Palomar - A Kimpton Hotel

Hotel description

This is the sort of town that’s long on ultra-expensive luxury hotels, presidential suites, and restaurants of the sort that cater mainly to lobbyists on expense accounts. Few and far between are places that could reasonably be called “hip,” at least without unrecognizably stretching the meaning of the word. So an East Coast branch of the Hotel Palomar, a member of the San Francisco-based Kimpton boutique hotel group, is likely to turn a few heads.

The Palomar, in classic Kimpton style, is the kind of hotel that exists comfortably between two worlds: it’s plush enough that luxury-hotel patrons won’t find it uncomfortably bare, and it’s stylish enough that design-hotel devotees won’t find it uncomfortably unhip. Rooms are big and bold, with modern fixtures and first-class details (L’Occitane bath products, Frette linens, laptop-friendly safes).

It’s located just off Dupont Circle, which makes it terrifically convenient, and it’s got some features you wouldn’t necessarily expect, including in-room spa services and an outdoor pool, as well as a popular Mediterranean restaurant called Urbana. More luxurious by half than any of the big chain hotels in its price range, and with a youthful energy the more expensive five-stars can’t touch.