good things, small packages

Ultra-boutiques — hotels with a very limited number of rooms but plenty of amenities — can be big on quality, giving a few special guests a singular experience. In Southport, Maine, USA the Inn at Cuckolds Lighthouse is a 19th-century lighthouse turned two-suite hideaway where cocktails are made in the paneled parlour and freshly caught lobster is served in the Shaker-style dining room. Costa Rica’s three-room El Alma, a member of Small Luxury Hotels of the World, hosts wellness retreats for just six guests at a time.

Those who check in to Amsterdam’s Hôtel Droog, meanwhile, might even feel a tad lonely: The one-room hotel sits above the Droog concept store, a cutting-edge showroom filled with pieces by Dutch designers like Marcel Wanders and Tejo Remy. But the One and Only Bedroom, as the hotel’s suite is known, is no afterthought, furnished as it is with colourful pieces from the gallery downstairs and serviced by the attentive staff of Droog’s café.