14 Hip New Inns to Get to Know Right Now

Former pro hockey player Lyon Porter imagined Urban Cowboy as a B&B for a new generation—one that provides “that welcoming feeling, that insider knowledge, that energy,” he says. Tucked in a residential area of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, the hotel has four rooms and a backyard cabin that evoke the Adirondacks with their rough-hewn joists, claw-foot tubs, antler chandeliers, and potbellied stove. The den has quickly become a social hub, where a chef from Mission Cantina might drop by to cook tacos while a bluegrass band jams out back. And like any gracious host, Porter puts out a formidable spread on the farm table every morning, all from local purveyors: White Mustache yogurt, jams from Blackman Orchards, and Blue Bottle coffee.

In the early aughts, moteliers Chris Sewell and Kenny Osehan spent two years cultivating a scene in Santa Barbara, throwing art shows and rock concerts while saving up to transform a leased flophouse into a design hotel. Their newest project, The Alamo Motel, wraps around a vintage-style tasting room in the small town of Los Alamos, about an hour’s drive north. It’s partnering with music promoters FolkYeah! to develop a series of outdoor summertime concerts and with local restaurants Full of Life Flatbread and Bell Street Farm for pop-up dinners. Expect guests of the bearded and bespectacled variety to follow. If you ask nicely, staff will recommend nearby antiques dealers to help you re-create their throwback Western aesthetic back home.

Made INN Vermont ditches fussy traditional B&B décor in favor of chalkboard walls, reclaimed wood furniture, and restored Deco chandeliers. You’re greeted with a local microbrew or a glass of owner Linda Wolf’s famous sangria and encouraged to hang with other guests. You can jam on the inn’s guitars and drums, play vintage board games, relax in the hot tub, or stargaze from the Victorian cupola. The inn puts a fresh, locavore spin on breakfast, serving a newfangled fruitcake—sweet bread with seasonal local fruits—alongside Vermont Coffee Company’s organic brews, Cabot creamery cheeses, farm-fresh fruits, and a cooked dish that typically stars Vermont maple syrup.

When you check in to the two-room Maison Rika, in the 9 Streets district, you’re welcomed with a chic skull-and-star print canvas bag and a personalized guide to the city. “That’s the way I treat someone who comes to my home,” says owner Ulrika Lundgren, designer of the cult fashion label Rika (Julianne Moore and Helena Christensen are fans). The line’s girly rocker aesthetic finds expression at her guesthouse in a bold black-and-white palette softened by fuzzy throws and embroidered pillows. Downstairs, a gallery-cum–lifestyle store hosts trunk shows and street art installations and sells accessories inspired by Lundgren’s travels (Norwegian Tom Wood jewelry, Ortigia Sicilia room spray). Though the designer has big plans for the brand—Tokyo and Scandinavia outposts are in the works—she’s determined to stay small. “No more than five or six rooms, so they will always feel intimate.”

In 2008, Justin Salisbury invited local artists to redecorate his family’s run-down guesthouse in Brighton in exchange for a stay. The result—all whimsical murals and kitschy throw pillows—was such a hit with guests that it led to two further hotels, one in Cornwall, and the latest in the posh London neighborhood of Pimlico. The look of the latter has grown more sophisticated (sofas upholstered in Turkish kilims; copper lighting by London design firm Nud Collection), but Salisbury and fiancée Charlotte Newey still trade on that communal mission. A below-ground lounge draws a mixed crowd of foreign guests, magazine editors, and diplomats; a series of cocktail master classes is planned. “What makes a great hotel are the people—the guests and the staff that create that free-spirited, homey ambience.”

Toronto’s Drake transformed the city’s Queen Street West neighborhood when it opened in the early aughts with its curated art shows, music venues, and dance nights. Now owner Jeff Stober has set his stylish sights on the countryside with what he’s calling Drake on the Lake. In an 1880s foundry on the shores of Lake Ontario, the 13-room inn draws on Prince Edward County’s wineries, farms, craft cheese makers, and food purveyors to create a culinary hub of lake-to-table cuisine. Locals and guests alike get in on figure drawing classes, bake-offs, artist talks, and concert series. Rooms filter the rustic setting (woolly throws, millwork headboards) through a modern lens, with artwork by Team Macho and Rick Leong and funky Canadiana—armchairs reminiscent of snowshoes or repurposed vintage landscape paintings. You can purchase similar pieces from the hotel’s General Store.

Mumbai’s Abode is a leading example of how hotels can cleverly tap into local culture. The design mixes hand-lettered signs inspired by Indian truck painters, pillows made from vintage saris, chaat stands transformed into side tables, and color palettes reminiscent of chai pots and pistachio desserts. The lobby functions more as a living room with its library of vintage Hindi and English books, masala chai and South Indian coffee served out of colorful enamel pots, and a menu drawing on popular street snacks. But the owners’ commitment to their location runs deeper: a hotel car service employs and empowers local women; massage therapists are trained by a school for the blind; and a boutique stocks products that support local NGOs.

