Luxury is cool. Art is cool. Great service is cool. Sometimes cool defies definition.
But when it comes to a cool hotel, you just know it when you see it.
The sixth annual CJ Cool List takes you across the ever-changing world of Caribbean hotels, throwing the spotlight on some established properties and some newer faces, from larger resorts to ultra-chic boutiques, from the Bahamas to the southern Caribbean. What do they all have in common? They’re just cool.
Here are the coolest hotels in the Caribbean for 2018.
Park Hyatt St Kitts It was the most anticipated opening in the Caribbean when it debuted last month in St. Kitts, thanks to the hard-to-match Park Hyatt brand and a remarkable design that’s married authentic, historic hues with cutting-edge accents. A new standard for Caribbean hotels.
Baoase Luxury Resort Curacao There’s a new standard-bearer for Caribbean cool. This endlessly chic boutique resort in increasingly hip Curacao is a fusion of Bali and the Dutch Caribbean, with some of the most impressively designed rooms in the region, outstanding service and the sort of hip-without-being-pretentious ambience that’s often impossible to pull off.
Round Hill One of the Caribbean’s legendary hotels remains an epicenter of cool, thanks to an authentic Jamaican ambience focused on clean, bright design (and yes, Ralph Lauren himself designed the guest rooms). There’s a reason it was Caribbean Journal’s Caribbean Hotel of the Year in 2017.
Treasure Beach.
Treasure Beach Barbados This recently-transformed property has injected new energy into the West Coast of Barbados, with artfully designed rooms that play with Barbados’ typical hotel countenance and an exciting culinary program.
Kimpton Seafire, Grand CaymanKimpton’s first hotel in the Caribbean (there’s another planned in Grenada) is the best of the brand: it’s sleek but quirky, with a level of personable but exacting service that’s still just a dream in much of the region.
Calabash Grenada’s flagship hotel, which recently joined Relais & Chateaux, combines outstanding food with a warm, inviting, lush setting on a great little stretch of beach. Make sure you splurge for one of the plunge-pool rooms.
Casa Colonial There’s no cooler place to stay in the Dominican Republic than this Sarah Garcia-designed stunner on the north coast of the country, with 50 rooms and jaw-dropping decor.
Cap Maison We’ve long loved this hotel at the far northern tip of Saint Lucia for its commitment to creativity, particularly in its inspired food and beverage program. They’re always thinking of something new here, from house-made limoncello to one of the Caribbean’s great beach bars.
Graycliff Luxury is cool. And Graycliff, the historic hotel and restaurant in Nassau, understands that luxury, at its core, is about indulging in the finer things in life, from one of the world’s largest wine cellars to an in-house cigar factory to a wine-blending program to an unmatched collection of cognacs. This is a truly grand place, a Mecca for the bon vivant.
Harbor Club St Lucia’s newest hotel is an energetic, crisply designed resort that’s one of the most architecturally exciting, contemporary hotels in the region in some time. The plethora of pools meet the megayacht marina in striking fashion, while the service is attentive and refreshing. It’s a big boost for St Lucia and the greater Rodney Bay.
Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort Aruba’s greatest place to stay is this adults-only property on Eagle Beach that’s a forward-thinking, ever-innovating hotel, from a commitment to the green movement to little touches like in-room air purifiers and iPad check-ins.
La Suite Villa Martinique’s most famous boutique hotel is not short on personality, thanks to its owner, Gilles Duplan, who has turned this retreat in the hills above Trois-Ilet into a striking, colorful, funky hotel that also boasts one of the island’s best restaurants.
The Dunmore Being timeless is cool. And that’s precisely the case at this Harbour Island hotel that’s long been a haven for in-the-know travelers in the Bahamas. There’s a charm that permeates this boutique property, an indescribable quality that transports you to a more glamorous time.
Sea Breeze Beach House, Barbados Another wonderfully transformed hotel, Ocean Hotels’ rebranded Seabreeze is an impressively outfitted resort with a lovely stretch of south coast Barbados beach and artful, light guest rooms.
The lobby at The Fred hotel in Frederiksted.
The Fred While it’s still in soft opening, this boutique is the most exciting thing to happen to the US Virgin Islands hotel sector in decades. The Frederiksted, St Croix setting combines beach and town, and the rooms are, well, you have to see them for yourselves.