The Best Places to Drink and Stay in the United States

A sharp-angled modernist building on the Southwest Waterfront, a short distance from Capitol Hill but feeling nothing like it. This 131-room hotel from the Montage group holds a rooftop bar with a circular bar and Potomac views, an all-day Latin American restaurant with water vistas, and a moody ground-floor bar wrapped in navy and gold palms. Check-in happens seated, at a desk by a fireplace, which sets the residential tone. It holds a Michelin Key.

Eight private cottages and a Tournament of Roses suite signal what kind of hotel this is before you've even seen the pool. Set on 17 acres in Pasadena, the Langham Huntington is old-money grand, the kind of place with multiple historic ballrooms and two gardens, where tennis courts get lit at night and the spa has its own philosophy. Forbes Four Star. Summer afternoons tend to dissolve at the pool bar.

A skybridge connects this Ritz-Carlton directly to Tysons Galleria, which tells you something about the clientele and their priorities. The hotel sits in Fortune 100 territory about fifteen miles from D.C., making it a logical base for both boardroom visits and wine country day trips. Upper-floor rooms look out over the Tysons skyline, the spa leans contemporary, and the wine bar runs live music. Forbes Four Star.

Liberace's mirrored Nickelodeon piano sits in the lobby next to a hovering Holos sculpture and a cluster of pink elephants floating in painted bubbles, which is a normal amount of art for a hotel check-in. The Conrad is the largest in its brand, a full-service Las Vegas hotel tower where the rooms lean into the same bold palette. The casino, a 5,000-seat theater, and 40 places to eat and drink are all on the same campus.

Crystal chandeliers run the full length of the marble lobby, which makes entering feel like an event before you've even checked in. This grand Waldorf Astoria hotel has been around forever, and the bones show it, from the vintage timepieces anchoring the corridor to the historic Sazerac Bar just off the lobby. The rooms are plush and numerous, the staff quietly expert at making famous guests disappear.

Shingled walls, porches aimed at the water, bocce on the lawn, and a private beach on Quonochontaug Pond: Weekapaug Inn has been a summer retreat on Rhode Island's southern coast for as long as anyone's grandparents can remember. Antiques and coastal touches fill the rooms, sailing and bird-watching fill the days, and the whole thing holds a Forbes Five Star without feeling the need to remind you of it. Old New England ease, genuinely unforced.

The vaulted ceilings and carved stone arches of a 19th-century bank are still very much the point at this Penn Quarter hotel, and the Michelin Guide recognized it with one Key. The bones are stately, the renovation decidedly less reverent, with D.C.'s history reinterpreted as design inspiration rather than preserved under glass. It lands somewhere between grand civic institution and a hotel that knows it's allowed to have fun.

The lobby is as big as a city block and designed, without apology, for people who will open a laptop in it. Ace Hotel Brooklyn is a Michelin Key hotel sitting on the edge of Boerum Hill, where the industrial bones and deliberately low-key atmosphere draw the kind of guests who prefer brownstone streets over Midtown. The Brooklyn Heights Promenade is a short walk, and the ground floor bar handles the rest of your evening.

Anguilla is famously flat, which sounds like a liability until you realize it means unobstructed views in every direction and beaches that stretch without interruption. This Forbes Five Star resort sits between two bays on the island's northwest shore, its Mediterranean architecture doing exactly what you'd want from a luxury resort: framing the Caribbean rather than competing with it. The crowd comes here to do absolutely nothing, and the property is very good at facilitating that ambition.

Kelly Wearstler's maximalist redesign of an old private club turned this 147-room hotel into something you'll spend a full check-in trying to take in. Original monogrammed doorknobs, hidden messages embedded in the art, a sweeping lobby mural by Abel Macias, rugs and tiles pulled from Turkey, Morocco, and Mexico. Two restaurants, three bars, and a rooftop pool mean you can stay busy without leaving. It holds a Michelin Key.

