When Summer Travel Means a Hotel of One’s Own

© Photo: Stefano Scatà / Courtesy of Pellicano Hotels La Posta Vecchia Hotel in Ladispoli, Italy.

By Laura Itzkowitz, Architectural Digest

Since the coronavirus pandemic hit, we’ve seen hotels react in many ways—donating rooms to frontline medical workers, feeding their communities, and taking people stuck at home on virtual trips—but now that many U.S. states and a number of countries are emerging from lockdowns, they have to adapt to a whole new set of challenges. According to a survey by The Points Guy, about a third of Americans report feeling comfortable with the idea of traveling this summer, with 47% of those surveyed considering an in-state road trip. But as people take to the roads again, most are exercising caution, prioritizing cleanliness standards, and social distancing when it comes to choosing where and how to travel. For the upper echelon of wealthy travelers, that may just mean taking over a whole hotel.

“Before Airbnbs and bucket lists, generations of families would come to Blantyre to spend time together,” Linda S. Law, steward of Blantyre in the Berkshires, a Gilded Age estate turned boutique hotel, tells AD. “They would generally visit for a month, the entire summer, in the fall for leaf-peeping, or in the winter for ski holidays. After all of these years, this type of guest is returning.”

© Photo: Panagiotis Fotiadis / Courtesy of Blantyre Blantyre in the Berkshires of Massachusetts.

Law is among a handful of hotel owners who have decided to forgo selling individual rooms this summer. Instead, she has made the 110-acre property available exclusively for buyouts and special events. She’s working with Sotheby’s to market Blantyre—a member of Relais & Châteaux—as a luxury vacation rental with rates of $50,000 per month for either the Manor House or the Carriage House, which have eight and 11 rooms, respectively, or $90,000 for the entire 19-room property. Amenities include a pool, two tennis courts, shuffleboard courts, a badminton court, croquet, private golf courses, hiking trails, a fitness center, a sauna and steam room, bicycles, and a helipad. For an extra fee, guests can have a private chef, housekeeping, grocery service, fully stocked bar, spa treatments, transportation, private tours of nearby attractions such as the Mount and Mass MoCA, a jazz band, and more. Guests who book a takeover get full run of the property, just as its original owners intended.

Like Blantyre, La Posta Vecchia is another historic estate turned hotel that’s returning to its roots as a private residence on the sea near Rome. Built on the ruins of a second-century B.C. Roman villa and later owned by John Paul Getty, the 15-room hotel is now a member of Leading Hotels of the World run by Pellicano Hotels, which also operates Hotel Il Pellicano in Porto Ercole on the Tuscan coast and the recently renovated Mezzatorre in Ischia.

© Photo: Courtesy of Pellicano Hotels The indoor seaside pool at La Posta Vecchia.

“The house was decorated by Federico Zeri, who was Getty’s art adviser, and so it’s one of the biggest private collections of Renaissance furniture. And the house is exactly as Getty had left it,” Marie-Louise Sciò, CEO and creative director of Pellicano Hotels Group, tells AD. Guests prepared to spend $50,000 per week to take over the hotel will get a taste of the dolce vita as Getty lived it, sunbathing and swimming in the sea, exploring the castle next door, and going on day trips to Rome. Guests can bring their own chef or use the hotel’s chef, who prepares deliciously simple Italian cuisine using vegetables and herbs from the on-site garden. “It’s a very small hotel but a very large house, so you have all the distancing you want,” Sciò says.

© Photo: Courtesy of Dunton River Camp Colorado’s picturesque Dunton River Camp.

Another property tailor-made for social distancing is Dunton River Camp, the safari-style glamping destination by the owners of Dunton Hot Springs in an old mining town in Colorado. Located on a former cattle ranch near a river, the camp comprises eight luxuriously appointed tents and is completely self-sufficient. Guests can go hiking, horseback riding, mountain biking, fly fishing, indulge in massages in the spa tent, and enjoy gourmet meals. “The kind of person that we’re a perfect fit for is those who love nature, love the outdoors, like to go out and get dirty and hike and fish, and really like that unobtrusive style of service but still enjoy a great meal and a perfectly made cocktail and clean rooms,” says Edoardo Rossi, executive vice president of Dunton Destinations. Rossi and his team decided to make the river camp available exclusively for buyouts based on guest demand. So far, he has a two-week booking in July and a couple of other buyouts for four or five nights—all by American families traveling from outside of Colorado.

© Photo: Courtesy of South Harbor Inn The South Harbor Inn on Long Island’s North Fork.

In contrast, the South Harbor Inn on the North Fork of New York’s Long Island, is mostly catering to New York City residents. Opened last year by Alex Azcona and Dan DeVito in a renovated 1897 farmhouse, the four-room hotel is the perfect size for a family or four couples who want to escape summer in the city. “We have been second-home owners in the North Fork for years, and while it has always been a popular area for vacation home rentals, this year the demand is higher than ever before,” Azcona says. “We are hearing from our friends in the real estate agent community that there simply isn’t enough supply out there, and it is in our best interest as well as our guests’ to change our accommodation model to accommodate long term rentals.” With nightly rates ranging from $429 to $499 per room in the summer, the $45,000–$50,000 monthly rate for all four rooms offers a bit of a discount versus paying per night.

Blantyre, La Posta Vecchia, Dunton River Camp, and the South Harbor Inn all plan to return to a normal business model between the end of this summer and spring 2021. For now, though, the buyout model offers hoteliers and the lucky guests who can afford a takeover more control over their environment—a key factor in regaining consumer confidence in the post-coronavirus world.