The Townsend Hotel

Much of the buzz about Detroit is focused on its inner-city renewal, but that’s far from the only story in town. There’s plenty worth knowing about in the outlying suburbs as well — and this includes the lovely town of Birmingham, Michigan, home of the Townsend Hotel. The building dates back only to the 1980s, but in hotels, as in so many other areas of life, it’s what’s inside that counts. In the case of the Townsend what’s inside is an absolutely classic luxury hotel, one that you’d swear had existed in its present form for half a century or more.

This means swanky guest rooms with marble bathrooms and all the high-end fixings, public spaces that are straight out of a prewar English country house, and an award-winning fine-dining restaurant, the Rugby Grille. It also means an afternoon tea service that wouldn’t look out of place in Downton Abbey, and a classic cocktail bar. Walking distance from downtown Detroit attractions you’re most certainly not — but you are close by to many of greater Detroit’s sporting, cultural and commercial attractions, which, needless to say, is even better.