21c Museum Hotel, Cincinnati

It’s simple enough. The original 21c Museum Hotel put Louisville, Kentucky on the boutique-hotel map in a big way, and had a considerable positive influence on the city’s arts scene in the process. Now the second one aims to do the same thing for Cincinnati, Ohio, a town where one well-designed hotel is in a position to exert an outsize influence.

This is not a city without artists, or art collectors, or art museums, as evinced by the 21c’s neighbors, the Contemporary Arts Center and the Aronoff Center for the Arts. And as of now it’s got a hotel that can hold its own against any in America’s coastal capitals.

The rooms are luxe, low-key in their elegance, and while they miss the rough edges of Louisville’s brick walls — this was an old-fashioned downtown hotel in a former life, rather than an industrial space — they are impeccably composed, their soothing minimalism livened by a well-curated collection of eclectic modern and contemporary furnishings.

Of course this one, like its Kentucky cousin, is about more than just rooms and suites. It’s also an impressive museum in its own right, with a permanent collection, rotating exhibitions, and space for special events. It’s also on hotel hours rather than museum hours, so you can get your art fix at all hours.

And there’s a fine restaurant as well, which more or less completes the package. Metropole is named after the hotel that stood on this site for the better part of a century, and while it’s a thoroughly contemporary affair, it’s got its fair share of nods to the past, from some inherited architectural details to a menu that’s based on classic wood-fired cooking.