Senior Contributor
Updated Jan 8, 2024
From Hawaii to Rome, some of the world's great hotels just got even better, like the Ritz-Carlton ... [+]
Ritz-Carlton Maui
One silver lining of the COVID pandemic for the travel industry was that it gave many hotels the opportunity to take a break, rethink things, and take on renovation projects that might have otherwise been impossible when open and doing business as usual. As a result, a rash of “better than ever” re-openings have occurred the past two years, and in 2023 I was fortunate enough to visit several top tier Forbes 4 and 5-Star hotels and resorts that had finished or were wrapping up massive upgrades or expansions. I’m not talking about new carpets or un updated spa, I’m talking 8 and 9-figure reimaginings.
Few renovation projects this big occur in the hotel industry, and if you Google “biggest hotel renovations,” you will find almost nothing, and instead get list after list of top new hotels. There’s something exciting about noteworthy new properties for sure, but to me there’s something even better about places you know are already great that move up a notch to even greater. In the past year and half, I’ve been to a lot of exceptional hotels and resorts, old and new, but these four stand out for being both old, new and truly better than ever. Not all were directly tied to the pandemic break, but all are massively improved—from an already very high bar.
Ritz-Carlton Kapalua, Maui, HI
The view from the firepit in the completely redone lobby out to the all-new stunning free form pool ... [+]
©JASON DEWEY 2021
This was my first great trip of 2023 and fittingly, it was one of the biggest upgrades in the hotel industry worldwide. When a hotel does a $1 million renovation, they send out press releases, and when they do a $10 million renovation, they get covered by the travel magazines. To put things in perspective ,the farsighted owners of the Ritz-Carlton Kapalua used the pandemic shutdown to kick off a $100 million project—on what was already a Forbes 4-Star hotel with a 4-Star spa.
Inspired by the travel industry changes brough on by COVID, the hotel invested in the future, aimed at the traveler of tomorrow, which is now today. People wanted more outdoor living, more privacy, and more luxury, so they added an all-new room category, the Fire Lanai Collection. These took ground level rooms and suites, removed the balconies (every room at the resort has a private patio or balcony) and added large private outdoor garden-style living areas with shaded trellis, hammock, seating and a push-button gas fire pit. The new outdoor spaces more than doubled the overall square footage, and you can walk out with a drink to your firepit and watch the sun go down or whales frolicking offshore. They were so immediately popular that the hotel went ahead and built a second phase of them just months after reopening.
What else? The enormous pool complex was completely rebuilt, with three large free form pools, (one adult-only), now all zero-entry with new luxury cabanas, and several new or expanded food and beverage outlets, with a focus on outdoor service and dining. The 54-acre property (just the Ritz, not including the vast Kapalua development and its golf courses, including arguably the best one in Hawaii, the famous Plantation) now offers cornhole, bocce, pickleball and tennis, multiple outdoor luau areas, and one major addition was a large open-air covered venue that regularly hosts concerts, and about once per month, the resort brings in a notable headliner. The resort is one of only six Ritz-Carlton hotels in the world hosting Jean-Michel Cousteau’s Ambassadors of the Environment program, with eco-tours and programming for all ages.
The very large fitness center has spectacular ocean views, and everything is brand new, from a fleet of popular Peloton bikes to the Tonal strength training system. The Ritz-Carlton Spa Maui features treatment rooms framed by private garden showers, volcanic stone grottos, steam, sauna and whirlpool therapies. Every guest room was redone and got new oversized TVs, Nespresso machines, Italian bath amenities, and five-fixture setup with separate tub, walk-in shower and dual vanities. Many have automated Japanese toilets and all feature tons of power and USB outlets, while the entire resort was upgraded to very fast internet suited to the suddenly popular remote work “vacations.”
The final major upgrade was the addition of a new Club Lounge, something common in Asia but still too rare among luxury hotels in this country. Ritz-Carlton, which has great lounges across the Pacific Rim, has done the best domestic job of any major brand, but this is a new flagship,
offering everything from extensive cooked to order breakfasts to fresh baked cookies to high quality wines (Decoy, Justin, real French champagnes) and spirts like hard-to-find Japanese whisky Yamazaki, all of it complimentary. Other beverage options include fresh pressed juices and signature tropical cocktails. The Club features a large outdoor patio with waiter service overlooking the 15th hole of the Bay golf course, and has a smaller ante room satellite with 24-hour coffee, soft drinks and snacks for late night or early morning needs.
