If you haven’t entered any dates, the rate shown is provided directly by the hotel and represents the cheapest double room (including tax) available in the next 60 days.
Prices have been converted from the hotel’s local currency (EUR160.55), via openexchangerates.org, using today’s exchange rate.
Abiding by its former life as a police station, Pillows Grand Boutique Hotel Ter Borch lays down the law for luxury stays in Zwolle. Its periwinkle-blue exterior gives way to a serene, siren-free setting (wake-up calls are much more courteous now) where the only enforcement is bed rest, sauna relaxation, and elegant Dutch dining. Thanks to drinking den the Living’s 24/7 service, you’re more than welcome to spend the night behind the bar – and free to go on your canal tour or e-bicycle the following day.
Noon, but flexible, subject to availability. Earliest check-in, 3pm.
Prices
Double rooms from £149.89 (€175), including tax at 9 per cent. Please note the hotel charges an additional local city tax of €4.00 per person per night on check-out.
More details
Rates exclude breakfast, but you can order à la carte options as well as an assortment of pastries, fresh juices and smoothies, and savouries for €34 a person.
Also
There are no specially adapted rooms for guests with mobility issues, and the hotel entrance is not step-free.
At the hotel
Saunas, fitness room, meeting rooms, lounge, e-bikes to hire, charged laundry service, plug adaptors, and free WiFi. In rooms: smart TV, Bluetooth speaker, air-conditioning, minibar, Nespresso machine, and bath products by Pillows Hotels.
Our favourite rooms
Bright, airy and minimalist sums up the Pillows bedrooms. Period details are cleverly blended with contemporary comforts in the Grand Deluxe Rooms, which are spread across the older part of the building – as are the Junior Suites, which come with the bonus addition of a giant freestanding bath tub.
Spa
Wellness comes in the form of two infrared saunas, which can be reserved for exclusive use ahead of time (usually €20 an hour, but Smith guests get one free session, which includes a refreshing smoothie). There’s also a compact fitness room if you’re in need of an urban workout.
Packing tips
A few practical wearables should serve you well (you’ll likely be boarding a canal boat or hopping onto a bicycle at some point during your stay).
Also
Planning a special occasion? Host a dinner party in one of the hotel’s private dining rooms – the larger of which can seat up to 40 guests.
Children
Welcome, but it’s mostly a swish ‘bleisure’ crowd here. Baby-monitoring equipment is available on request.
The conservatory tables are bathed in natural light, but it seems a shame not to sit out on the terrace when the weather is fine.
Dress Code
Relaxed tailoring will ease you into Coperto’s casual brunch and corporate dinner scene.
Hotel restaurant
There’s an indoor-outdoor feel to Coperto Restobar, with its tree-fringed terraces and greenhouse-style setting. The menu draws inspiration from Italy and France, with a few Dutch classics (like local oysters and shrimps, charcuterie from Dalfsen, and Amsterdam-grown onions) thrown in for good measure. If you can’t decide what to order, try one of the tasting menus with paired wines (starting with three courses and going all the way up to seven). Breakfast and light bites (from Holtkamp bitterballen to Zwollenaartje pastries) are served in the Living, a cosy space warmed by a crackling fireplace and open kitchen.
Hotel bar
Pull up a stool at the oversized marble breakfast bar in the Living and order just about anything you fancy – the extensive drinks menu takes you from day to night with herbal teas, syrup-laced coffees, mocktails, wines, and whiskey.
Last orders
Breakfast is from 7am to 11am, lunch from noon to 4pm, and dinner from 5pm to 10pm.
Directly opposite Zwolle’s train station, Pillows Grand Boutique Hotel Ter Borch is a five-minute walk from the city centre and an hour from Amsterdam and Utrecht.
Planes
Schiphol (on the outskirts of Amsterdam) is the closest airport, which is just under two hours by car from the hotel. Ask the concierge about airport transfers, which start from €200 each way.
