cryo Oxygen Shot facials. The pool ripples beneath a vaulted ceiling, surrounded by stone columns and cushy cabanas. Claridge’s is no longer the only show in town, but it’s with good reason that every other heritage hotel in London still sees it as the benchmark. From $1,060. —Noo Saro-Wiwa
Michelle Chaplow/Cashel Palace HotelhotelCashel Palace – Tipperary, Ireland
$$ | Gold List 2024 
Hot List 2023 Readers' Choice Awards 2023This red-brick Palladian pile sits at the foot of the looming Rock of Cashel, one of Ireland’s most famous historic sites, with its Romanesque chapel, roofless cathedral, and pencil-shaped round tower. The woodsmoke-scented entrance hall (log fires are lit daily) is bookended by black Kilkenny marble mantelpieces and wall-to-wall art that includes major names of Irish art history—Lavery, Jack B Yeats, Orpen—mostly copies of the owners’ private collection, with a few originals hanging strategically out of reach. There are 42 rooms and suites, outfitted in heavily textured fabrics, curtains zhuzhed up with pelmets and tassels. Best of all are the rooms with views over to the enigmatic Rock on the hilltop, which is atmospherically lit up at night. A slick spa is beautifully set at the edge of the restored gardens—look out for the centuries-old mulberry tree planted to mark Queen Anne’s coronation. Breakfast and afternoon tea are taken in the cream-walled room named after the monarch, where local products (jams, bacon, and eggs) are the mainstay of the menu. The Bishop’s Buttery, the fine-dining offering, champions Tipperary produce in delicately plated dishes of Shepherd’s Store-cheese agnolotti and apples with caramel and Calvados. From $378. —Gráinne McBride
hotelÇırağan Palace Kempinski – Istanbul
$$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023There are certain hotels that look like they have been lifted straight from a film set, and this one—with its vast, marble-floored lobby, regal palm trees, and flawlessly uniformed bellhops—has a serious Wes Anderson feel. Originally built by a 17th-century sultan, the Çirağan Palace Kempinski is an Ottoman-era imperial palace overlooking the glistening Bosphorus. Weave through winding corridors to delve into rooms complete with four-poster beds, tulip-patterned headboards, velvet armchairs, marble bathrooms, and red-and-cream-striped wallpaper. The palace’s other areas are similarly decadent: There’s riverside fine dining with magnificent Turkish dishes at Tuğra, a centuries-old Ottoman arch, and the original palace hammam, tucked away behind a large wooden door with floor-to-ceiling marble and ornate carvings. As well as being an imperial residence, the hotel also hosted parliamentary procedures, royal courts, and beauty pageants; it even served as a playing field for the Beşiktaş football team. All in all, it’s a blissful, storied escape in the middle of one of the world’s most historical cities. From $542. —Lale Arikoglu
Courtesy Domaine des EtangshotelDomaine des Etangs, Auberge Resorts Collection – France
$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024 Hot List 2016 Readers' Choice Awards 2021, 2022, 2023Domaine des Etangs proclaims itself to be in the business of “art de vivre” and, for once, the marketing blurb is on the money. The setting is the turrets of a 13th-century château reflected in a glassy lake, wrapped up in 2,500 acres of forest, ponds, and meadows—posing pastures for sleepy herds of Limousin cattle. Seven Isabelle Stanislas-designed suites unfold in the main building, with more in six far-scattered cottages and a farmhouse. Rooms are filled with modern and antique furniture, while the bones of the building—stone walls, eaves, gargoyles—sing out. Art is taken seriously throughout. There’s a peaceful minimalist gallery, La Laiterie, harboring an Yves Klein, and the estate hosts everything from Olafur Eliasson pieces to Hergé’s Tintin illustrations. Eating well starts with perfect crêpes and market fruits for breakfast, and restaurant Dyades’ locavore menu (noted in the Michelin guide) elevates the herbs, flowers, fruit, and vegetables of the kitchen garden. Children are catered for in a laissez-faire way, with a playground and zip wire, a tennis court floating on a lake, and a beamed attic filled with games. My highlights were rowing across the lake with a picnic after too much rosé and walking with groundsman Jean-François Magnan, who spent his boyhood wandering the rain-green pastures and orchid-filled copses. Since 1986, the Domaine has been owned by the Primat family, which oversaw its refurbishment. In 2023, the French countryside hotel entered the Auberge Resorts Collection, and it’s clear that its spirit, graciousness, and slow pace remain gratifyingly unchanged. From $485. —Lydia Bell
Oliver Messel/The DorchesterhotelThe Dorchester – London
