Best hotel in Scotland. A youth hostel in the 1950s, this magical place overlooking Badcall Bay is as far as you can imagine from a world of dormitories with lumpy beds and lumpier porridge. A cream tea is served in the conservatory, there’s a choice of 60 malt whiskies in the lounge bar, and readers report by the dozen that both the nightly-changing menu of food and the porridge are delicious. Bedrooms have had a swish make-over, and some have beautiful loch views.

Best hotel in the Miclands. There’s a reason they call Lord Northampton the Mystic Marquess. He and his wife Tracy have placed well-being right at the core of their reinvented 16th-century coaching inn on the Castle Ashby estate. Take a yoga class or a gong bath, book a nature trail in the castle grounds and swim in the lake designed by Capability Brown. It’s not posh in the least, with a relaxed air throughout the beautiful interiors, in earthy, mossy tones to reflect the surrounding countryside.

Best hotel in Ireland. Warm Irish hospitality and superb food are on offer at this Victorian country mansion, where the restaurant is a destination in its own right. Angel Pirev uses food from the kitchen garden and orchard to help create his well-received menus, served in the deep-blue restaurant with its wedding-cake plaster ceiling. Traditional-style bedrooms have fabrics and wallpaper by Zoffany, Jane Churchill, Cole & Son; everywhere there is carefully chosen artwork and furniture, plus vases brimming with flowers.

Best hotel in the South West. It’s worth booking into this seaside bolt-hole just for the spectacular views over the sands to Burgh Island (rooms come with binoculars). But guests also really appreciate the friendliness of owners Petra Lampe and Martyn Scarterfield, who make everyone feel at home. Take the path down to the beach, sit on the inviting decked terrace, and tuck into Martyn’s nightly-changing evening meals in the garden room, where the seascape provides a feast for the eyes as well as the stomach.

Best hotel in the South of England. A whole litter of pigs has entered the world since Robin Hutson opened the first of a new breed in 2011. While they’re all special, it’s the mother pig in the New Forest that reinvented the English country hotel, with food sourced from within a 25-mile radius and its kitchen garden. The ethos is hip not hooray, with nothing too hammed up about Judy Hutson’s shabby-chic interiors. The only fly in the pigpen is that Pigs aren’t for pups: dogs have to stay at home.

Best hotel in the North of England. Talk about reinventing the motorway service station. Formerly Tebay Services Hotel, this Lake District hotel on the M6 was created by the resourceful Dunning family after the M6 carved up their hill farm. It offers quiet rooms with fell views, tasty Cumbrian food, excellent value for money and what readers describe as a feeling of ‘peace and well-being’. Its delicious but unfussy food features fresh farm produce; there is also a farm shop on site. It’s a world away from the usual motorway chain hotels.

Best City Hotel. Named after the three brothers Guest who own it, this boutique property occupies a trio of Grade I listed town houses in a Georgian terrace. Rooms are all different, with touches of whimsy that might include a coffee maker in a doll’s house or exotic bird wallpaper inspired by the pergola in Henrietta Park opposite. All have a record turntable, a Dyson hairdryer and access to the complimentary pantry. Return from exploring and wallow in a circular copper bath for two in the basement spa.

Best pub with rooms. As pubs with rooms become more and more stylish, the Duke stands head and shoulders above the crowd. Georgie and Sam Pearman’s 17th-century Cotswold stone inn comes with a country-chic air in its carefully designed rooms, with luxurious fabrics, hand-blocked wallpaper, wooden furniture and perhaps a red bathtub in a red and white tiled nook. For something a bit different from your average pub grub, they grill meat and fish over charcoal, cherry and apple wood.

Best B&B. A warm welcome with cake isn’t the only thing guests get at Sheila and Robert Mitchell’s B&B. Rooms have sweeping views over Swaledale, exposed-stone walls, bathrobes and Noble Isle toiletries. Sheila and Robert can advise on the local area, including the best walks and good places for dinner. Particular praise is heaped on the breakfasts, with an extensive choice that includes pancakes, smoked haddock, local eggs, croissants from the village bakery and Sheila’s award-winning marmalade.

Best hotel in Wales. Owner Melanie Boissevain is an interior designer and it shows: together with her family she has created stylish, relaxing rooms in this Strawberry Hill Gothic house on the coast a five-minute drive from Tenby. Antiques rub shoulders with French market finds, blowsy wallpapers and Persian rugs. Enjoy Modern British cuisine in the romantic dining room, with Arcadian-print wallpaper and candlelight, as well as views over the bay to the Gower peninsula through romantic cusped windows.

Best Country Hotel. Michelin-starred cuisine, elegant bedrooms and red squirrels in the garden are the successful recipe for this 20-room hotel. Chef Paul Leonard sources 90 per cent of produce from a ten-mile radius of Forest Side, much from the vast kitchen garden, to create his inventive dishes. Light and airy bedrooms come with Zoffany fabrics, Herdwick wool carpets, beds by local company Harrison Spinks, and Bramley toiletries. The icing on the cake? There are walks from the door.

There’s character aplenty at this pub on an organic farm, with bedrooms named after different fields, a communal area called The Wallow with table football, and everything from milk to meat supplied from the surrounding fields.

It’s the relaxed atmosphere together with everything from a games room and outdoor pool to cots and baby- listening devices that make this hotel a firm family favourite. There is no charge for children sharing their parents' room either.

A firm favourite with readers, The Bell faced a challenging time when the River Monnow flooded and flowed through its ground floor. Now the dog-friendly pub is better than ever, with a fresh look, great food and riverside walks.

