The “Hotels” Bringing Us Back to Nature

In recent times, American lodging has embraced road-trip travelers in ways both new and reminiscent of the old. (Wildsam covered the comeback of classic motor lodges last year.) 

And this year, we noticed one trend in particular: New spots, tuned to nature, designed to put guests in closer touch with their surroundings. Sometimes, these efforts look like hotels; in other instances, they stir together cabin living and camping. At every one of these Road Trip Award honorees, the setting is inspiring and the prospects are, let’s say, a breath of fresh air.

The Olympic is already a place apart—very close to an island, its geography and, especially, the mossy climate dictated by the squeeze between the wild Pacific and the Puget Sound. This new trio of dispersed luxury campsites, just north of the national park, leans into remoteness and the forest-hushed landscape, aiming to create a temporary alternate reality for guests. Menizei is emphatically not a hotel, but rather a light-touch invitation to hole up in shelters that aren’t rustic, per se, but which favor the self-directed and self-sufficient traveler. (With its adults-only reservation policy and coinage of the concept “forest cocooning,” not to mention cool, goth-y, mod-black cabin architecture, Menizei strikes a romantic note, but also welcomes solo adventurers.) Cedar saunas, floating bathhouses and blackout tents build on the sense of remove and restorative quiet.

The first ground-up J-Tree hotel project in more than a decade, Reset Hotel takes its bow at a somewhat fraught time in the California desert. Years of Instagram/vacation-rental cookie-cutter aesthetics left this spectacular, demanding landscape somehow overexposed. Fortunately, this place looks and acts like no other place. The shipping container-esque design forms and outward-looking, nature-oriented ethos reflect a collaboration between cofounder Adam Wininger and architect Ben Uyeda, known for his DIY-oriented design ethos. (Uyeda’s YouTube channel will give you the vibe.) The partners considered their project’s effect on the local housing market and its connection to the desert ecosystem around it. The modular design, the spare aesthetics and ample access to patio space and stargazing perches strike a balance between design and nature, and most of the property will remain desert. Some say the results evoke a science-fictional space colony, but to us, it’s all Earth, all the way.

We’re not sure if the folks behind the striking archipelago of modern cabins that make up Prospect Berkshires actually coined the phrase “landscape hotel.” But they say it, and we like it. On the site of a former campground that had run into hard times, a thoughtful reclamation of history and nature evokes that rustic/refined duality that is so very New England. Regional design/build firm Alander created the handsome, Scandinavian-accented prefab cubes that now look out over Prospect Lake. Landscape design and native plantings applied a healing touch to the property and shoreline ecosystems. An existing historic structure became the on-site restaurant, Cliff House. Aside from the 80-plus-acre lake itself, a welter of nearby hiking trails include Appalachian Trail access. If you want to go Thoreau, now you know.

Treehouses at Starved Rock
Multibedroom, elevated, luxurious forest abodes in Ottawa, IL

Cypress Resort
High-end woodland villas at in Jasper, GA

Tu Tu’ Tun Lodge
Unearthly “glass cabins” add a modernist note to the old-school lodge on Oregon’s Rogue River