$$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023Not to be outdone by arrivistes thudding onto the top-end scene, the Dorch has been shaking her tail feathers with the biggest refurb in three decades: public spaces supercharged, and two floors of new rooms and suites revealed. Penthouses and a rooftop remain under lock and key until later in 2024. The hotel where Elizabeth Taylor signed her Cleopatra contract in the bath remains out-and-out fabulous—but with a Pierre-Yves Rochon uplift. The Artists’ Bar sparkles with a mirrored ceiling, Lalique crystal pillars girdling the bar, and Liberace’s mirror-ball-clad baby grand. This is the spot for caviar, native oysters, and Petal Head cocktails (Stoli Elit vodka, kumquat, Aperol, and passion fruit) served from a trolley. A hoard of London-centric art glints on the walls: Ann Carrington’s Elizabeth II silhouette in mother-of-pearl buttons, Sue Arrowsmith’s delicate silver leaf with coral branches. Martin Brudnizki’s Vesper Bar invites intimacy with its smoked glass and scalloped armchairs, and the spa (best for Dr. Uliana Gout’s new medical-grade facials) is a pink girly haven. The Grill by Tom Booton, a fun slice of British culinary theater, has a fresh menu; don’t miss the squid bolognese à la Koffmann, given the tick of approval by Pierre Koffmann himself. The new suites have the palettes of an English garden, in leaf green, rose, and heather. If Hôtel Plaza Athénée is the American fantasy of Paris, then this Park Lane dame’s new rooms are the American fantasy of Britishness—one we are happy to buy into. From $1,136. —Lydia Bell
Courtesy Finca CortesinhotelFinca Cortesin – Malaga, Spain
$$$ | Gold List 2020, 2022, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023The international luxury names may be piling into Spain at breakneck speed, but none has yet achieved the status of the great Finca Cortesin. With 67 suites, Bali-esque pools, a Mediterranean-facing beach club, a vast spa, and a top-brass golf course, it’s a paradigm of perfection on the cusp of Casares, a typical whitewashed town near Marbella. Finca Cortesin is more than the sum of its parts, but each part has been created by someone of significant talent. Javier López Granados is the big-vision CEO-owner who pulls it all together; Rene Zimmer the consummate managing director, who also helms new sister property Grand Hotel Son Net in Mallorca. Architects Roger Torras and Ignacio Sierra conceived this take on a classic Andalusian finca, which gleams sparkling white against the deep-blue Med and vivid flashes of potted geraniums. The sleek public spaces, filled to the rafters with antiques, were originally curated by the late, distinguished Portuguese decorator Duarte Pinto Coelho (after his death, the baton passed to exuberant Madrid-based antiquarian Lorenzo Castillo). Landscaper Gerald Huggan planted the perfumed and palm-studded gardens, replete with jasmine and wisteria. The inviting suites are the work of interior designer sisters Ana and Cristina Calderón, who dressed high-ceilinged rooms with bright pieces, color feature walls, vibrant bouquets, and paintings. To dine with Lutz Bösing, chef at El Jardín de Lutz, is to take a masterclass in classic Spanish cuisine, especially seafood such as a rich mantis shrimp cream soup with lobster and basil. From $700. —David Moralejo
Courtesy Four Seasons Gresham PalacehotelFour Seasons Hotel Gresham Palace Budapest
$$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021This is Budapest’s grandest hotel, a 1906 marvel of Secessionism (Central Europe’s take on Art Nouveau) that’s undergone an exceptional renovation: chandeliers and stained glass repaired and cleaned, mosaic tiles scrubbed, white stucco repainted. Its location couldn’t be better, on the riverfront, in the heart of buzzing Pest, looking across the Danube to hilly Buda and the medieval Old Town, and right by the famous Chain Bridge. The concierge team fizzes with advice and information—about where to find the best bars, and other discoveries—though the area around the hotel is seething with interest: See opulent Gundel, the famous café and restaurant that opened in 1910; the smart shops of Andrassy Avenue, a broad boulevard modeled on the Champs-Élysées; the Franz Litzst museum; and the glorious Hungarian State opera house. From $466. —Adriaane Pielou
Courtesy GleneagleshotelGleneagles — Scotland
$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023This is a hotel that needs no introduction. An 850-acre estate set against the sprawling Scottish countryside, Gleneagles gained icon status pretty rapidly after it opened in 1924 and soon became known as one of the world’s loveliest hotels for golfing, relaxing, and exploring the bonny lands beyond. Home to three world-class golf courses (the King’s Course, Queen’s Course, and PGA Centenary Course), the hotel reached new levels of fame in 2014 when hosting the 40th Ryder Cup. Beyond golf, Gleneagles is much loved by an array of celebrities who flock to the estate to spend time in the great outdoors (the hotel offers falconry, fishing, shooting, archery, and more) or kick back in the award-winning spa, with two indoor pools, an outdoor thermal pool, and 20 treatment rooms where guests can settle down for massages that use lotions and potions made with local ingredients and Scottish botanicals. From $726. —Lydia Bell
Courtesy Starwood Hotels & ResortshotelThe Gritti Palace – Venice
