Hotel Locarno

It’s easy to think of the boutique hotel as a fairly recent phenomenon, but Rome’s Hotel Locarno was serving up a uniquely eccentric brand of glamorous hospitality as early as the 1970s. As a guest house, it dates back even farther — the main building to 1925, when its Art Nouveau architectural style was the state of the art, and an adjacent villa all the way back to 1905. Thanks to constant attention by successive generations of proprietors, it’s kept itself splendidly up to date, and its multiple layers of history lend it a depth that other 21st-century boutique hotels would kill for.

The location, just off the Piazza del Popolo, is beautifully central, whether you’re here for the sights, the shopping, or just la dolce vita. Your arrival is suitably grand, and while the most basic rooms are by no means vast — another consequence of the Locarno’s particular era — they are beautifully atmospheric, and more than a little bit luxurious. (The suites, of course, are another story entirely.)

A restaurant is not at all a given in a Roman boutique hotel, but the Locarno’s got a fine one, serving an eclectic mix of Roman classics and more unusual fare. Meanwhile the bar is a particular attraction, with decades of history serving inventive cocktails to a who’s-who of local creative types — and, more recently, a Mixology Lab, teaching classes on classic cocktails and modern innovations alike.