Four brilliant new boutique hotels to know

A Porto townhouse reborn

For a few years Porto has given Lisbon a run for its boutique-hotels money. Casa Cedo, which opened last November with eight rooms in a restored 19th-century townhouse, puts even more home-from-home style into play. A very swanky, cosy home: its owners, an Irish-Italian couple, brought in architect Joana Leandro de Vasconcelos along with Quiet Studios, a Lisbon-based design firm founded by Daniela Franceschini. The result leverages lots of wood, soft touches and warm tones.

Original architectural elements both high (ornate plaster mouldings) and low (rustic beams) have been preserved. Marquetry headboards, hand-carved cabinetry and wall mirrors, lighting fashioned from brass and plaster: all are bespoke. There’s a sweet little florist-fragrance boutique that doubles as hotel reception at the entrance, and out back a peaceful garden full of native ferns and laurels for enjoying an afternoon tea or glass of something local.

Highland high design

In Scotland, openings are coming thick and fast. Two to bookmark: Dun Aluinn and Kilchoan Estate by Dunton. The former, located above the Tay Valley, roughly halfway between Perth and the Cairngorns, was run for several years as a private, fully catered estate by its architect-designer owners John Burke and Susie Whyte, whose team would provision the kitchen, organise excursions and generally look after guests. Now the 1909 Queen Anne house has reopened as a boutique hotel, its nine suites pared back to their bare elements and imbued with a fresh and minimal take on Highlands style. All that needs to be plush, generous or coddling – beds and linens, bathtubs, fireplaces (there are three throughout the house) – has been made so. The private cinema is one lovely communal touch; the extraordinary 5.5m-long oak-and-bronze dining table another. 

To the west, on 13,500 acres of the wild and woolly Knoydart Peninsula, the owners of Colorado’s beloved Dunton Hot Springs are opening, in a few weeks’ time, the Estate at Kilchoan, a passion project that’s occupied them for the past few years. Five cottages, a haute-dining and drinking hall, called The Long House, and a full spa with sauna and yoga studio constitute the summer ’26 first stage. The fully inclusive programmes – from your ferry tickets (it’s virtually inaccessible by car) to your last nightcap – also feature guided walks in the preposterously scenic countryside that surrounds the property.

Palisociety hits West LA

Anyone in the market for a small and easy stay in Los Angeles would do well to look to Palisociety, California’s homegrown hotel collection specialising in intimate properties up and down the state. The Hôtel Lili, the newest in its portfolio, sees the Pali formula subtly upgraded: appropriate considering the address, just south of the famous intersection of Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards in the centre of Beverly Hills.

The Lili’s 44 bedrooms are fitted into a classic 1939 residential building. The design is high Los Angeles, splicing English cottage onto golden-era Hollywood (for every swath of gleaming silk velvet, some chintz). Your minibar will be stuffed with local delicacies, craft beers and good California wines; the downstairs bar, equal parts cosy and glam, has a small-bites menu all afternoon and evening.

@mariashollenbarger