Nemacolin, Farmington, PA
The Grand Lodge, one of three hotels at the Nemacolin resort, was just completely gutted and redone ... [+]
Nemacolin
Nemacolin may be the best luxury property in the country that many people have never heard of, a grand resort spanning well over 2,000-acres with multiple lodging options and extremely extensive sporting facilities. The dream project of Joseph Hardy III, the billionaire founder of the 84 Lumber chain, Nemacolin is now firmly run by his family, who put pride of ownership and excellence ahead of everything else.
Just to give you an idea, before they decided to upgrade, Nemacolin contained a Forbes 5-Star hotel, Falling Rock, a 5-Star restaurant, Lautrec, a 4-Star hotel, the Chateau, a 4-Star restaurant, Aqueous, and a 4-Star Spa. Only a handful of top resorts such as Wynn Las Vegas and Georgia’s Sea Island can claim these kinds of multiple winners. Nonetheless, the family decided it was time to upgrade—to the tune of over $200 million dollars—more than most new luxury resorts cost to build from scratch.
The Peak, a year-round pool and entertainment complex, was built from scratch during the pandemic as ... [+]
Nemacolin
The first big change guests will notice was The Peak, an entirely new entertainment venue added during the pandemic that combines a mini-water park style year-round outdoor pool complex with indoor fun including bowling alleys and axe throwing, plus food and beverage, all overlooking one of the resort’s ski chairlifts, open for fun summer and winter.
A big change guests won’t notice is Wisteria, an entire residential neighborhood hidden on the vast property that is just for employees, with its own housing, supermarket, rec center and restaurant. While visitors cannot use it, Nemacolin is known for longtime staff retention and customer service excellence, and investments like these keep that going strong, which translates into a better guest experience.
More recent was a total redo of the Grand Lodge, Nemacolin’s third hotel. It was completely gutted and whittled down from 97 rooms to 56, all of them suites—and all with butler service, already a standard at the 42-room 5-Star Falling Rock, so named because its architecture is inspired by Frank Lloyd Wright’s nearby architectural masterpiece Falling Water.
The Grand Lodge reopend as an all-suite luxury property, with all new accommodations like this one. ... [+]
Nemacolin
The new suites boast huge balconies, wet bars and unusually large and ornate bathrooms with gigantic walk-in showers, Japanese toilets, endless imported marble, and pretty much everything they could think to buy. The resort’s signature fine dining restaurant, Lautrec, closed for months for a total refresh, the Lodge got a large new farm to table restaurant, Fawn & Fable, which showcases the resort’s Wine Spectator award winning cellar, the largest commercial collection in Pennsylvania, as well as a new grand bar, new grand lobby, and pretty much new everything. The owners are not shy about their ambitions to add another 5-Star rating to the resort with the rebuilt Grand Lodge, which now houses a big chunk of their $50 million art collection that is on display around the resort.
Also new is a state-of-the-art golf academy, a standalone facility equipped with the best teaching technology money can buy, including bays featuring Trackman, Swing Catalyst and Dual Force Plates, plus an entire outdoor Trackman equipped driving range and dedicated short game area.
The Grand Ldoge got new rooms, a new lobby, a new large restaurant, and this showpiece new bar.
Nemacolin
This is on top of vast existing recreational offerings that include two Pete Dye designed 18-hole golf courses that have hosted the PGA Tour, a world-class clay shooting, sporting clays and fly-fishing facility, downhill ski resort, ropes course, Ninja gym, off-roading, horseback riding, dog sledding, art classes, and a separate Holistic Healing Center in addition to the 4-Star mega-spa and fitness center. Ther’s even a rescue animal sanctuary onsite with outdoor enclosures spread out so you can walk around it, featuring everything from lions to tigers to rare buffalo. There are not many resorts where early morning joggers might hear lion howls.
Next up is a total renovation of the Forbes 4-Star Chateau, reopening this summer, and based on the ... [+]
Nemacolin
An essentially new luxury hotel, golf academy, entertainment center, employee village, and multiple new bars and restaurants would be a lot anywhere. But as soon as the Grand Lodge reopened last year, they shuttered the Forbes 4-Star Chateau next door, which was built as an homage to the Ritz Hotel in Paris, and began a similarly thorough renovation that will redo every guest room. The better-than-before Chateau will debut for summer 2024, and you can be almost sure that more additions and improvements will follow.
