The 43 Best Places to Stay and Do in Dallas

A Forbes Five Star hotel in Uptown, The Ritz-Carlton Dallas opens with a marble-and-chandelier lobby that earns every cliché and then tries to top it with a House of Krigler perfumery tucked into the corner. Guest rooms run gray and sleek with enough technology to distract from the views. Dean Fearing's Southwestern restaurant anchors the dining, a 12,000-square-foot spa handles the recovery, and a poolside situation fills the middle hours.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

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.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key
2. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended

A former cattle ranch turned low-rise resort, with TPC Las Colinas fairways visible from most balconies, sits just minutes from DFW and somehow feels nothing like an airport hotel. The Ritz-Carlton Las Colinas spreads across 400 acres, trading the urban tower format for genuine breathing room between buildings. Three pools, a large spa, tennis and pickleball courts, and five dining options give guests enough to do that leaving feels optional.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
2. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Three rooms above a restaurant and café on Lower Greenville, Casa Duro is less a hotel than a very good friend's Italian apartment, assuming your friend is obsessed with Italian culture and happens to own the building. The Duro Hospitality Group runs it the same way they run the two spots downstairs: with a specificity of taste that makes the whole thing feel more like a considered stay than a booking. It holds a Michelin Key.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

The name is a portmanteau of Swiss and Texan, which tells you almost everything about the mood here. This Harwood District hotel plays continental service standards against big-hat Texan swagger, and the combination reads less like a theme than a personality. Spacious rooms with commanding views, decor with a freewheeling sense of humor, and a rooftop worth returning to every night. The Michelin Guide awarded it one Key.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

Cowhide armchairs in the lobby set the tone: this is a luxury hotel that committed to being Texan rather than just landing in Texas. Part of the Auberge Collection, Bowie House brings the brand's polished design sensibility to Fort Worth's Camp Bowie corridor, pairing it with local artwork and upscale Texan cooking. Rooms, suites, and the pool terrace all lean spectacular. The Michelin Guide awarded it 2 Keys.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Keys

The cantilevered rooftop pool jutting out over Main Street like an afterthought someone forgot to pull back is the image that stays with you. The Joule is a design hotel in a Gothic bank building from the 1920s, and the tension between those two facts is kind of the whole point. It's the kind of lobby you wander through even when you're not staying there, which Dallas apparently does, given the 2025 Best Hotel Lobby nod from the Dallas Observer.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels
2. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Hotel Lobby · Best of Dallas

Local contemporary art covers nearly every surface at Canvas Hotel Dallas, a full-service hotel on Botham Jean Boulevard that positions itself as the antidote to the city's long run of forgettable corporate rooms. The collection rotates, the pieces are by Dallas-area artists, and the overall effect is less "lobby installation" and more "someone here has actual taste." A Michelin Selected Hotel.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The name is shorthand for Design District, in case you were wondering. This cocktail bar and late-night dancehall is dressed like your coolest grandmother's basement, all shag rugs, old couches, and polished brass knickknacks. Cocktails are taken seriously, and local DJs eventually take over, turning the lounge crowd into a dance floor. Dallas Observer named it the city's best nightclub in 2025.

1. D Magazine 2024 · Best After-Party · Best of Big D
2. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Nightclub · Best of Dallas
3. Dallas Observer The Ultimate Dallas Bar Guide

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Named for the men who drove cattle up the Chisholm Trail, Hotel Drover sits inside Fort Worth's historic Stockyards district, where the Western aesthetic is less costume party, more lived-in. The rooms lean rustic without tipping into bolo-tie excess, the backyard has a pool and hot tub, and the upscale 97 West restaurant is on-site when the mood calls for it. Michelin awarded it one Key.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

A Perkins + Will renovation turned a landmark Deep Ellum building into this Kimpton boutique hotel, and the bones of the original structure still show. Kimpton does a reliable version of stylish-but-approachable, which fits the neighborhood's mix of music venues and murals better than anything glass-and-tower would. A solid base for exploring a part of Dallas that most conventioneers never find.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The walnut-heavy Beaux Arts lobby sets the tone at this downtown Dallas hotel, where the fixtures are bold and the lighting is the kind that makes everyone look like they have a secret. Rooms run toward warm and plush, and the suites are reportedly among the largest in the city. The heated rooftop pool stays open until midnight, cocktails included, which is a civilized policy for which the Adolphus deserves more credit than it gets.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The hardwood dance floor in the center of the main room is the whole argument here. This sprawling gay bar on Cedar Springs has multiple bars, several rooms, and a two-story outdoor patio, all draped in western kitsch and framed cowboys doing cowboy things. Two-stepping lessons run weekly, alongside karaoke, trivia, and drag shows. The crowd skews as welcoming as the staff will tell you: everyone's invited to the boot-scootin'.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Karaoke Spot · Best of Dallas
2. D Magazine 2024 · Best Gay Bar · Best of Big D
3. Dallas Observer The Ultimate Dallas Bar Guide

