The Christopher

Perhaps no destination in the Northeast feels quite so quintessentially New England as the island of Martha’s Vineyard. And on the Vineyard, there’s no place more stately and upright than Edgartown. So it’s no small matter when a 15-room Victorian inn undergoes a makeover, trading its traditional interiors for a bright and lively look that adds mid-century modern and French Caribbean influences to the mix. This irreverent playfulness is something of a trademark for the Massachusetts-based Lark Hotels, and it’s just part of what sets the Christopher apart from the typical Vineyard inn.

The other part is, well, the rest of the experience. Despite its antique good looks, this is a thoroughly contemporary hotel, aimed less at the habitual travelers who’ve been coming to Edgartown for decades and more at a generation that’s accustomed to the upscale boutique-hotel experience (not that they’d be sad to develop a decades-long following of their own).

With 15 rooms it’s by no means large, which makes for personalized service and an easy, convivial atmosphere. The lounge and the back courtyard with its firepit are the hotel’s social spaces, and the location, just off Main Street, is convenient and central — and an impressive and inventive breakfast sends you out into the streets in style.