Galery69

Some hotels, even some very fine ones, exist mostly for economic reasons — maybe New York’s luxury hotels were full to bursting, or Berlin’s boutique supply was running thin. But the best of them are often motivated by something else entirely. It would be a stretch to claim that northern Poland’s Lake Wulpińskie had a massive pent-up demand for a boutique hotel along the lines of Galery69. Not that we’re complaining — the more gorgeously designed, art-infused boutique hotels there are in the world, the better, as far as we’re concerned. Lake Wulpińskie is the setting Małgorzata and Wojciech Żółtowsky envisioned for their creation, and so if you want to see it, Lake Wulpińskie is where you’ll go.

This one, even more than most, is a labor of love, and Galery69 is as much a showroom for their modernist, locally sourced handiwork as it is a hotel. The proprietors themselves are furniture makers, and everything you see here (or sit on, or lie on) was made by their own hands. The twenty-one rooms are all different, all inventive, never the least bit dull; twelve of them look directly out over the lake via the panoramic terrace, which is a view worth having, if you can get it. And the Masuria region is itself quite full of character — the Żółtowskys are as proud of their surroundings as they are of their hotel, and they’re only too happy to show you the countryside at its best.

How to get there:
Galery69 is located 126 miles (about a 2.5-hour drive) from Warsaw.