Twin Farms, Barnard, VT
One of the eight new Treehouses at Vermont's Twin Famrs, a legendary Forbes 5-Star resort.
claude-simon langlois
There are Forbes 5-Stars resorts and then there is Twin Farms, which in 2020 also won Forbes Travel Guide’s “Hotel of the Year” for having the highest score of any of the 107 5-Stars in the world—98.24% out of a possible 100, according to Boston Magazine. In 2022 Conde Nast Traveler put it in the Top 50 Hotels worldwide, and the once hyper-influential and ultra-critical Andrew Harper’s Hideaway Report named it the Number One hotel in the country. It goes on and on for this longtime Forbes 5-Star winner and Relais & Chateau standout: Town + Country “World’s Best Adults-Only Resorts”; Travel + Leisure “The Most Romantic Couples Resorts in the World”; Brides “Best Honeymoon Resorts in the US and Canada”; and at Food + Wine’s 2023 Global Tastemaker Awards, Number One in the US for both Best Hotel For Food and Best Hotel Bar.
With just (until last month) 10 luxury art-filled and individually themed cottages, four Farmhouse suites, a 2-bedroom Lodge and four lavish rooms in the main building, Twin Farms is one of the smallest resorts in the world to win so many awards and accolades. This 16-years old and over only property occupies a bucolic 300-acre farm once owned by Sinclair Lewis, the first American to ever win the Nobel Prize for literature, and his famous spouse, journalist Dorothy Thomson. It is known as an “adult summer camp,” with a laid-back vibe and make your own fun aesthetic, enabled by recreational offerings unlike any other place, especially for such a small number of guests.
Twin Farms has just 28 accommodations — and its own private downhill and cross coutry ski areas.
Twin Farms
For example, Twin Farms has downhill ski slopes, but instead of lifts, they have chauffeured snowmobiles to whisk guests to the top between runs, and full alpine and Nordic equipment rentals, expect these are included, not rented. Because alpine touring, aka skinning or uphill skiing, has recently become popular, the resort just purchased a full fleet of high-end Italian gear specifically for this sport, even though only a tiny handful of guests will ever use it. There’s fly fishing, canoeing, biking, a freestanding furo for Japanese hot bathing, spa, gym, tennis, pickle ball and much more. They have their own extensive cross-country ski, hiking and mountain biking trails system, guides on demand, and will meet guests pursuing outdoor recreation anywhere on the property with gourmet picnics and champagne, all of it included in room rates. In fact, picnics are so big here that they have a special map of places to have them, guests often enjoy them in their accommodations, and they are the only luxury hotel I know of that has a “Picnic” tab on their main webiste menu.
The 5-Star Twin Farms has won just about every award a hotel can win, but is especially famous for ... [+]
Wayne Earl Chinnock
It is probably the most luxurious all-inclusive resort in the country, especially famous for its amazing cuisine. Food is where even the best all-inclusives tend to fall flat, but at Twin Farms the food is better than the fine dining at many “regular” luxury hotels that charge an arm and a leg extra. There are no buffets, every reservation warrants an advance questionnaire about food likes and dislikes, and every meal is staffed with a sommelier offering multiple choices of included and carefully pre-selected pairings. You can also have any (or every meal) as room service and anything you wish for is granted—hot cookies and a bottle of wine at 2AM, delivered? Yes, and included.
Until very recently, all of these activities and pampering has been for just 20 possible accommodations. This is why the addition last month of eight new Treehouses is such a big deal here, a 40% increase in available units at a property that is often sold out. Ther are four clusters of two treehouses next to each other, but in each pair they are offset and angled for privacy. All lay along a new loop road that was built for them in previously wooded acreage, and from May to October, each comes with a golf cart and cars are not allowed (except house car pickup and return on demand), to preserve the wilderness feel. All are cantilevered into hillsides so entering is across a flat walkway, requiring no climb or decent, while the far sides of the units, with expansive decks and floor to ceiling windows looking into the forest are elevated as high as 20-feet off the ground. Each unit is about 800 square feet with a stunning bathroom.