$$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023If you were to enter The Gritti Palace without realizing it offered board and lodging, you might find yourself looking for the ticket counter. The ultimate grande dame in Venice is every inch a museum of the city’s decorative history, with its silk and damask wall coverings, acres of painted stucco and precious marble, and gilded ceiling beams from which Murano chandeliers hang like elegant jellyfish. It was only in 2013, when it reopened following a $38 million revamp, that The Gritti was able to square the wow of the guest experience with the wow of its antique splendor. (In the 1940s, when Ernest Hemingway penned his Gritti-set novel Across the River and Into the Trees, it didn’t even have en-suite bathrooms). You don’t need to book the airily magnificent Somerset Maugham Royal Suite to feel that you have joined the club; a not-so-modest, entry-level Deluxe Room will do just fine. It too is swathed in stylish Rubelli fabrics; it too feels like Casanova might be hiding in the wardrobe. The Gritti Terrace, with its views across gondola-infested waters to the great Salute church, is one of Venice’s finest breakfast spots, and the late-2023 arrival of executive chef Alberto Fol from Hotel Danieli is a local win. At the deliciously private Bar Longhi, happiness is pulling up a stool at the inlaid marble counter, asking head barman Cristiano Luciani to fix one of his moreish wild fennel martinis, and channeling your inner Peggy Guggenheim. From $850. —Lee Marshall
Courtesy Hacienda San RafaelhotelHacienda San Rafael — Seville, Spain
$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024Black-and-white photographs of Hacienda de San Rafael show a handsome, solitary farmhouse slipping quietly into oblivion amid rolling fields of cotton and wheat in Andalusia’s agricultural heartland. That was before Kuky Mora-Figueroa inherited it and, with her English husband, Tim Reid, decided to breathe new life and purpose into its 18th-century bones. It was 1992 when the Hacienda first opened its doors as a hotel. Now, three decades on, it has mellowed and matured, blending into gardens of riotous color and scent, and quietly expanding from 11 to 20 rooms to include three thatched casitas and a pool villa. Although Mora-Figueroa and Reid have handed the reins to their two sons, Anthony and Patrick, their imprint still defines the look and feel of the place, with an eclectic assortment of heirlooms and antiques mixed with travel treasures. Old-world, aristocratic, and grand is the first impression on approaching the Hacienda’s distinctive white and yellow façade, but guests are greeted like long-lost friends. The temptation is to stay put, curled up with a book by one of the four pools or snoozing in a shady corner of the garden, but Seville and Jerez are within reach and there’s a multitude of curated experiences on offer, from horseback riding, hiking, and bird-watching—even sherry tasting in the region’s finest bodegas. Few pleasures can match the simplicity of an ice-cold glass of manzanilla sipped beneath the jacaranda tree at the front of the Hacienda, while the sun drops to the horizon. From $379. —Pamela Goodman
Courtesy Heckfield PlacehotelHeckfield Place – New Forest, England
$$ | Gold List 2019, 2022, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023You’d be forgiven for thinking that Heckfield Place is your typically grand country-house hotel. There’s certainly enough of the usual elements to throw you off the scent: the sprawling grounds and manicured gardens, the impressive stately exterior, the sweeping staircase, and walls adorned with oil paintings. But all is not what it seems. For starters, there isn’t a hint of stuffiness or pomp. The team greet guests with a calmness that’s contagious, guiding you about the place with the kind of ease that never feels imposing. Even the uniforms, designed by cult clothing company Egg—all corduroy, linens, and flouncy blouses—are refreshingly unexpected. Bedrooms are stripped back and country comfy without leaning too heavily into the more ubiquitous country-pile aesthetic—creamy oatmeals, subdued greens and pinks and yellows, not a sniff of chintz. And then there’s the food. Both Marle and Hearth, the two restaurants, are overseen by starry chef Skye Gyngell. There’s a farm-to-fork ethos, drawing heavily on the estate farm and kitchen garden for the menus. The latest addition is The Bothy by Wildsmith, a serene, two-floor oasis enveloped in the hotel’s gardens. Years in the making, it’s a deeply soothing space with a gorgeous pool and treatment rooms for hours-long sessions that might include diagnostic kinesiology or abdomen massages. The hot tubs on the deck overlook the grounds, where, in the summer months, you can take a walk around the estate with a picnic or enjoy a dip in the misty lake. In the winter, follow up a session in the waters with a cosy afternoon curled up by the fire in the living room—aim for 4:00 p.m. and wait for a homemade cake to magically appear on a platter before staff dutifully place fat slices on plates to enjoy as a piano tinkles in the corner. From $695. —Sarah Allard