The kiva fireplace in the lobby is going year-round, and the handcrafted doors are so heavy they make every entrance feel vaguely ceremonial. This Rosewood hotel sits a block from the Santa Fe Plaza in a pueblo-style building that reads more like a serious local artifact than a luxury property, with vigas overhead, local art on the walls, and a restaurant that takes New Mexican culinary tradition at face value. It holds a Michelin Key.

A 17-million-gallon lagoon sits outside the door, and guests spend their days kayaking, paddleboarding, or simply floating around what amounts to a manufactured beach in landlocked Orlando. The Conrad is a Forbes Four Star resort with 433 rooms, floor-to-ceiling windows, and two Jack Nicklaus golf courses competing for attention with the water slides. Walt Disney World is less than three miles away, so the clientele write themselves.

Wood-paneled lobby, fresh flowers, chandelier light, and parlor furniture that signals you've arrived somewhere that takes comfort seriously. This West End hotel runs on the classic Ritz-Carlton formula: big rooms by D.C. standards, Frette linens, soaking tubs, and Asprey products in marble bathrooms. The minibar comes stocked with champagne, which is either indulgent or practical depending on your afternoon.

Two blocks off the Strip, this all-suite hotel skips the casino floor entirely, which means no slot machines, no cigarette fog, and no one blocking your path with a yard-long cocktail at nine in the morning. The 64-story gold-and-glass tower is exactly as understated as it sounds, with Swarovski chandeliers and marble lobbies doing the heavy lifting. Good option if you want Vegas proximity without full immersion in the spectacle.

Eight suites, twenty-four guests at a time, and a thousand acres of Clark Fork riverfront along the edge of Lolo National Forest: RiverView Ranch keeps the headcount low on purpose. This Forbes Five Star all-inclusive ranch outside Missoula covers everything from airport transfers to meals to fly-fishing, with horses, snowmobiles, and hiking trails filling the gaps. The kind of place where the wilderness is the amenity and solitude is the whole point.

The façade is modeled on the Ritz Paris, which tells you exactly what you're in for at this Forbes Five Star resort in the Pennsylvania countryside. Inside, vaulted ceilings, crystal chandeliers, and white-gloved butlers on the club level set the tone. The grounds, though, are where things get interesting: two golf courses, Polaris off-road adventures, and, yes, actual zoo animals wandering the property.

Spanish-revival arches and Turkish rugs set the tone at this Forbes Five Star resort on its own private island off the Georgia coast. The original building came from Addison Mizner, the architect who shaped Palm Beach, and the Mediterranean bones are still intact. A raw bar handles the post-beach oysters; the Georgian Room handles the formal Southern dinners. Families with sandy kids and couples in linen share the same long driveways without it feeling awkward.

Three championship golf courses roll right up to the guestrooms at this Forbes Five Star lodge on St. Simons Island, styled after an English manor with hardwood floors, exposed beam ceilings, and private balconies facing either the fairways or the Atlantic. Forty-three rooms and suites keep things intimate, and the Golf Performance Center draws the kind of guest who brings their own glove. Sister property The Cloister, just nearby, adds a spa and beach club to the itinerary.

A converted 1901 factory building in Williamsburg with 13-foot ceilings, original wood beams, and floor-to-ceiling windows framing the Manhattan skyline. The Wythe holds a Michelin Key, and the in-house credentials are real: Le Crocodile, the French brasserie downstairs, draws its own crowd, and Bar Blondeau on the sixth floor has views that make the room feel optional. Industrial-chic without the irony quotes, and about as Williamsburg as a hotel gets.

Casitas scattered across 40 desert acres make it easy to forget the other 209 guests exist. This Forbes Four Star, Michelin Key resort sits at the foot of Pinnacle Peak, where saguaros do the landscaping and Troon North's two golf courses are practically at the door. The pool is a genuine refuge from the Scottsdale heat, the spa runs Four Star as well, and Talavera handles dinner. Phoenix is a short drive whenever the desert quiet starts feeling too quiet.