A century-old Beaux Arts building in Uptown Dallas, the Stoneleigh is a hotel that its newer neighbors can't quite replicate no matter how hard they try. London designers Fettle refreshed the rooms by channeling Dorothy Draper, the original decorator, so the place reads classic rather than preserved-in-amber. An Italian supper club and a cocktail bar keep guests from wandering too far. The Michelin Guide has it among its selected hotels.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The cowhide upholstery and local artwork make clear that this is no generic chain drop-in: the Thompson Dallas is a city-center hotel that wears its Texas credentials alongside its Manhattan modernist bones. Rooms come with minibars stocked with Texas-made products, and a spacious spa sits on the ninth floor. The tower location means the views are part of the deal, and a modern Italian restaurant by a Michelin-starred chef handles dinner.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A former mid-century motel across from Southern Methodist University, Graduate by Hilton Dallas kept the bones and added a design-savvy refresh that fits more naturally in a coastal boutique than a Dallas zip code. The rooms are clean and modernist, the personality is intact, and the guests skew younger and lighter on luggage than the grand Texan hotel lobby down the road. The Michelin Guide lists it among its selected hotels.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The parking lot is gone, replaced by outdoor lounge space, which tells you everything about how Valencia Hotel Group rethought the classic mid-century courtyard motel. This boutique hotel in the Dallas suburb of Irving keeps the bones and swaps the rest for contemporary rooms with high-end details. Two Mules Cantina handles Tex-Mex, a beer garden runs live music on weekends, and the Salt Tequila Bar is exactly what it sounds like.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The refurbished 1961 palm tree roadside sign out front tells you everything about what this boutique hotel is trying to do: resurrect a classic Texas motor court without the questionable plumbing. Car-seat upholstery, burlwood headboards, and headlamp-shaped fixtures carry the automotive theme through all 143 rooms. A restaurant, a social club, and a rooftop bar mean you can stay in all night, and AT&T Stadium is minutes away when you can't.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Half skate park, half food rescue operation, 4DWN is the kind of place that makes you feel slightly lazy for only doing one thing with your afternoon. Professional skaters built the ramps, and the same organization diverts fresh produce from landfills and hands it out free each week, no processed food allowed. Show up to skate, to volunteer, or just to watch people who are considerably better on wheels than you will ever be.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Skate Park · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Date Night Activity · Best of Dallas

Thirty bar stations, live bull riding, and a floor big enough that two-steppers never have to negotiate for elbow room: Billy Bob's Texas is the kind of honky tonk that makes the word feel undersized. The building spent earlier lives as a cattle barn and an airplane factory before finding its calling as a live music and dancing venue. Willie Nelson's Fourth of July picnic has landed here. Wear boots; you'll feel underdressed without them.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place To Country Dance · Best of Dallas

A sprawling music shop on the Carpenter Freeway that stocks everything from orchestral French horns to electric guitars, Brook Mays/H&H Music is the kind of place where a parent buying a student's first rental flute ends up next to someone hunting a vintage find. The repair shop keeps it practical. If your kid is starting band this fall, this is probably where the school director pointed you.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place To Buy an Instrument · Best of Dallas

Central Market is a grocery store that programs its sound system the way a record collector programs a party, pulling obscure B-sides and local finds between the funk grooves and jazzy lo-fi. The mix shifts with in-store themes, so the playlist on a given Tuesday is not an accident. It won a Dallas Observer Best of Dallas nod for it, which says something about how low the bar is everywhere else.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Playlist at a Grocery Store · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Playlist at a Grocery Store · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Playlist at a Grocery Store · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Playlist at a Grocery Store · Best of Dallas

Dim lighting and espresso martinis set the mood at this Fitzhugh Avenue lounge, where the booths are deep enough to hide in but the vibe is too convivial for anyone to bother. Clifton Club lands somewhere between chic cocktail bar and neighborhood regular haunt, sophisticated without making you feel underdressed. The Dallas Observer named it the best place to meet your next ex, which is either a warning or an itinerary depending on your recent history.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place To Meet Your Next Ex · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best After-Hours Nightclub · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place for Latin Club Music · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place To Line Dance · Best of Dallas

A scruffy, beloved Deep Ellum music venue that's been around forever, Club Dada runs on a DIY ethos that still feels earned rather than curated. The room is small enough that a 15-minute set from an unknown local act can genuinely change someone's night. If you want to find the next interesting Dallas musician before everyone else does, this is where you start looking.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place to Catch a Rising Local Musician · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Cigar Lounge · Best of Dallas

A record store that decided to become a hardcore and heavy metal venue, and the local scene decided right back. The space is small, the sound is loud, and the crowd shows up ready to mosh. Bands like Tactosa and Implosive Disgorgence have played here alongside local acts, and the annual Sweat Fest TX does exactly what the name suggests. Gritty, consistent, and absolutely not for the noise-averse.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Place To See Hardcore Heavy Metal · Best of Dallas

Nature of Things is a nomadic gallery that doesn't stay anywhere long enough to get comfortable, which seems to be the whole point. The curator plants shows inside borrowed spaces around Dallas, from a small Oak Lawn house to the upstairs loft at the Texas Theatre, each one built around a specific idea or figure. The Texas blues show honoring Lightnin' Hopkins gives you a sense of the ambition. Free admission, no fixed address.

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Unconventional Art Space · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Music Store · Best of Dallas

1. Dallas Observer 2025 · Best Bar to Watch Women’s Sports · Best of Dallas