hotelHotel d'Inghilterra – Rome
Gold List 2024Initially opened in 1845 as Hotel d’Angleterre, this place became a classic over the 170 or so years that followed. There are 80 rooms, though something about this Rome hotel makes it feel as if there are fewer. Some (the Balcony Suites) are recently renovated, all have restored antiques throughout. The bar is one of the best hotel drinking spots in the city (the cheerful staff are very good at what they do and take pleasure in applying novel twists to classic cocktails), and Café Romano is an all-day restaurant serving excellent regional dishes and, inevitably, a certain amount of comfort food for homesick travelers. The hotel couldn’t be more central and the service is exceptionally warm, enthusiastic, and attentive. This is a place to book for its right-there-in-the-thick-of-it convenience and its particular quality—specific but difficult to pin down—of intimacy, courtesy, and conviviality. From $657. —Steve King
hotelHotel de L'Europe — Amsterdam
$$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2018, 2021, 2022, 2023In a city more known for its scene-y or slick design hotels, De L’Europe resides like a distinguished matriarch on the banks of the Amstel, overlooking the rippling waves—and tourist barges—of the river and higgledy-piggledy mustard-hued merchants’ houses. Once a 17th-century Renaissance-style inn on the site of former defense walls, the hotel has gradually gone upmarket under the ownership of the Heineken family since 1950. A Dutch-focused art collection peers from the walls, and a lobby draped in floor-to-ceiling bronze silks and tarragon velvets envelops guests with mirror-walled nooks that become gossipy corners at night, soft-lit by antique crystal chandeliers and fueled by cocktails that mix cumin seeds with coriander-infused mezcal. Rooms are bathed in light and provide a televisual view of the moving city. Warm-floored marble bathrooms come stocked with Diptyque products, and super-king-sized beds are framed by geometric headboards. As a result of the hotel acquiring the buildings next door over the years, the showstopper rooms are now the new ‘t Huys suites, overseen by creatives from the art and design world, such as Salle Privée and jeweler Bibi van der Velden, with more in the pipeline. One of the hotel’s biggest draws is Marie, the Côte d’Azur-inspired bistro, with perfect steak tartare and tarte tatin. For a blowout, the two-Michelin-starred Flore’s “conscious fine dining” offers such treats as North Sea crab with sour quince gel, chanterelle mushroom, and walnut leaf. From $870. —Jemima Sissons
Hôtel du Cap-Eden-RochotelHotel du Cap Eden Roc — Antibes, France
$$$ | Gold List 2019, 2022, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023The wisteria at the Hotel du Cap was planted the year the hotel launched. That was 1870, before a generation of restless pleasure-seeking writers and artists, including Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Marc Chagall, turned the classic winter retreat into a summer playground, escaping Prohibition and societal strictures after the Great War.
A century later, the 1970s were another turning point for the Riviera landmark, when the Oetker family bought the villa after sailing past and catching a glimpse of the iconic property. Thus began a new, heady, unbuttoned denim-shirted era, when social boundaries were crossed around the legendary swimming pool, which had been blasted out of basalt and fetishized in society photographer Slim Aarons’ colored images. Royalty and rock stars mingled with writers, rogues, and reprobates. After the jazz and jet ages, came the dot-com bubble buzz, and the brief oligarchization of the pool. All these eras are now past.
These days, it is as it should be—that Matissean “Luxe, Calme et Volupté”—at the Riviera recreation ground and landmark hotel, where the outside world is kept very much at arm’s length. Hotel du Cap has closed only four times in its long 150-year history, most recently during the pandemic, but when I returned last year, the influencers were back in force, posing along the cushiony Grande Allée that rolls out towards the sea. It is pure Instagram gold, of course: a ceremonial catwalk 650 feet long, trumpeted on both sides with pines, that leads from the 19th-century Napoleon III classic mansion, past the flirty palms, to the party terrace of Eden Roc jutting over the water like the prow of a ship. It’s a place to see and be seen—and yet nothing feels more private, peaceful and like a hideaway than a day spent sequestered in one of the 31 cabanas with a bottle of Whispering Angel rosé. These simple, rustic shacks are the heart and soul of the estate, positioned on the rocky outcrops of the seaboard beneath the whispering Aleppo pines.
Other ways to spend the day include wallowing in the Dior Spa, honing that serve on one of five clay tennis courts (which are assiduously hosed down before breakfast), or visiting the beehives and birdhouses. In a corner of the 22 acres of mimosa- and wisteria-scented parkland, there’s even a pet cemetery where regular guests have buried departed companions.