The only adults-only hotel on the sprawling Boca Raton resort grounds, the Yacht Club is an all-suite property where champagne meets you at check-in and a floor butler handles the rest. All 112 suites have private balconies facing the marina, the lake, or the Atlantic. A Forbes Five Star. The top-floor restaurant is exclusive to guests, and the wider resort's beach, golf, spa, and pickleball courts are all yours.

Porthole windows punched into a bright white facade give this boutique hotel the silhouette of an elegant liner docked in Coconut Grove. The Cipriani family designed it around the idea of a modern yacht club, so the nautical theme earns its keep rather than feeling like a theme park. A rooftop Italian restaurant, a science-focused spa, and bay-adjacent surroundings round things out. It holds a Michelin Key.

A Greg Norman-designed golf course and a 40,000-square-foot spa suggest this Forbes Four Star resort has no real interest in competing with the theme park circus a few miles up the road. The JW Marriott Orlando, Grande Lakes sits on its own landscaped grounds with a waterpark for the kids and a reimagined lobby lounge for the adults who pretend they don't also enjoy a waterpark.

The clock in the lobby and the gilded Peacock Alley lounge are lifted straight from the New York original, which is either charming or slightly unsettling depending on your relationship with theme parks. This Forbes Four Star resort earns its keep with a nature preserve on one side, a golf course on the other, and genuinely attentive service throughout. Magic Kingdom is fifteen minutes away, but the pool makes it easy to forget that entirely.

The hotel has its own resident dog, Georgie, available for guest cuddles, which tells you something about how seriously the Fairmont takes its wellbeing pitch. This Georgetown hotel is a comfortable, upscale base for the city, with spacious rooms and a three-floor wellness center running a 50-foot saltwater pool, sauna, steam room, and spin classes. A renovated lobby and courtyard bar draw the power-lunch crowd even when they're not staying over.

A 52-floor tower built from the ground up in Streeterville, a few blocks east of the Mag Mile and a short walk to Navy Pier. The hotel leans into Chicago's architectural legacy with design choices that feel considered rather than corporate, and a 75-foot lap pool and rooftop lounge raise the stakes for an urban stay. Business travelers and weekenders both find their footing here without too much awkward overlap.

The hotel sits inside Water Tower Place, which means stepping off the elevator lands you in a shopping mall with over 125 stores, and stepping outside puts Chanel, Cartier, and the Art Institute within a few blocks. It's a luxury hotel on the Magnificent Mile, so the Gold Coast energy is built in. Rooms run at Ritz-Carlton prices, and the location does a lot of the justifying for them.

Mid-century lines, leather and velvet, and eclectic artwork set the tone in the lobby of this boutique hotel tucked into the Gold Coast, where historic mansions and designer boutiques crowd the sidewalk outside. The 247 rooms lean luxe without tipping into stiff, the vibe is hip without the velvet-rope attitude, and a complimentary Lexus house car is the kind of quiet flex that earns its keep. Nico Osteria draws locals in off the street.

Olson Kundig designed the building, and you can feel it: forest greens, midnight blues, velvety textures, and lobby shelves stacked with books about treehouses and cabins. This hotel sits a short walk from Pike Place Market, threading the needle between Pacific Northwest rusticity and a sleek urban nightlife pedigree. The rooms lean masculine and warm, with furnishings that look comfortably broken in rather than showroom-fresh.

Cocktail menus organized light to full-bodied are a small kindness this bar extends before you've even ordered. Highball is a dimly lit cocktail bar on the second floor of a historic building in downtown Phoenix, doing the speakeasy thing with genuine commitment. Housemade ingredients show up throughout a lengthy menu where the flavor combinations tend toward the unexpected. A James Beard Outstanding Bar semifinalist, and a first-date spot that actually earns the designation.

