Hotel Indigo Durham

The city of Durham is known perhaps above all for its picturesque historical attractions: the university, the castle, and the spectacular Norman-era Romanesque cathedral. In this environment, a rakishly modernist luxury boutique hotel might be accused of a certain insensitivity to its surroundings. Fortunately the Hotel Indigo Durham, though a luxury boutique hotel it is, commits no such faux pas: it’s set not in a decommissioned red-brick Victorian-era university building that goes by the impossibly charming name of Old Shire Hall.

The rooms and suites are unmistakably modern in their design sense, but are full of historical references, whether in the décor, the artwork, the textiles, or even the architecture — some of them preserve the quirks of the hall’s original floor plan. And something like a freestanding copper bathtub can be historical and contemporary at the same time, especially when it’s displayed against the backdrop of a vast modern bathroom.

Tempting enough, but it’s the restaurant that might just seal the deal. Hotel Indigo Durham features not just an ordinary hotel restaurant, but the Marco Pierre White Steahouse & Bar, serving upscale English and French fare in a stunning dining room under the rotunda of the old Durham Council senate chamber.