Although the Hotel du Cap moves with the times, it never gives in to the vagaries of fashion, and remains a classic. Anatole France’s plaque at the entrance of the path to the cabanas sums up, “What will be is what was.” The hotel still subscribes to the cherished adage that, in tumultuous times, living well is the best revenge. From $971. —Catherine Fairweather
hotelHotel Imperial – Vienna
$$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019At Hotel Imperial, get swept away in a fairytale whirl of 19th-century pomp and circumstance, the sort that could be soundtracked and choreographed by Baz Luhrmann, lit by chandeliers, with marble floors you want to slide across in your socks and a fleet of liveried footmen who will happily take those socks to be washed and pressed afterwards. It’s eminently approachable and just wants everyone to enjoy themselves. It’s all too lazy to reach for a Wes Anderson The Grand Budapest Hotel reference for this sort of hotel, but here the comparison is justified: Michael Moser, the hotel’s head concierge for 31 years, was the inspiration for Ralph Fiennes’ Monsieur Gustave in the film—and was even asked to appear in the film, but his duties prevented him. In the rooms, there are velvets and flock wallpapers and drapes assembled with the sort of maximalist aesthetic that would have Barbara Cartland reaching for her sunglasses. As for the food, the schnitzel is one of the best in town, so large you could drape it over your knees to keep warm in winter. Outside of the hotel, there’s a reason the Prince of Württemberg built his home here: The Imperial is right on the Ringstrasse, the imperial-era boulevard that encircles the historic centre of Vienna—so all the main sights are walkable. This is a neoclassical grande dame right in the waltzing heart of Vienna—as grand as they come but not above letting its hair down. From $350. —Rick Jordan
SARAMAGNI/Il SerenohotelIl Sereno – Lake Como, Italy
$$$ | Gold List 2018, 2024 Hot List 2017 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023When it launched a few years ago in Torno, Il Sereno, Lago di Como caused a sensation. It was the first hotel in the area of Lake Como to be designed by a world-renowned architect—and Patricia Urquiola, the Spanish starchitect and a longtime resident of Milan, did a fabulous job. The hotel blends into its surroundings thanks to the “light” building, with its many windows awash with sunlight reflected by the lake. The garden, with around 183 varieties of plants, creates a gorgeous floral landscape that syncs up with the environment. Even the Brazilian quartzite heated infinity pool and the ashwood deck become one with the lake in a continuous line: harmony. From inside the hotel you can often glimpse the waters of the Lario, the other name by which Lake Como is known, an iconic part of Italian culture and the backdrop of Alessandro Manzoni’s 19th-century novel The Betrothed, where star-crossed lovers Renzo and Lucia manage to finally reunite and get married. Il Sereno’s lobby is elegant, soft, and welcoming, filled with the best of Italian design—furniture by Cassina, Moroso, B&B Italia—as are the 40 rooms, all with a view, and the exquisite vertical garden by Patrick Blanc. The delicious and simple (albeit Michelin-starred) food is courtesy of Raffaele Lenzi and features local freshwater fish and vegetables, served alongside sensational cocktails (even the alcohol-free ones). As if so much contemporary beauty were not enough, there’s still the wooden motorboat, a beautiful Riva, ready to take you around the lake or to Villa Pliniana, a 16th-century palace with another 17 bedrooms—a perfect setting for listening to the music of the villa’s beautiful grand piano while gazing upon the waters of Lago di Como. From $815. —Maddalena Fossati
hotelLucknam Park – Wiltshire, England
$$ | Gold List 2019, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023England isn’t short of vast, sumptuous country estates and perfectly fetching manor houses. But Lucknam Park peeps over the rest from lofty heights. This Grade II-listed pile—creamy stone dressed with creepers tangling down its tower like Rapunzel’s hair, best glimpsed from the melodramatic beech-lined driveway—has been around since the late 17th century, and operated as a hotel under its current ownership since the end of the 1990s. Staying here is a deeply reassuring reminder that, sometimes, the classics endure for a reason. Plump four-poster beds are covered in rich floral fabrics or set against wallpaper patterned like humbugs. Original sash windows welcome in West Country sunshine that glints off chandeliers; in the cosy bar, martinis are whipped up cheerfully by informal but expert staff; and the bikes and golf carts lined up at the entrance can whizz you around the estate at the drop of a hat. These are just some of the smart touches that elevate Lucknam Park from reliably traditional to top-of-its-game. Many come here—and repeatedly—for the restaurant (executive chef Hywel Jones’s team have worked to keep the kitchen’s Michelin star for 17 years and counting). But then there’s the 111Skin facials, the gloriously steamy indoor-outdoor pools, the horse riding, clay pigeon shooting, and archery. Whatever their poison, guests all appear at breakfast with the unfakeable air of those who are truly rested. There’s no other weekender in the country that does it quite like this. From $371. —Sarah James
Alex MacleodhotelLundies House – Scottish Highlands
Gold List 2024I’ve always loved the subtle sensations of a hotel waking up, but Lundies House takes it to another level. At the crack of dawn, a thin silver light drips over the masses of purple loosestrife flowers that wave against the big solid stones and sash windows of the old manse. Then, for hours, just the wind in the garden and curlews (curlews!) across the Kyle of Tongue: a pristine sea loch that unfurls in a vast façade beyond the house and the little village of Tongue on its eastern shore. Eventually, the distant clatter of someone lighting a fire comes from one of the sitting rooms followed by a padding off along slate flags into a kitchen where a chef is tuning the radio.
Is this the most beautiful hotel north of Inverness? I’d say so, and go into a daze thinking about it. Tranquil Scandinavian design and bespoke Scottish cabinetry typify the properties across the 13 Scottish Wildland estates owned by Dane Anders Holch Povlsen, but Lundies is the jewel. Its launch four years ago, just before the pandemic, went somewhat unnoticed. The thick stone walls of the 1842 former clergy house (Reverend Lundie was an early resident) are gorgeously bolstering. Here, you’re swaddled from the temperature shifts of Scotland’s rocky Highland coastline. A handful of bedrooms upstairs in a supremely lulling color palette, and a few more in what were steadings in a courtyard, make eight. On the ground floor of the main house are warm, communal areas equipped for restoration and relaxation.
