Welcome to the next generation of travel, where the best of hotels and privately owned rentals are thoughtfully blended for discerning travelers who want to live like locals. As these six concepts prove, they’re the ultimate home away from home.
The Guild
When Brian Carrico and Chris Herndon launched the Guild in 2016, they “wanted to create a new hotel model, one that is built around the guest, where they get to control the entire experience and personalize it to exactly what they want and need for their stay,” says Carrico. Now with 12 properties across Austin, Dallas, Miami, and Cincinnati, the Guild operates as a boutique hotel within luxury residential buildings. Carrico and Herndon lease out multiple floors within the buildings and turn them into blocks of studio, one-, and two-bedroom suites. Every unit, individually designed to pay homage to its city, boasts a full kitchen, in-room washer and dryer, high-speed internet, and smart TVs. Guests have access to the buildings’ amenities, while onsite staff and a digital concierge offer 24/7 assistance.
Designed by Austin-based architect Michael Hsu, the most recent Guild property in Miami features bold tropical patterns, minimalist modern lighting, and splashes of color. “It playfully layers Miami’s colors and charms with the comforts of home,” says Hsu, “with furniture, books, and accessories that reflect the city’s vitality to create a unique experience for visitors.”
Hotelette
Allison Crawford had gone on one too many girls’ trips with less-than-ideal accommodations. “The group would be in different rooms on different floors in a hotel. Or, we’d stay in an Airbnb that didn’t live up to its pictures and had an intrusive ‘someone lives here’ vibe, where you’re rearranging sticky condiments in the fridge to fit your rosé,” she says. Crawford, an interior designer based in Austin, took matters into her own hands: Hotelette combines thoughtful design and luxury touches found in boutique hotels with the easy, group-friendly aspects of an Airbnb stay. Now with three properties in Austin, Dallas, and Nashville, each home merges the designer’s fashionable, eclectic aesthetic with the personality of its city. Crawford outfits the rooms with wares picked up from her own travels, like flatweave rugs from Marrakech, as well as pieces from local female artists. “I want everything to feel personal,” she says. For guests looking to score some of Crawford’s style, there’s the recently launched Hotelette Shop. “We spent over a year curating this collection of décor, art, and accessories that guests interact with in Hotelette. Everything has been tested by my team and either found on one of my trips or created by a female artisan.”
Roost
Hospitality company Method Co. founded Roost to provide stylish, extended stay accommodations in its native Philadelphia. “Transitions and stays away from home can be difficult,” says Method Co. CEO and cofounder Randall Cook. “The goal at Roost is to make our customers’ lives easier during this period with warm and attentive service and a well-appointed apartment. It puts the people who stay with us in more of a local versus tourist mindset.” The recently opened Roost East Market marks the brand’s third outpost in Philadelphia, with Washington, DC and Charleston, South Carolina locations in the works for later this year. Overlooking Reading Terminal Market, the new-build property houses 60 fully furnished apartments and amenities like a community vegetable garden, lap pool, fitness center, screening room, library, and demo kitchen. New York-based Morris Adjmi Architects oversaw the design, giving the studio, one-, and two-bedroom apartments a warm and collected feel. “We made a conscious decision to blur the boundary between hospitality and residential design,” says Chris Taylor, creative director of interiors at the firm, who layered an inviting mix of custom and vintage pieces like antique Persian rugs, walnut furniture, and saddle leather accents—all of which lend a “personal, lived-in sensibility to all elements in the place.”
Sweet Inn
Europe-bound travelers seeking apartment rentals without the fuss of dealing with a homeowner (or their belongings) have 550 options in 11 cities thanks to French-Israeli startup Sweet Inn. Founded in 2014, the company likens itself to a “hotel spread across the city,” says CEO Javier Cedillo Espin. Each destination has a street-level central lobby, at which guests can store luggage or use the lounge and business center, while a handpicked selection of newly renovated and designed apartments—which come with concierge services—are scattered across desirable neighborhoods.
Valley Rock Inn & Mountain Club
When 1stdibs founder Michael Bruno stepped away from the antiques site in 2015, few thought his next move in the design world would occur in the sleepy town of Sloatsburg, New York. But the serial entrepreneur and style guru saw potential to revive the community, purchasing 25 buildings in the village—including the former post office, hardware store, and firehouse—that now make up the Valley Rock Inn & Mountain Club, a multi-acre resort with a gym, organic food market, and bike shop (a restaurant, art gallery, book store, and screening room are slated to arrive later this year). The four standalone Waldron Houses provide guests the opportunity to play house in the country. Bruno recruited New York designer Lisa Bowles of Roark Modern to bring the 19th-century properties, which together have 17 bedrooms, to life. “Michael wanted to do something that would be very universal, familiar, and comfort-driven,” says Bowles, who specializes in midcentury antiques. The homes are filled with treasures from Bowles’ and Bruno’s personal collections, along with artwork and vintage finds from Chairish and, of course, 1stdibs.
Bode
“Travelers who vacation together with family, friends, or colleagues are looking for the authenticity and hominess of residential accommodations—but they require the safety, consistency, and prime location of traditional hotels,” says Philip Bates. “It’s time for the two to merge.” Enter Bode, an Orange County, California-based brand, recently launched by Bates and his brother, David. Bode’s first property, which opened last fall in Nashville, is a conversion of a mid-1980s-era condo building that resulted in 100 guestrooms. Led by local firm Dryden Architecture and Design, it features black gunmetal countertops, leather strap cabinet handles, and shiplapped industrial shelving. For its second venue in Chattanooga, Tennessee, the brand has opted for a more character-filled historic building from 1916. Nashville and Montgomery, Alabama firm Pfeffer Torode Architecture went for a “raw feel, with the polished concrete and exposed brick of a New York loft,” says Bates. In contrast, a new build in Palm Springs, California set to open next year, with interiors by locally based o2 Architecture, will offer a contemporary desert mélange of woven baskets, white walls, and agave plantings.
Photography courtesy of the Guild, Nicole Mlakar, Lena Isely, Catherine Truman, Matthew Williams, and Sweet Inn
