The best new UK hotels that opened last month
Hotels expert Ianthe Butt picks the hottest stays that launched in May
From a sustainable superstar in the heart of London to a wild-at-heart manor in Lincolnshire, here are six of the UK’s most interesting new places to rest your head for the night.
The Retreat at Elcot Park, Berkshire
After the storming success of The Mitre at Hampton Court, The Signet Collection’s second property, 55-room The Retreat at Elcot Park, has arrived. The historic, 18th-century country pile, set smack-bang between Hungerford and its antique shops and market town Newbury, has been brought right up to date, with modern countryside interiors sporting macaron shades, and bedrooms with striped headboards, scallop-edged side tables and antique furniture.
Top suites offer occasion bathing, with roll-top tubs set by bay windows or atop raised wooden platforms. Dining’s also high on the agenda; pick laidback 1772 or the leafy Orangery for modern European plates and Wessex Downs panoramas, or there’s Yü for a whirlwind of Asian flavours. There’s also a courtyard with a bakery, coffee shop, hair and nail parlour and wine shop, as well as tennis courts, a croquet lawn and The Signet Spa, where ila treatments led by talented Bliss Pienaar will have you relaxed in a flash. Help-yourself pantries on each floor are stocked with local goodies, and a cabana-lined outdoor infinity pool and the Whispering Angel bar will arrive in July, just in time for summer swims.
Rooms from £150, B&B; elcotpark.com
Hotel Amano Covent Garden, London
Promising a touch of its home city of Berlin in the capital, Amano Group has chosen London for its first hotel outside Germany. Sitting on the more affordable end of the spectrum, its Covent Garden location, steps from the Fortune Theatre on Drury Lane, is unbeatable for those looking for a Theatreland base. The 141 rooms, with orb lighting and a monochrome palette, have a touch of sci-fi minimalism to them, while the largest Goldy rooms, with freestanding bling-tastic gilded bathtubs, and Daluma amenities in street-facing windows up high, give new meaning to the notion of “coming for a show” (there are black curtains to preserve the modesty of those with less exhibitionist tendencies).
What the property may lack in fuss and frills, it makes up for in its personality-packed, indoor-outdoor rooftop bar, which offers summer escapism, with DJs spinning funky grooves while you sip appealing caipiroska cocktails. There’s also a sultry basement bar, and Penelope’s, an Israeli-Spanish restaurant, is set to open in the autumn.
Rooms from £169; amanogroup.de/en
Hotel La Tour, Milton Keynes
Putting Milton Keynes on the map when it comes to hotels, and of particular interest for business travellers, is the newly opened Hotel La Tour, which has 261 rooms and several conference rooms inside a gleaming skyscraper moments from the MK shopping centre. Practical bedrooms have floor-to-ceiling windows that show off the urban glitter or let in leafy views of Campbell Park, and sport decor in muted golds, blues and burnt oranges, as well as excellent blackout blinds to ensure a good night’s slumber.
As for post-meeting wind-downs, Fourteen bar and restaurant, set, as the name suggests, on the 14th floor, offers 360-degree vistas, seasonal British meals, afternoon tea, and a glitzy marble-look central bar for fairly extra cocktails, including a cookies and cream boozy milkshake and a Billionaire’s espresso martini, which comes topped with 23-carat gold leaf.
Rooms from £120, B&B; hotel-latour.co.uk
Inhabit Queen’s Gardens, London
After setting the bar for sustainability and socially conscious hospitality with its Southwick Street debut in 2019, Inhabit’s second outpost in nearby Bayswater is set to deliver similarly soul-lifting, eco-friendly stays. Strengthening the brand’s rooted-in-wellbeing ethos, 158-room Inhabit Queen’s Gardens sits in a crescent of townhouses in Lancaster Gate, not far from Paddington station. Tranquil bedrooms and communal spaces, including a library, are done up in modern Scandi style, featuring furniture by social enterprise Goldfinger, soft furnishings by Kalinko Homewares, and Studio 306 cushions made by people living with mental illnesses. Corridors are lined with drawings of British botanicals, and uncluttered bedrooms (including 13 interconnecting and four accessible) have Naturalmat mattresses, hidden TVs, and Skandinavisk toiletries.
As well as a Peleton bike and pilates at the wellness centre, at the restaurant there’s a California-style meat, dairy and refined sugar-free menu courtesy of Yeotown (think blue spirulina pancakes, BBQ cauliflower wings). Behind the scenes, Inhabit is working hard to become one of the UK’s first hotel groups to achieve B Corp certification.
From £170, room only; inhabithotels.com
Sawcliffe Manor, Lincolnshire
Shaking up the staycation scene, a hot pick for multi-gen and group getaways is rural wonder Sawcliffe Manor. Rather than a traditional rent-by-the-room affair, instead, weekend guests can take over a historic, antique-packed manor dating from the 11th century, which fuses Queen Anne four-posters, a Georgian dining room, Art Nouveau touches, original fireplaces and bright bedspreads, and sleeps up to 24; or three standalone cottages with wood-panelled ceilings and zingy floral fabrics, each sleeping 6-8.
Opt for a Sunday-Friday stay and three of the manor-house rooms can be taken over individually at a bit of a steal. Set on a working, 3,000-acre family-run farm rooted in sustainable practices, there’s a walled garden, wildflower-filled meadows, and a 400-acre nature reserve, The Warren, where wild ponies roam, plus a spa for hot-tub or milk-bath soaks.
As well as generous breakfast baskets, owners the Elwes family can provide pies and stews to cook in the Aga for supper, arrange a Mad Hatter-inspired afternoon tea, and offer activities to entertain the whole family, from axe throwing to stone-baked pizza making.
Mid-week rooms from £75, room only; cottages from £150, room only (sleeping 6-8); the manor from £1,300 (sleeping up to 24), B&B; sawcliffemanor.com
The Bell & Crown, Wiltshire
A revamped boozer with appealing flagstone floors and open fireplaces to hunker down by, former coaching inn the Bell & Crown in Wiltshire has just opened up six new, and rather lovely, rooms on its upper levels. After days spent exploring Stourhead’s pretty National Trust gardens – a five-minute drive away – enjoy properly good pub food (think Westcombe curd fritters with sour cream and chive dip, followed by rhubarb and custard turnovers) by candlelight, then retire to won’t-break-the-bank bedrooms that have a homely rural feel, and freshly baked milk chocolate cookies to nibble on.
Each bedroom has been zhuzhed up with Egyptian cotton linen, marbled lampshades, smellies by land&water, antique French nursing chairs, and Moroccan Berber rugs.
On Mondays there’s a pop-up pizza joint in the pub car park, plus there are plans for a walled garden in future. As for breakfast? Expect an eclectic menu featuring hearty full Englishes, shakshuka, and retro Pop-Tarts.
Rooms from £100, B&B, bellandcrown.com
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