Lundies has achieved the holy grail of the small hotel: an atmosphere of an intimate country house that is as private or clubbable as the mood takes you. There are no enforced chats between guests, but no awkward silences either. The staff are present, but not neurotically so. Lundies’ food is immaculately seasonal and local. Chanterelles like golden coins and crabs that taste of a bracing morning walk along the sand. In the kitchen, I spotted homemade jars of gem-colored preserves: damsons, rowan bud vinegar, toasted hay, and spruce. There’s a natural pool for swimming in a stream in the garden, and a luminous little dining room with walls hand-painted by a botanical artist in a shimmering dreamscape of midsummer blossom. When lit by candles, it’s quite a thing to behold, especially after sitting around the massive iron fire pit at dusk in the courtyard, drinking Orkney gin, and watching the summer’s second batch of swallows whirling in and out of the wood stack. From $566. —Antonia Quirke
hotelMandarin Oriental Ritz – Madrid
Gold List 2024Mandarin Oriental knows that its Madrid outpost will forever be known simply as “The Ritz”—our Ritz, the one inaugurated with pomp by King Alfonso XIII in 1910; the one that welcomed Grace Kelly and Rainier of Monaco during their honeymoon; and the one where Mata Hari, Salvador Dalí, and countless other stars caroused. After its remodeling and reopening in 2021, The Ritz is now even more Ritz-like than ever, thanks to Mandarin Oriental. Storied Madrid architecture firm Rafael de La-Hoz and French interior designers Gilles & Boissier (whose touch graced the Baccarat Hotel New York) had the challenging task of reinventing the hotel while holding onto a certain spirit. The most striking detail was the recovery of the great glass vault of the Palm Court, the social heart of the building, which had been concealed for 80 years, and the opening of the enormous doors that connect, physically—and emotionally—to the Museo del Prado (the great art gallery is so close you can almost touch it). But other magical corners abound. My favorites include The Beauty Concept spa, with its spectacular indoor pool, treatment cabins, and fitness trainers; the timeless counter of the Pictura cocktail bar, where I’ve spent endless hours watched over by gilt-framed oils; Deessa, chef Quique Dacosta’s artistic restaurant, which has gained two Michelin stars in two years; and the rare oasis that is the hotel garden. To eat Dacosta’s paella here, under the city’s eternal blue sky, has become a defining Madrid experience at what remains a quintessential hotel. From $870. —David Moralejo
Courtesy Palacio Principe RealhotelPalacio Principe Real — Lisbon
$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2023It’s hard to put a finger on exactly why going through the gates to the garden of Palácio Príncipe Real feels quite so much like arriving home. On the face of it, this is an imposingly grand affair: a renovation of an exquisite 1877 pastel-pink home set around a soaring atrium; a garden oasis in Lisbon’s smartest quarter, where the Teixeira da Mota family once hosted legendary parties. And yet, from the red Renault 4 in the cobblestone courtyard to the proper English breakfast tea and borderline kitsch runner ducks around the place, there’s a cosy, unpretentious whimsy to life here. A lot of that comes from its English owners, Gail and Miles Curley, who rescued the tired building from an ugly office conversion in 2015, embarking on a challenging renovation just as Lisbon was starting to boom. They are charming and self-effacing hosts, clearly in love with their very personal project, but wont to reference Fawlty Towers while making sure it’s nothing of the sort. One of 25, the garden room we stayed in is sublime, with ornate ceiling-height blue tiles and a roll-top copper bath next to the old fireplace. It looks out over a miniature Eden of palms, jacaranda, and lemon trees toward the pool, lit up come evening as a chatty cocktail hour begins outside the main house. Now and then, Isabel Amaral, an etiquette coach who grew up here with her seven siblings, will drop by, wowed by the restoration, but perhaps not the only one for whom Palácio Príncipe Real feels like a homecoming. From $475. —Toby Skinner
hotelPalazzo Avino – Amalfi Coast
$$$ | Gold List 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020In any other setting, it would be impossible to miss the lashings of marble, vaulted hallways, and antique busts, yet all eyes point in one direction: to the horizon. Palazzo Avino, first built as a private home in the 12th century, has a fairy-tale vista across the Monte Avvocata valley and the yacht-speckled Bay of Salerno. Known as the “pink palace of Ravello,” it is run by sisters Mariella and Attilia Avino, who have infused the place with buckets of personality and style—right down to the hand-painted tableware designed by Mariella and the Mar-a-viglia white wine from their vineyard, La Cascinetta, served at the glam Lobster & Martini Bar. The decor is Poseidon’s palace by way of Moda Operandi, with pink shell tiles, glossy sea-foam-blue bathrooms, and chic scalloped headboards. Palazzo Avino doesn’t do straight lines: Doorways are arched, ceilings domed, mirrors wavy, all mimicking the raggedly vertiginous coastline. Baroque terraces bursting with bubblegum-pink dipladenias lead down to the pool, where candy-striped parasols shade Dolce sliders, and homemade Sorrento lemonade arrives in colorful Marino glassware. The hotel’s beach club, 20 minutes away, is a sprawling cliffside hang-out, in 2023 taken over by Valentino, complete with red loungers and retro changing booths. The main restaurant, Michelin-starred Rossellini’s, is one of the most spectacular dining rooms on the Amalfi Coast, where waistcoated waiters serve plates of lemon ravioli by candlelight, and all is well with the world. From $645. —Charlotte Davey