Reclaimed wood and polished concrete set the tone at this eco-minded luxury resort on Collins Avenue, where the design borrows from surf culture and the building materials were sourced before the Instagram grid was even a concept. It occupies a full city block of beachfront with Atlantic views on one side and the Biscayne Bay skyline on the other, and carries a Michelin Key. The crowd arrives with reusable water bottles and very good luggage.

Rows of reclaimed leather belts line the wall behind the front desk, which sets the tone for this 171-room boutique hotel in the Domain Northside shopping district. Hill Country rusticity runs through the whole property: cowhide chairs, blue velvet armchairs by a fireplace, and a neon phrase borrowed from a Texas Tornados song. It holds a Forbes Four Star rating, and sits close enough to the Austin tech campuses to pull a reliably well-dressed business crowd.

Fifteen acres of Newport Beach waterfront, a Forbes Four Star resort where the concierge can send you off in a vintage Mustang, color of your choosing, with maps and a packed picnic basket. Summer concerts, outdoor films, and Fourth of July barbecues keep the calendar full. Drive the coast toward Laguna Beach, and if the timing cooperates, blue whales and dolphins are out there doing their thing too.

Fifteen minutes north of South Beach, which is just far enough to feel like a different city, this oceanfront luxury resort sits two rooms per floor along the Atlantic, so the building never feels like a scrum. The two-story lobby leans into the drama with jatoba columns, leather walls, and an Ed Moses canvas you can't miss. A Forbes Four Star property, closed for renovations through late 2026, so time your visit accordingly.

Fourteen rooms and suites dressed in retro European style, split between a busy French Quarter street and a quiet inner courtyard, with just enough eclectic detail to make you feel like you're staying somewhere rather than merely sleeping somewhere. The Celestine is a small hotel with a Michelin Key, and its social life pools around Peychaud's, the courtyard cocktail bar named for the local bitters, where guests gather as if on cue.

A Dallas hotel set inside an old cotton and oil magnate's estate, where the wood-paneled bar runs jazz three nights a week and afternoon tea happens in the library as if that's perfectly normal. Thomas Pheasant's redesign kept the French doors and crown molding and added the kind of modern comfort that makes you forget you're sleeping in a piece of Texas history. Miron Crosby cowboy boots in your room are a nice touch.

A 19th-century mansion on its own private peninsula in Newport, Castle Hill Inn sits where Narragansett Bay opens up and the light does something unreasonable at sunset. The 33 rooms spread across the main house and shingled cottages along the water. Breakfast, afternoon tea, a lighthouse trail, and sunset sails are all part of it. Forbes Four Star and a Michelin two-key property.

Mediterranean-style resort spread across a hillside outside San Diego, with a Tom Fazio golf course, a spa, six restaurants, and four pools wired with underwater speakers for reasons you will either love or find deeply alarming. Guest rooms lean into the fantasy, with marble soaking tubs, fireplaces, and balconies big enough to mean it. A Forbes Four Star property that covers every angle, including an Explorer's Club for kids so the adults can actually use the cabanas.

The Heathman has been anchoring Portland's performing arts district long enough that the neighborhood grew up around it. It's a boutique hotel in the truest sense, with rooms that feel considered rather than corporate, and the kind of downtown location that puts you within walking distance of theaters, museums, and serious dinners. The renovation leaned hard into sustainability, which fits Portland's self-image perfectly. Headwaters downstairs handles Pacific Northwest seafood when you don't want to go far.

The atrium lobby sits inside what was once Portland's grandest department store, glazed terra cotta still gleaming nine floors up. The Nines is a luxury hotel that leans into that past without turning itself into a museum, placing commissioned work from local artists alongside the occasional artfully staged mannequin. In a city where a flannel shirt passes for formal wear, the place offers a quiet, unapologetic dose of glamour.

Ski-in/ski-out access to Big Sky Resort, three fly-fishing rivers nearby, and a Tom Weiskopf golf course next door keep the itinerary full at this Forbes Five Star, Michelin Key mountain resort. When you come in from the cold, the walls of windows, deep leather chairs, and roaring fires make sure you know you're still in Montana, just a warmer version of it. The spa runs to 11,000 square feet, in case the slopes weren't enough.