Trains
The hotel is a minute’s walk from Zwolle Centraal, which is directly connected to Amsterdam and Rotterdam (handy for Eurostar travellers). There’s also a regular service to Schiphol airport, which takes around 90 minutes.
Automobiles
Zwolle itself can be explored on foot, but having a car will grant you access to the surrounding Dutch countryside. There are various rentals at the airport and train station, and you can park at the hotel (€17.50 for 24 hours). Charging stations are also available for electric vehicles.
Worth getting out of bed for
The Hanseatic charms of Zwolle have been overlooked for too long by city breakers in favour of Dutch heavyweights like Amsterdam and Rotterdam. Pillows Grand Boutique Hotel Ter Borch puts visitors within a five-minute stroll of Zwolle’s mediaeval centre, with its 600-year-old Sassenpoort (city gate) and towering 14th-century Peperbustoren. Canal boats and cycling tours (e-bikes can be hired from the hotel) are a wonderful way to cover the city’s star-shaped waterways and leafy avenues, lined with historic merchants’ houses, traditional bakeries and chocolate shops. Browse the pretty shop-fronts along the Sassenstraat, or the many market stalls in the Grote Markt (which is particularly magical around Christmas time). If you’re visiting during July, each Wednesday of the month sees Blauwvingerdagen, the largest fair in the Netherlands, take over the city centre. Allocate at least a couple of hours to peruse the church-turned-bookshop Waanders in de Broeren (come for the books, stay for the architecture), and you could easily spend a day getting lost in the Museum de Fundatie – home to a vast visual arts collection, including works by Van Gogh and Picasso, plus a sculpture garden – near Heino village.
Local restaurants
It only seems natural to make your way from Pillows (a former police station) to De Librije (a former prison), not just for the befitting history trail – but the restaurant’s three Michelin stars have been drawing a culinary crowd to Zwolle for the best part of three decades (from their previous base in the city’s library). There’s a strong focus on seasonal, local ingredients (including fresh catches from the North Sea) which grounds the ever-changing, inventive tasting menu in Dutch flavours. For more relaxed waterfront dining, reserve a terrace table at De Hofvlietvilla, an all-day brasserie on the Zwolse Canal.
Local cafés
Café culture in Zwolle is cosy by day, and clubby at night (some lively dance parties go down after dark). Housed within one of the city’s oldest buildings, Het Refter could see you sipping mint tea and artisan coffee one minute, then from one of the 20 specialty Dutch and Belgian beers on tap the next.
Local bars
Built into the old city wall, Het Beugeltje is a seriously historic spot for a pint of craft beer – head up the spiral staircase to reach the tower bar for unbeatable canal views.
Every hotel featured is visited personally by members of our team, given the Smith seal of approval, and then anonymously reviewed. As soon as our reviewers have returned from this historic hotel in Zwolle and unpacked their market finds and craft beer, a full account of their Hanseatic city break will be with you. In the meantime, to whet your wanderlust, here's a quick peek inside Pillows Grand Boutique Hotel Ter Borch in the Netherlands…
The Pillows brand has mastered the art of transforming historic buildings into contemporary hotels, and Pillows Grand Boutique Hotel Ter Borch is no different. Like its sister properties scattered across Belgium and the Netherlands, the Zwolle outpost is a calming retreat dressed in neutral tones, soft linens, and handpicked artworks – certainly donning a more stylish uniform than its former police-station days. Step through the hallway’s herringbone-tiled floors and into a world of Dutch modernism – the rooms and suites are understated yet inviting, and the Living bar somehow manages to be cosy yet refined (where you could just as happily curl up with a Dutch literary classic, as an expertly crafted cocktail by the fireplace). Although its tranquil interiors and often booked-up restaurant are big draws, this hotel is most-wanted for its arresting location – just moments away from Zwolle’s train station (making journey-planning easy-peasy), and the mediaeval canal-lined centre.
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