Sakis PapadopouloshotelPorto Zante – Zakynthos, Greece
$$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024 Readers' Choice Awards 2022, 2023It’s the steps down to the stone-clad spa here that I remember most clearly. Perhaps because I was eight months pregnant, and hyper-aware, but mainly because they were straight from a fairy tale: so dinky and intriguing, paved into the hillside and bordered by lush Mediterranean foliage. I’d walk down them to a different treatment every day, as per the family-owned hotel’s advice—gradually unwinding, resetting, reviving, listening, and watching the waves of the Ionian Sea through huge open windows. Porto Zante is ideal for a babymoon. The villas are vast and design-driven, but ultra-comfortable, with a temperature-controlled pool and a personal concierge, who embraced us and said, “You are our babies now.” Few places in Europe are as private or have service levels to match this. Want to eat from the Japanese-Asian menu at Maya, but in the Greek-Mediterranean Club House so you can listen to the resident pianist? Done. Need some time out from your toddler but they’re resisting the kids’ club? The determined staff will have them giggling in no time. Keen to explore the surrounding sea and villages or nearby city? Itineraries can be arranged on the day, then adapted from the four-by-four or yacht. It’s no wonder that presidents, royals, and cultural icons come here to disappear down those magical steps whenever they need to lighten their mental load. From $2,521. —Becky Lucas
hotelPoseidonion Grand Hotel – Spetses, Greece
Gold List 2024Looking across the water from Porto Heli to Spetses, the first thing you notice is the Poseidonion, jutting out like a vast, immaculately frosted cake above the shore. On opening in 1914, it was the first hotel in the Balkans with hot water, and was constructed with steel from Germany, wood from Romania, and limestone from Bulgaria: only the best would do, whatever the cost. Years of decay followed, and there are stories of bathrooms collapsing down three floors into the lobby. But now, fully restored and extended by its owner, Emmanuel Vordonis, it is, once again, immensely glamorous and international. It has the feel of a very wealthy and adored Edwardian maiden aunt, taking a detour from the usual Côte d’Azur to enjoy instead the delights of a Greek island. There are rooms with sea views and garden views, pool suites, royal suites, and a Tower Room—all in a classic pale palette that reflects the island light to such an extent that you have the suspicion, now and again, that you’re somehow floating. The seafood is excellent and, while dining on the outside terrace, you really feel the electricity, communal warmth, and humor of this very special island. From $750. —Antonia Quirke
hotelRegina Isabella – Ischia, Italy
$$ | Gold List 2024Ischia is a volcanic island of verticals—all cliffs, summits, and hairpins—so to find a five-star resort on the waterfront is surprisingly rare. That Regina Isabella’s marina, little beaches, sunbathing platforms, and pontoons offer such easy access to clear, emerald-colored sea is an obvious sell, as are the four swimming pools and legendary thermal spa. Marinated in the essence and spirit of its 1950s heyday, the hotel captures the golden era of Mediterranean sophistication and dolce vita glamor. The style and atmosphere continue in 128 bedrooms spread across three different units and buildings, completed between 1956 and 1963. Some still have vintage dressing tables, bedsteads, and the cherrywood marquetry of built-in cupboards, with modernist iron-railed Juliet balconies—such as the one in room 370, from which Elizabeth Taylor famously hurled Richard Burton’s clothes following an epic row. The hub and raison d’être of the resort is the spa with indoor thermal pools and extensive facilities, where you can go for a quick-fix facial or a non-surgical filler, or have a personalized program and complete wellness overhaul. The location, between cliff and sea, and on the edge of the charming, short-stroll-away town of Lacco Ameno, means you can also experience life in a vivid, former fishing community. Here is a hotel that can be all things to all people: a destination spa and starred restaurant, a restorative retreat with natural thermal hot springs, and an intimate, relaxed family resort. From $378. —Catherine Fairweather
Vincent LerouxhotelRitz Paris – Paris
