A Surprising Hotel Brand Luxury Travelers Need To Know

Dukes Hotel in London is arguably the most famous place to have a martini in the entire world. It’s the very spot where James Bond creator Ian Fleming drank his while ruminating on famed character 007’s penchant for the drink. It’s where white-tuxedoed staff roll a cart filled with gins and vermouths (and organic lemons imported especially from Italy) right to your chair in the stately library style bar, and shake (or stir) your custom drink to order. They have been doing this for many years, before the “mixology” and craft cocktail crazes took over. But it’s not just drinks: the boutique hotel is great, classic Britannia luxury with a fabulous location in tony Mayfair/St. James, steps from the bespoke shopping of Jermyn Street, very close to Green Park and Buckingham Palace. Dukes Hotel is a top choice for business or leisure visitors to London, and it is a member of Small Luxury Hotels of the World. (NOTE: I was a paying guest at Dukes and did not accept any free rooms or travel or martinis from hotels when researching this article).

Last year I was doing a feature for Whisky Advocate Magazine on 10 great hotels around the world for whiskey lovers, and I found a charming spot in Dublin, the family-owned Brooks Hotel. With less than a hundred rooms and a marquee downtown location for exploring the heart of the city on foot, Brooks is a warm, intimate property, and home to the acclaimed Francesca’s restaurant, with its own elaborate private chef’s garden in County Wicklow supplying fresh ingredients. All rooms are decorated with handcrafted Irish wooden furniture, sumptuous fabrics and modern Irish artworks. Brooks’ award-winning Jasmine Bar is a whiskey fantasy, with over 70 Irish selections, including one of just 114 single cask bottles of Willie Napier 44-year old released, back in 1964. There are more than 100 other whiskies from the US, Scotland, Sweden, New Zealand, Japan, Australia, Holland, South Africa and even Sri Lanka. Francesca’s is locally famous for its homemade Irish brown bread, and all overnight stays include the deliciously gourmet take on the traditional full Irish breakfast. Brooks is the kind of hidden gem I love to discover as a traveler, and it too is a member of Small Luxury Hotels of the World.

These are just two similar experiences I have had in recent years that made me start to wonder what this association is all about. I went and got the answer to that question, and it turns out that Small Luxury Hotels of the World (SLH) is a great tool for today’s upscale traveler. Recent studies have shown that travelers are increasingly curious, focused more on unique experiences, and going further off the beaten path, and this demographic meshes well with the SLH aesthetic. At the same time, information overload has hit travelers hard, and instead of making planning easier, the internet has in many cases increased the amount of time it takes to do trip planning and research and left many wanders scratching their head in confusion. This is one of the same key reasons for the renaissance of the well-informed travel agent, which I have documented extensively in these pages at Forbes (read “Why You Need a Travel Agent” here).

Here’s’ the bottom line: Google “Luxury Boutique Hotels Rome” and you will get well over 12 million hits. Try visiting even a small fraction of those and it’s a year long project. But visit SLH.com and check the Eternal City and you’ll quickly find the one super chic answer you didn’t even know you were looking for: Fendi Private Suites, an over the top 7-room temple to style in the beating heart of the city center, with suites located over the iconic fashion brand’s flagship store in Palazzo Fendi, a former aristocratic mansion residence. With a hip restaurant, bar, rooftop terrace, Fendi furniture in every suite, personal shopping and signature “everything is possible service” this is one of the most unique luxury hotels in the world, but few travelers, even regular visitors to Rome, know about it. Now you do. But that is just one example of smaller being better. Another is SLH member Petit St. Vincent, the acclaimed private island resort that is perennially ranked as one the best of the best luxury spots in the entire Caribbean.