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Phew, the kids have finally gone back to school – now it’s time to treat yourselves. The lastest guide from Mr & Mrs Smith has gone online to bring you the most romantic and stylish coastal hideaways. Here Juliet Kinsman, its editor, selects six of the best
Type in ‘boutique hotels’ on Google and you’ll have as much chance of finding the right stylish retreat as unearthing next season’s Banenciaga bag at a jumble sale. There will be a deluge of properties, and no way of telling a gem from a fleapit. Which is why, after best-selling guidebooks on sexy British and European hotels, Mr & Mrs Smith has launched its latest collection online. This latest pick of lovers’ hideaways are all near the sea, from island retreats in and , to hip hangouts on the Riviera and Moorish palaces in . They were judged on their intimacy, comfort and individuality, and reviewed by experts like Giles Coren and Ekow Eshun.
For details and how to book these six hotels, and the rest of our new ‘Coastlines collection’, go to www.mrandmrssmith.com.
1. The Belvedere - Mykonos, Greece
Style Whitewashed wonderland.
Setting Steps from the centre of Mykonos.
The first Greek island to be ‘discovered’ in the Fifties, its main town rapidly gained a reputation as the Cyclades’ most-happening harbour. With its perfectly curved bay, maze of white-washed alleys and picturesque windmills, it became a must-see for any island-hopper. The proliferation of trendy clubs and fashion boutiques attracts a pan-global crowd of the young and beautiful, all united by their shared purpose – to pose, party and be pampered. And few places fulfill these criteria quite like the Belvedere. This haven of laid-back luxury oozes style and glamour, elevated high above the sugar-cube buildings below and with a heavenly view of the Aegean beyond. The Belvedere wears its party credentials on its (white) sleeve with 37 rooms and eight suites spread in the six buildings around the swimming pool. The coterie of honed, toned and tanned model types by the pool are clear indication of the sort of jet-set crowd that touches down at this party hotspot in summer.
Rates €105-€744, including breakfast; all prices are double rooms or suites for two people.
2. Escondrijo Hotel - Vejer, Spain
Style Moorish but modern.
Settings Cobbled streets of Costa de la Luz.
Tenette Ludlow and her partner, Nigel Anderson, are two British refugees from urban servitude who brought this former chapel back fro the dead last year. They have made something that, depending on how you look at it, is either a tiny, intimate and quite stunning boutique hotel or a private home with four rooms set aside for paying guests. And that is the great thing about it. For as long as you are in Vejer – a month or just a night – this is your home. And it’s not some shonky self-catering duplex with a view of the petrol station; it is a dream of the Spanish Golden Age. These days, traveling is so often about simply observing a foreign lifestyles, about witnessing historical continuity and low-key exoticism, rather than living it, and you start to wonder if it is worth doing at all. Then you come somewhere like Escondrijo (meaning ‘hidden place’), and you know that it is.
Rates €75-€130 including breakfast, excluding 7 per cent tax.
3. Puro Hotel - Palma, Mallorca,
Style Arabian nights.
Settings Mallorcan metropolis.
Palma has gone through a renaissance. Es Baluard, a new museum of modern art, opened in 2004, and the Old Town itself has been smartly modernized with numerous designer clothes stores and great new places to eat and drink. Emblematic of those changes is Puro. Converted from a 14th-century palace hotel in the former fish market district, its simple stone exterior has hardly changed over the centuries. Step inside and it’s a different story. Puro has 26 rooms, most of them over-looking the courtyard of white, natural stone decorated with palms and fountains. There is a simultaneous sensation of retreat from the sun-baked streets and discovery of the oasis-like interior. Swedish owner Mats Wahlstrom spent a few years touring the world by motorbike and the result is a design that pays homage to Marrakesh, Miami and Bali all at once.
Rates €150-€400 plus seven per cent tax, breakfast included.
4. La Coluccia - Sardinia, Italy
Style Modern opulence.
Setting Open spaces and emerald seas of Capa Verda.
Verdant it certainly is: beyond the open-air atrium of the pristine 47-room hotel, a promenade of trees leads past the lawn to the sea. The design – minimal blacks, whites and greys – the bathrooms, our balcony and its sea view more than make up for the lack of acreage. Sardinia is full of surprises – it is glamorous yet uncrowded: is this what the was like before tourism happened? It feels like one great big area of outstanding natural beauty, and La Coluccia, one of very few boutique hotels on the island, does everything so well that even the laziest holidamakers won’t feel guilty about sticking around there for most of their stay. As the sea off Capa Verda is littered with tiny isles ripe for exploring, do try and muster up the energy (and the moolah) for a speedboat trip. Its €150 well spent: you are rewarded with stop-offs at whim on the most incredible beaches.
Rates €100-€500, including either lunch or dinner.
5. Hotel Signum - Salina, Aeolian Islands,
Style Family run Sicilian farmhouse.
Setting Lush, green II Postino country.
This island retreat is composed around a series of terraces bursting with lime-trees, bougainvillea and honeysuckle (and also outdoor speakers cunningly disguised as rocks, as we inadvertently discovered as we lobbed a particularly challenging after-dinner grappa into the flowerbed). Each room is named after an indigenous flower and almost all of them have their own tiny piece of outside space to swindle away sunset with a G&T and a game of backgammon while comparing brown feet. It is important to bag a sea view for a gulp of the gardens right down to the deep-blue ocean, with the active volcano Stomboli beyond. Hours can be whiled away dangling off the edge of the infinity pool gazing into the horizon deliberating over which pasta dish to try at dinner, and the most taxing thing I did was deciding whether to venture out in my new Mui Muis.
Rates €110-€190, VAT and service included.
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