Le Sirenuse

Nothing beats Le Sirenuse for traditional, dignified luxury. In 1953, two years after it opened, John Steinbeck described it as “an old family house converted into a first-class hotel.” More than half a century of overexposure later, that impression remains at this storied hotel, now in its second generation of Sersale family management. Nearly all the rooms in the poppy-red, 18th-century villa, with museum-quality antiques and hand-painted ceramic-tile floors, have a private balcony or patio overlooking the bay. Diversions include an alfresco champagne-and-oyster bar, a pool and Aveda spa, and a vintage wooden boat for tooling up and down the coast in 1960s-starlet style. The Neapolitan menu at the restaurant, La Sponda, was devised by chef Matteo Temperini.