The new Treehouses are designed for "nesting" in a wilderness setting.
claude-simon langlois
These are not treehouses in the sense of being on limbs built up in a tree, but rather because they are in the trees, with amazing downward and outward views of nature. Every element inside has been designed to embrace the view, and they are more contemporary than the rest of the options here, based on the design of Aviary, the most modern of the existing cottages. There is lot of reclaimed wood, huge floor to ceiling glass windows that slide open to create a three walled environment, large decks that are curvilinear so you when seated inside you feel close to the forest, but outside there is still plenty of sitting room. The entire concept was built around “nesting,” and while everything at Twin Farms is cozy and private, these are expected to garner a higher rate of room service orders. Like all the other lodging at the resort, they are full of the best of the best of Vermont artisans: Simon Pearce glass, Andrew Pearce wood crafts, Miranda Thomas pottery, Charles Shackleton custom furniture and so on. In addition to museum quality art found all throughout the property, the Treehouses add framed Audubon prints, since each is named for a native Vermont bird.
I have been lucky enough to have visited Twin Farms several times, as it is close to my home, and this is the first lodging or dining addition on property since the first time I went two decades ago—a big deal. I just returned to check out the new units, and they are “treehouses,” in the same way people in Nantucket call their luxury homes “cottages” or robber barons used “camps” to describe their Adirondack estates.
One of the hallmarks of Twin Farms is a sense of intimacy and escape from crowds, and it is designed to spread the few people here out. Between room service, picnics, outdoor summer dining venues and the former standalone pub, it has always been a moveable feast at mealtimes, but even if every guest decided to eat in the main dining room on any given night, there are still empty tables, and you always have your own space. To preserve this with the extra guests the Treehouses will bring—at most 16 of them—the first phase of the recent expansion was to convert the former pub into a second full-service restaurant, Twiggs.
The bar at the new Twiggs restaurant at Twin Farms.
claude-simon langlois
Twiggs opened well in advance and in anticipation of the new lodging, but it’s a seismic change for a property long focused on gastronomic excellence, essentially doubling the number of options in the dining decision guests must make each night. It is more casual than the main dining room, which skews multiple courses, and set up so you could grab something as simple as a cheeseburger (of course, made from grass-fed, drug free beef from a local Vermont farm described on the menu and topped with award-winning Vermont cheeses), or a full 3-4 course dinner. It has a new elaborate kitchen that is also used to teach complimentary cooking classes offered regularly for guests, and the centerpiece is a huge wood fired Argentinean style grill. Twiggs has a full bar in front and a tavern feel, and the food was amazing, making deciding where to have dinner about the heaviest lifting you will ever do have to do if you stay at this fabulous property. The round of current improvements to what was already one of the most astounding resorts in the country is not over yet, but the next phases are top secret.
Anantara Palazzo Naiadi Rome Hotel, Italy
It's hard to go wrong when you combine two 19th century Roman palaces on one of the city's most ... [+]
Anantara Hotels & Resorts
Always a popular vacation spot, the Eternal City is hotter than ever, and the Telegraph just named it one of the 20 Destinations Worldwide to Visit on 2024—the only spot in Italy to make the list. They cite multiple luxury hotel opens, new restaurants, gardens and pedestrianized areas as reasons, but I’d add food, as Rome has both its own cuisine and a best of the best selection of Italian regional specialties.
My latest great Roman hotel experience was a hybrid new and majorly renovated hotel. Formerly the Naiadi Palace, this luxury property was part of Boscolo Hotels, a family run company that had several 5-star properties in Italy, but was then sold and its hotels split up. This gem was snapped up by Minor Hotel Group, a major luxury hospitality player based in Thailand that is quicky expanding its brands worldwide. These include the Elewana Collection, one of the best operators of luxury African safari lodges, Europe-based NH Hotels, which already also has several luxury hotels in Italy, including Rome, and Avani Hotels, with dozens of luxury hotels and resorts across the Pacific Rim, as well as the Middle East, Mexico, Australasia, Africa and now Europe as well.
It's hard to believe, but this lobby bar did not exist before the recent renovation.
Anantara Hotels & Resorts
But this grand property was reserved for Minor’s flagship luxury brand, Anantara, and was the first in Italy (quickly followed last year by a resort on the Amalfi Coast). In Europe Anantara has followed a strategy of acquiring iconic old hotels and historic buildings and transforming them, each with a sense of history and place you cannot build from scratch today. The Anantara Palazzo Naiadi Rome Hotel is a perfect example, originally two porticoed, semi-circular, private palaces ringing one side of the Piazza della Repubblica, built in 1887 by famed Italian architect Gaetano Koch (who did the headquarters of Banca d’Italia and the American Embassy). The palaces were combined about two decades back and while the outside is seamless, with a striking curved façade, inside you can still see the connection, as great pains have been taken to preserve and showcase traditional architecture, including ancient, exposed timbers. The Anantara Rome opened perhaps too quickly, and did not have all its elements in place until last year, but now that the ongoing renovation and expansion is finally complete, it is a top choice in Italy’s capital.
