We give our Cesar Awards to the ten best hotels of the year. Named after Cesar Ritz, the most celebrated of hoteliers, these are the Oscars of hotel keeping.
Editor’s Choice Cesar Winners 2017
Gravetye Manor - Classic British Escape
East Grinstead
‘Classy, comfortable and tasteful, the house has kept its period character without being “old hat”; the rooms are elegantly furnished without being pretentious,’ say trusted Guide correspondents in 2016, of this ‘special’ country house hotel.
The Blakeney Hotel
Blakeney
In a ‘scenic’ setting facing ‘tranquil’ marshland – ‘a joy for painters’ – the Stannard family’s ‘popular’ traditional hotel attracts all generations of regular guests, who praise the ‘remarkably high standards of service and amenities’.
From £85 per night
Hell Bay Hotel
Bryher
The rocky coastline may have been hell for sailors, but a short hop by propeller plane and boat brings you to the smallest of the inhabited Scilly Isles, something more like heaven.
The Nobody Inn
Doddiscombsleigh
‘What a fab place,’ say Guide inspectors in 2016, who arrived on a jolly quiz night at Sue Burdge’s ‘wonderful’ village pub-with-rooms.
The Cross at Kingussie
Kingussie
In an ‘interesting’ spot in Scotland, ‘very friendly’ hosts Celia and Derek Kitchingman run their ‘lively’ restaurant-with-rooms in a former tweed mill on the banks of the River Gynack.
From £100 per night
Battlesteads
Hexham
A ‘very special place in a very beautiful part of the world’, this pub, hotel and restaurant is run by Dee and Richard Slade with one eye on planet Earth and another on the stars.
From £115 per night
Ael y Bryn
Eglwyswrw
The ‘genuine warmth’ that imbues Robert Smith and Arwel Hughes’s much-loved rural B&B impressed Guide inspectors in 2016 as much as it does returning guests, who rave about the hosts’ ‘enthusiasm, support, flexibility and desire to please’.
From £100 per night
The Hardwick
Abergavenny
‘A contented buzz’ fills this ‘sophisticated yet unpretentious’ rural restaurant-with-rooms in an ‘attractive’ sheep-grazed setting.
Brocco on the Park
Sheffield
‘What a joy to discover this stylish city hotel,’ Guide inspectors enthuse in 2016.
The Royal Oak
Swallowcliffe
The Cinderella story is writ large in this ‘magnificent’ pub-with-rooms, an ‘elegant’ thatched-roof inn in a wooded valley.
From £100 per night