$$$ | Gold List 2018, 2020, 2024 Hot List 2017 Readers' Choice Awards 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023César Ritz opened this limestone bastion of French hospitality in 1898 and, in the course of running it, he and his wife, Marie Louise, who would take over the business, flipped the industry on its head. It was the first hotel in Paris with telephones, the first to offer private baths, and the first to install electricity throughout the property. It was also one of the first places in town where women could come without chaperones and meet friends for five o’clock tea. From the start, The Ritz Paris has been a Grand Siècle-style hotel with a modern soul and, much as in 1898, change is afoot. It’s said that when he was too ill to dine out, Marcel Proust had chicken and potatoes sent over from The Ritz Paris—now those hallowed kitchens are home to their first female head chef, Eugénie Béziat. Chef Béziat was born in Gabon to French parents and spent her childhood in Africa, so the flagship restaurant, Espadon, features dishes such as chicken yassa, a Senegalese speciality, and barbecued lobster with cassava semolina. Meanwhile, down a warmly lit hall is Bar Hemingway, named for the American novelist who scrimped for a cocktail a week at The Ritz. Last spring, longtime head bartender Colin Field (inventor of the Clean Dirty Martini, served with an ice cube of olive juice) stepped aside, and his protégé Anne-Sophie Prestail, has come in from the wings. From $2,163. —Jo Rodgers
hotelSchloss Elmau – Germany
$$$ | Gold List 2020, 2024 Hot List 2016 Readers' Choice Awards 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022Some hotels stir emotions and soothe the soul in equal measure. Schloss Elmau—a sprawling sanctuary high up in the Bavarian Alps—is one such place. It could be the pristine air or the crystal-clear lakes. Maybe it’s the enormous rooms, sensationally comfortable beds or floor-to-ceiling windows with uninterrupted mountain views. Or possibly it’s the reassuringly weighty, boldly colored bathrobes that are given to each guest, including children, on arrival—perfect for darting across the vast lawn to the outdoor Nature Spa. Pursuits including wild swimming, e-mountain bike tours, yoga, concerts, talks, walks and much more keep bodies and minds active, while eight restaurants, ranging from family-friendly buffet style in La Salle to fine dining at Luce D’Oro, ensure that tummies are full. There are six spas (three for adults and three for families), heated outdoor infinity pools, steam baths and saunas, two slick gyms and a vast hammam. Philosopher Johannes Müller built the original property in 1916 as a place for people to discover the spiritual benefits of nature and music. Today, Dietmar Müller-Elmau, his grandson, runs the magical microcosm with a modern spin on its founding principles and stratospheric levels of comfort. Perfected over decades, this place invigorates the mind, body and soul. From $744. —Louisa Parker Bowles
Nelson GarridohotelSublime Comporta – Portugal
Gold List 2024Set among the pine forests and sand dunes of Comporta is Sublime, a boutique hotel with idyllic surroundings, first-class hospitality, and an away-from-it-all atmosphere. Understandably, people associate Comporta with the late-sunset beauty of summer, but Sublime is welcoming all year round. In fact, the heated floors, freestanding bathtubs, and private terraces feel utterly blissful during the colder months, should you wish to visit off-season. There are three restaurants: Sem Porta is the main affair and serves Algarve pink prawns, lobster rice, and Iberian pork; Tasca da Comporta is a little more casual, focusing on small plates; and Food Circle is a chef’s kitchen in the middle of the property’s organic garden. There’s also a beach club, spa, and on-site herb and vegetable garden. From sunrise on your private deck to chef’s table dinners, everything has been delicately thought out—and you’ll remember the utter relaxation you felt here long after you return home. From $286. —Abigail Malbon
Johanne NyborghotelUnion Øye – Norway
Gold List 2024“It’s like something from a Scandinavian fairy tale,” I heard a guest saying on arriving at Hotel Union Øye in Norway’s Sunnmøre Alps. They had a point. The red and cream half-timbered exterior, with its decorative fish-scale roof and ornate lattice work, does conjure a storybook fantasy. Numerous writers thought so too. Karen Blixen, Henrik Ibsen, and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle all loved this spot, as did other illustrious guests, from Queen Maud of Norway and composer Edvard Grieg to Kaiser Wilhelm II, who liked to turn up with his own bath in tow. So there’s history to the place, a sense of which oozes through its paneled interiors, up the sturdy pine staircase to the 24 bedrooms where flouncy wallpapers, heavy brocade, and damask are blended with antique furniture and twinkling chandeliers to bring a museum-like quality. Old-world Edwardian glamor you might call it, though it’s a tad spooky too: lovelorn Linda, the resident ghost, has been known to make her presence felt. Fast forward to the 21st century and in come the Flakk family, keen environmentalists and pioneers of sophisticated travel experiences in Norway under their 62º Nord brand. They’ve awakened this sleeping beauty from her slumbers and given her a serious overhaul, adding a cluster of new-build, old-style farmhouses with 14 further rooms, and a new conservatory restaurant and Palm bar. Hotel Union Øye now feels altogether younger and fresher, ready for the next generation of inspirationalists to explore the fjords and high mountains right on its doorstep. From $302. —Pamela Goodman
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