Chef/patron Richard Hendey cooks as much as possible on the premises at his small hotel, from bread to ruffles. Readers rave over his nightly-changing menus, which feature local Devonshire produce and fresh food from the kitchen garden.

There’s plenty of Scandi chic at Gert Bach’s thatched cottage with its stripped-back pale interiors highlighted by colourful abstract art canvases and Solent views. The terraced gardens supply the kitchen, which produces simple but superb dishes.

Guests receive a warm welcome plus a garden tour at Walter and Nuala Sweeney’s refined Georgian town house. Bedrooms are supplied with sherry, fresh milk and flowers, there’s a superb choice at breakfast, and everything is great value.

Italian foodie flair meets West Country charm at this uber-stylish restaurant with rooms on Exmoor’s coast, where chef Pio Catemario di Quadri cooks up a storm while Cindy Siu creates eclectic, appealing interiors worthy of the food.

On certain nights, chef/patron Conor McClelland replicates the entire nine-course meal served on the Titanic the night she sank. Lavish rooms include the golf-themed Rory McIlroy bedroom, and a breakfast of titanic proportions is served.

With stucco ceilings, antique-filled rooms and ornate fireplaces, the Murray family’s manor house is clearly made to be shared with someone special. After dinner à deux in the wood-panelled dining room, you can retire to a sleigh bed or four-poster.

Our inspectors were bowled over by the food created by Michelin-starred chef/patron Geoffrey Smeddle in his old coaching inn with modern interior. Dishes might include pastrami of sea trout, loin of deer.

Readers’ complimentary reports on this adults-only hotel flood our inbox. The seaside setting, spa and smiling service, alongside an effective environmental policy, win repeated praise. Over the past year we haven’t had a single negative comment.

Fantastic food, amazing value and a side serving of culture in nearby Stratford-upon-Avon are the hallmarks of this restaurant-with-rooms. The barn is as atmospheric as they come, with a flagstone floor and an impossibly high vaulted ceiling.

Walks from the doorstep, views of Helm Crag, and fires to gather round for pre-dinner drinks make the Winsland family’s Victorian country house hotel a clear winner. As is the food, with imaginative menus, homemade bread, and kippers for breakfast.

There’s a library in the double-height stables and a delicious dinner is served with a serenade from chef Paddy Flynn, who runs this 18th-century country house with his wife, Hannah. The Georgian interiors have a relaxed, homely atmosphere.

Local ales are served as well as Michelin-starred food at this Dales pub with beams and luxury rooms. Chef/patron Michael Wignall uses local food but global inspiration to create such dishes as Yorkshire duck with soy, black bean and miso.

William Griffiths’s Georgian former coaching inn is the very model of a town hotel; family run, with friendly staff, a relaxed locals bar, eclectic menus, modern artworks. Afternoon tea is a particular treat, with cakes from the hotel’s own bakery.

Silk, Spice… the bedrooms at Deborah Clark and Tony Orchard’s boutique hotel recall the original owner. A Georgian Orientalist and diplomat, he’d have enjoyed drinks on the pretty veranda, dinner alfresco, a free- standing bath in a glamorous bedroom.

Perfect hosts Vivienne and Philip Taylor set high standards at their Peak District longhouse home. Three of four well- equipped guest bedrooms are suites. A log burner warms the cosy lounge. Breakfast brings an array of fresh and very local produce.

Deep in the countryside, Willem and Pippa Vlok have created superb accommodation in historic farm buildings around parterre gardens. From dinner in a room resembling a medieval great hall, to a perfect breakfast, everything delighted our inspectors.

Just minutes from the yacht-filled Solent lies Luke Staples and Lewis Green’s chic, immaculately run boutique hotel, with top-notch, locally sourced food, a pretty garden for alfresco dining, hands-on owners and thoroughly charming young staff.

Our inspectors loved everything at David and Rona Pitchford’s Georgian manor house, but it’s Mr Pitchford’s cooking that really sets it apart. A typical dish: roast Kentish lamb, smoked potato puree, haggis and lovage tart, roasted onion, lamb sauce.

With a cosy, beamed bar and Michelin-starred cooking in the child-friendly, veggie-friendly restaurant, James and Kate Mackenzie’s former coaching inn is a winner. Smart bedrooms have a terrific bathroom, and everything in the garden is edible.

Hari and Colin Fell have created luxurious contemporary accommodation within historic, rustic farm buildings. Eggs from the ducks and hens in the paddock, vegetables from the kitchen garden, wild garlic foraged from the Forest of Dean supply chef Rob Cox’s 20-mile menus.

Struan and Louise Lothian spare no effort to please guests at their friendly hotel. Fires burn in comfy lounges. There’s a cabinet of whiskies; rooms with balcony, with books, a four-poster, binoculars, loch views; a daily-changing menu of superb cooking.

A generosity of spirit infuses Simon Haden and Frederieke McMurray’s Georgian country house, with magical views across the Burren to Galway Bay. Elegant interiors are filled with antiques, modern art, fresh garden flowers. The cooking is unpretentious but imaginative.

There are glorious loch views from bedrooms filled with antiques, at Lord and Lady Macdonald’s former hunting lodge on Skye. Ancestral portraits abound. A ghillie organises fishing and stalking, while chef Marcello Tully cooks delicious fare. Speed, bonny boat!

This chocolate-box-pretty-thatched village inn is infused with wit – the bar filled with odds and ends; a billiard table at the foot of a bed – but chef/patron Andrew Pern’s Michelin-starred cooking is seriously good. One room has both spa bath and piano.

An exciting gourmet destination within sight of the Scottish border. Each smart bedroom is named after an infamous clan of Border Reivers – a daring departure.