Will travel for food. That’s the motto of many a road-tripper who has pulled over at this charming little café in the crossroads town of Bloomville, NY. Built in an 1860s house by carpenter/cabinetmaker Justus Kempthorne and model-turned-chef Inez Valk-Kempthorne, the restaurant became a destination for its wood-fired pizzas, cooking classes, and pop-up dinners with guest chefs. The two decided to take it one step further and furnish three rooms upstairs as a mini-inn with Kempthorne’s roughly hewn handmade beds, plus nubby linen drapes and letterpress prints. So you can stop in for a dinner of lemon-marinated fennel, feta, and parsley pizza and stay for a breakfast of savory corn pudding baked with Last Harvest Farm eggs and Cowbella butter. A souvenir for the road: a picnic lunch of house-made chicken liver mousse, garlic aioli, pickled ramps, and spicy greens on a fresh baguette.

The Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert—a gorgeous 19th-century glass-roofed shopping arcade built for the royal family—sets the scene for this 23-room ode to modern Belgian design. Saint-Hubert was once an artists’ hangout, so it’s fitting that the hotel is the result of a collaboration between art collector–entrepreneur Nadine Flammarion, designer Fleur Delesalle, and architect-ceramicist Camille Flammarion. Camille’s multihued geometric tiles echo the historic parquet flooring and the graphic prints of the rugs. The hotel’s buzzy little restaurant and wine bar and its vintage-inspired bookshop occupy former workshops where artisans once crafted objects for Belgium’s royal family.

The new 10-room Ale House Inn redefines B&B: here, it’s bed and beer. You’re welcomed with brews from local favorite Smuttynose Brewery, a nod to the building’s former life as a keg storage warehouse dating back to the 1800s. The hotel works hard to plug guests into Portsmouth, offering in-room iPads loaded with recommendations, free use of Trek cruiser bicycles, discounts at cooking schools, golf courses and sailboat rides, and often-free tickets to shows at the Seacoast Rep Theatre. The color palette is inspired by the ocean, and nautical references turn up throughout the hotel, from old steamer trunks to weathered ropes and pulleys.

A little bit country, a little bit rock and roll. That’s the vibe of this eight-room inn in Tishomingo, about two hours south of Oklahoma City—and it comes as no surprise when you learn the owner is Miranda Lambert. The country superstar fell for the 1901 building and decided to open a funky down-home inn and meeting place with a lounge, a New Orleans–inspired bar (serving Texas- and Oklahoma-made vodkas), a tearoom, and a dining room. The singer often pops over from her boutique across the street to say hi to guests dining on hearty breakfasts of skillet egg casseroles or spiced apples with fresh whipped cream served up on mismatched china. The rooms, a riot of plaid and brocade, florals and cowhide, include antiques Lambert picked up flea-marketing while on tour.

L.A. is a city of neighborhoods. Staying at this new five-room gem places you in to the east side’s funky Los Feliz. Inspired by the ’hood’s creative energy, the design of each room tells a different chapter in the life of a fictional writer, from his childhood in Oklahoma to his dalliances in Paris. The hotel feels like a small apartment building; rooms sport kitchenettes with retro-style Smeg fridges, locally sourced snacks, record players with individually curated LPs, and a bottle of wine from local favorite Bar Covell downstairs. To really take advantage of your stay, head downstairs to chat up the bartenders on the best local cold brew, favorite music venues, and the area’s vintage shopping. Go ahead, make yourself at home.

Betty Soldi and Matteo Perduca have been beautifying their native Florence ever since opening their design shop And Company. Now Perduca, a lawyer and art collector, and Soldi, a calligrapher and graphic designer, have turned their talents to Soprarno Suites, an intimate B&B in a 16th-century building that formerly housed the office of La Repubblica newspaper. The 11 suites feature restored ceiling frescoes and a decades-spanning collection of design pieces, from Deco armchairs to midcentury Arco floor lamps, vintage pull-down maps to repurposed toy cars. Guests mingle in the library and the shared kitchen space or debate music while perusing the hotel’s record collection. The staff is looped in to the fashion and food scene in the surrounding Oltrarno neighborhood.

The Rose opened in 2014, but it’s really just the latest chapter for a building that has mirrored the history of its Venice neighborhood. City founder Abbot Kinney built this place as his party pad, and it was, by turns, a brothel, a drug den (Jim Morrison and Dennis Hopper were customers), a gang headquarters, and a surf hostel before its latest incarnation under the direction of photographers Glen Luchford and Doug Bruce. Now the beachy-boho inn offers a mix of affordable rooms downstairs (with shared bathrooms) and multi-room suites upstairs. It draws an eclectic mix of guests—models and designers, surfers and tech types—who chat over breakfasts of Blue Bottle coffee and Short Cake bakery croissants.