Kelly Wearstler folded a 1920s Spanish Colonial building into a new construction on Wilshire, which is a neat trick and exactly the kind of thing you notice when you check in. The boutique hotel sits a few blocks from the beach, rooms running bright whites and sand-colored fabrics with vintage furniture doing its best to look casual about it. The rooftop bistro draws nightly crowds and Surya Spa has a following. Michelin awarded it one Key.

The digital windows scroll through passing landscapes while you sit inside a wood-paneled Presidential Pullman car that never moves, which is either the concept or the joke, possibly both. Platform 18 is a reservation-only immersive cocktail bar built around Prohibition-era drinks and Roaring Twenties New York. The Pinnacle Guide awarded it 2 Pins. Book ahead; walk-ins go nowhere fast.

The cabin is dressed in burnt orange and warm walnut, the windows show a looping blue-yonder reel, and a flight attendant is rolling the beverage cart your way. Carry On is an immersive cocktail lounge built around the first-class, Mad Men-era flight fantasy, preflight announcements and all. Reservations drop weekly and go fast, so plan accordingly. The Spirited Awards named it a Top 10 U.S. Nominee for Best New Cocktail Bar.

The ceiling is covered in thousands of clay churchwarden pipes, each one claimed by a regular who never came back to collect it. Keens is an old-school Manhattan steakhouse in Midtown, all dark wood and white tablecloths, and the mutton chop alone has landed on the New York Times list of the city's defining dishes. The porterhouse is USDA Prime, dry-aged in-house, and broiled without apology. It sits at number 68 on the World's Best Steak Restaurants list.

The bar faces San Francisco Bay, with Alcatraz and the Golden Gate framed in the windows, which does a lot of the work before you even sit down. The Buena Vista is an old-school saloon that claims credit for introducing Irish coffee to America, and the bar staff still make them in assembly-line batches. Come at 9am or midnight; the order is the same either way. It won the Spirited Awards' Timeless U.S. Award in 2024, which is about right.

A tiki bar so small it was once a violin-repair shop, which tells you everything about the square footage and nothing about the ambition. Three generations of the same family have been pouring Mai Tais under the thatched canopy on Sunset since the sixties, and they do not serve beer or wine, so don't ask. Modern tiki bars tend to look like this place photoshopped. The original is still doing it straight.

The whole room is built to look like the cargo hold of a 19th-century ship, portholes and all, which sets the stakes early at this immersive tiki bar on Indian School. The cocktail menu runs from classics to the team's own riffs on the genre, leaning into the full theatrical bit without apologizing for it. Phoenix New Times named it the city's top tiki bar, and the Spirited Awards put the bar team among the top four in the U.S.

Floor-to-ceiling windows look straight across the East River at the Lower Manhattan skyline, a view few New York hotels can match. This eco-minded luxury hotel sits at the edge of Brooklyn Bridge Park, where salvaged materials and low-impact design feel less like a brand statement and more like a natural fit for a waterfront that was industrial wasteland not so long ago. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Key.

Each of the twelve rooms in this Midtown Village boutique hotel is named for a woman who passed through when the building housed the New Century Guild, an early feminist organization. The rooms themselves are eclectic and photogenic without feeling like a theme park, and the service is full hotel, not glorified B&B. No restaurant on-site, but the concierge earns their keep pointing you toward the neighborhood. The Michelin Guide awarded it one Key.

Jewel-toned marble tiles in the bathrooms set the tone for this boutique hotel on Carondelet: unapologetically luxe but somehow never stuffy. The rooms feel like sleeping in the home of a wealthy friend with excellent taste and a light touch, the kind of place that holds a Michelin Key without making you feel like you need to dress for it. New Orleans has no shortage of grand hotels; this one just makes grand feel easy.