The hotel sits on the site of the Diocletian Thermal Baths, the most luxurious in a city whose ancient Roman inhabitants were crazy for thermal baths, and this is where the rich and powerful came to take in the waters. The building is suspended over the ancient ruins, and new glass panels in the floor let you gaze down on historically excavated foundations, pools and mosaics while wandering the property. Asia-based Anantara is famous for the quality and scope of its spas, so the signature treatments here are inspired by Roman history, including olive oil, local honey, sea salt and mud, while the spa suites are stunning modern treatment rooms built of local stone. There’s even a “gladiator facial” for men, along with ayurvedic treatments from Anantara’s Asian roots.
INEO in the Anantara is Rome's newest fine dining spot, small and intimate with just 28 seats.
giovanna di lisciandro
The original hotel, built from luxury palaces, had plenty of marble and fine woodwork everywhere, and the renovation expanded on this, even sourcing marble for the same Italian quarries. Almost every hotel on earth this grand has a showpiece lobby bar, but this was notably lacking, so they added an imposing new “classic” round cocktail bar beneath a giant chandelier in a domed space, a massive redo of the first floor that looks like it has been there since palace days.
Besides the lobby bar and spa, additions include two new restaurants. INEO (from the Latin for “new beginning”), is a new celebration-worthy fine dining gourmet restaurant with just 28 seats. It’s gorgeous, elegant and helmed by Executive Chef Heros de Agostinis, who was born just a few hundred meters from the kitchen, though he has cooked around the world, with 25-plus years in Michelin starred restaurants and the most famous possible mentors, multi-starred Heinz Beck, and history’s most renowned culinary superstar, Joel Robuchon. On top of the hotel now sits one of the largest rooftop bars in Rome, year-round with indoor and outdoor spaces. Anantara brought in influential Portuguese celebrity chef Chef Olivier da Costa to open SEEN by Olivier, a fusion restaurant melding foods of Italy, Brazil and Japan, with stunning city views in every direction. The attached SEEN by Olivier Bar serves cocktails, sushi, and DJ supplied music. There’s also a rooftop swimming pool.
The new rooftop is one of the largest in Rome, with a restaurant, seperate bar/nightclub and ... [+]
Anantara Hotels & Resorts
While included breakfast is the norm in Europe, and luxury hotels tend to have extensive buffets, this one is exceptional even by Italian luxury standards, among my all-time favorites, set in a dedicated second floor space only for breakfast, and only for overnight guests, dramatically overlooking the Piazza della Repubblica and its famous centerpiece artwork, the Fountain of the Naiads. The elegant buffet adds an extensive menu of optional cooked to order dishes, with very high-quality products and rotating daily local Roman specialties.
The renovated guest rooms are quite large for a city hotel, and there is an eclectic mix, including rare two-level loft duplexes, well suited for families. The executive and twin Presidential suites have some of the most over-the-top hotel bathrooms anywhere, with extras such as an oversized whirlpool bath with waterfall, huge walk-in shower and separate full hammam, or Turkish steam bath. Better rooms have actual balconies and terraces you can go out on for cocktails or room service, taking advantage of the great views over the Piazza, and again, unusual for urban hotels.
While it is not part of the renovation, a final unique aspect of his property is its location, on the edge of the city center, close enough to the top touristic sites to walk, but just outside the worst of the city’s infamously bad traffic, and the streets outside are not clogged non-stops with loud selfie-snapping tourists, common around many luxury hotels here. It’s a very easy walk (I did it even with luggage) from Rome’s main train station, Termini, not just a transit hub but now a destination in its own right, with the fabulous Mercato Centrale, one of the best of the new generation multi-vendor food halls, showcasing the best of Roman cuisine. There is a metro station beneath Piazza della Repubblica, literally seconds from the front door, the A-line, which runs straight to the famous Piazza di Spagna and the Spanish Steps, the heart of Rome’s ancient historic area, just two stops away (also an easy walk), and is the best way to get to the Vatican, just six stops.
Original article from Forbes.com can be found here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/larryolmsted/2024/01/08/better-than-ever-renovations-most-improved-luxury-hotels-for-2024/
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