Nîmes, France
$236
Connoisseurs of 18th-century refinement are filling up Jardins Secrets (3 Rue Gaston Maruejols; 33-4/66-84-82-64; www.chicretreats.net) faster than you can say, "Luxe, calme et volupté." The hotel is in downtown Nîmes but feels like a romantic rural refuge, with just four guest rooms, a rosy bougainvillea-clad façade, and a small swimming pool in the shadow of orange and olive trees. An embarrassment of curated antiques, bowls of garden roses, and curtained bathing alcoves with freestanding rolltop tubs have made this one of the most desirable addresses west of the Rhône.
Paris, France
$263
Deep in the Latin Quarter, not far from the busy Rue Mouffetard, lies the futuristic new Five Hotel (3 Rue Flatters, 5th Arr.; 33-1/43-31-74-21; www.thefivehotel.com). Here, the standard rooms tend toward petite, but what they lack in size they make up for with ingenuity and groovy details such as changeable colored lighting and a five-scent fragrance menu. Doubles are known as "glimmering superiors" for the tiny fiber-optic stars that adorn the tops of the canopy beds. If you can, book an over-the-top suite: No. 501 has a multicolored curtain covering the bed; No. 603, a suspended sleeping loft.
$215
Hôtel Le Sainte-Beuve (9 Rue Ste.-Beuve, 6th Arr.; 33-1/45-48-20-07; www.hotel-sainte-beuve.fr), which takes its name from the 19th-century literary critic Charles-Augustin Sainte-Beuve, is for traditionalists. In the lobby, a wood-burning fireplace is flanked by red couches and antique furniture. Each of the 22 individually decorated rooms gets marks for charm, but No. 6 is the standout; its turquoise walls are covered with romantic charcoal portraits of Parisian women. That said, if you’re looking for something roomier, stay in the Sainte-Beuve suite: street- and courtyard-facing windows and a small lounge area make it feel like a private pied-à-terre.
Berlin, Germany
$155
Berlin’s recent buzz has been all about the eastern part of the city, but the west side is showing signs of a resurgence. Case in point: the Hotel Garni Askanischer Hof (53 Kurfürstendamm; 49-30/881-8033; www.askanischer-hof.de). An old-school gem, the hotel has soaring ceilings and a maze of bedrooms, all with turn-of-the-century Art Nouveau furnishings and vintage-style radios. Frau Glinicke, the proprietress, has overseen the comings and goings of guests—including Helmut Newton and David Bowie—since 1963. Don’t be put off by the shabby ground-floor landing. Upstairs, the windows are taller than most guests, and overlook a wide, tree-lined boulevard straight out of a John Le Carré novel.
Milan, Italy
$175
Transparent plastic bedside lights by Kartell. Bathrooms lined with Bisazza mosaic tiles. Wall paints, in fashionably named hues like "pearl gray" and "dauphine," from chic Belgian interiors company Flamant. And—believe it—wastebaskets and wardrobe interiors lined in Gucci wallpapers sporting the famous double "G." Welcome to Forestiera Monforte (2 Piazza Tricolore; 39-02/7631-8516; www.foresteriamonforte.it), a fashion-forward bed-and-breakfast that’s perfectly suited to this city. The owners are a pharmacist and a lawyer who’ve finally solved the dilemma of how to get a designer fix without spending a thousand euros a night.
Naples, Italy
$238
As a diplomat’s daughter raised in the world’s top hotels, Michelle Lowe was uniquely qualified to create a haven that doesn’t scrimp on design and luxury. Together with local architect Massimo Sciarra, she set about transforming this 17th-century property in Naples’s most fashionable neighborhood, Chiaia, into the nine-room Micalò (88 Riviera di Chiaia; 39-081/761-7131; www.chicretreats.com). The parquet-floored rooms have handmade white-linen quilts and staircases leading to bathrooms with custom fittings fashioned from creamy Trani stone. In fact, stones are the theme here: volcanic rocks from nearby Vesuvius sit like sculptures on the stone bar in the breakfast salon. Even the room keys hang from pebbles found on the nearby beach.
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