Palihotel Westwood Village

From the outside it’s hard not to see Los Angeles as one continuous megacity, but Westwood Village is in some ways a classic university town, home to the community around UCLA. That’s the central concept of Palihotel Westwood Village, a boutique hotel that’s got more in common with a particularly stylish university-town boarding house than with the opulent Hollywood luxury hotels that you might associate with Los Angeles.

With particular emphasis on the “stylish” part. This one blends Parisian romance with mid-century modernism, and the 1939 building — Westwood Village’s first hotel — lends it an air of throwback glamour. Paligroup specializes in stretching fairly modest nightly rates into an experience that’s anything but “budget,” and that’s certainly the case here, as the rooms come with 43-inch televisions, Smeg fridges, well-stocked minibars, and rain showers, as well as enormously comfortable queen or king beds.

The hotel’s residential concept means that, beyond breakfast and a cozy little lounge, there’s not much in the way of public space. Palihotel Westwood Village is more pied-à-terre than grand hotel; anyway, there’s plenty to get out and see, from UCLA and sights like the Hammer Museum and the Geffen Playhouse to nearby Beverly Hills and Santa Monica.