Good Hotel Guide

In ‘lovely Cotswold stone buildings around a pretty courtyard’, this mostly 16th-century former coaching inn has had a stylish make-over.

‘A lovely, family-friendly hotel,’ was Guide inspectors' verdict on this 16th-century stone manor house with spa in beautiful grounds, ‘looking out over rolling hills’.

In a hillside location with ‘stunning sea views’, this supremely family-friendly hotel has something for everyone – indeed, everything for everyone.

Overlooking National Trust parkland, this Georgian country house has ‘a real sense of grandeur’, say inspectors in 2018.

A ‘wonderful hot tub in the grounds’ is one of the unexpected delights of Hazel Thompson’s B&B in the Vale of Lorton, close to Loweswater, Buttermere and Crummock Water.

Built by a Spanish merchant in 1750 and, as you would guess, once home to the parish priest, this smart town-centre B&B has been run for more than 20 years by ‘likeable’ hosts Philip and Noreen McEvoy.

Scottish Baronial meets Italian Renaissance in Samantha Leslie’s Victorian pile on one of the last great Irish castle estates still owned by the founding family.

A Victorian baroque showstopper, this manor house stands on a steep hill in gardens above the Fowey estuary. It is part of the Luxury Family Hotels group.

In a wild coastal corner of the Highlands, this white-painted Victorian house gazes out across moorland, croft and sea.

Henry VIII gave the manor of Barnsley to each wife in turn – the old romantic! – before it passed to the Bourchier family, who built this Cotswold stone house in the 1690s.

A 17th-century mellow stone building overlooking the ‘broad way’ with its cafés, antique shops and milling tourists, is run as a well-regarded restaurant-with-rooms by Andrew and Gaynor Riley.

While families whoop it up at sister hotel Bedruthan (previous entry), grown-ups enjoy the serenity at this adults-only hotel and spa.

‘Intimate and eccentric’, this one-time cottage hospital on a ‘testing’ country lane has been converted into a ‘stylish’ rural guest house at the foot of Cadair Idris.

Guests step straight into a ‘grand entrance hall’ at this B&B in a village in the Yorkshire Dales national park.

In a small town well placed for tours of the Ring of Kerry, and the Wild Atlantic Way, Una and Dermot Brennan’s hotel is family-run, with a lot of heart and luxury boutique aspirations.

With Tal-y-llyn lake practically in the back garden, Cadair Idris behind, and ‘some of the finest walks in any national park’, Alex Yorke and Lorraine Hinkins’s Snowdonia B&B wins praise again this year.

‘The name means “leg of stone”,’ a Guide inspector tells us – a reference to the rocks on and over which this ‘fabulous, ultra-modern’ B&B is built.

Michael Caines’s ‘beautifully restored’ Georgian manor house stands in parkland beside the luminous Exe estuary.

Through a classical arch, on a narrow central lane, this boutique city hotel has bags of character and a genial atmosphere.

On a 150-acre working farm, clucking hens are the only neighbours at this Joan and Martin Slack’s 'charming, welcoming’ B&B in the Derbyshire Dales.

Just beyond Hugh Town, this ‘consistently good’ hotel is minutes from two sandy beaches, and across from the Victorian church that shares its name.

Galleries, antiques and arthouse cinema – oh my! Buzzy Bermondsey is home to trendsetting London culture and this youthful, privately owned hotel.

From on high, Wendy and Neil Burrows’s farmhouse enjoys stunning sunsets over the Alkham Valley.

Rebuilt and reinvented by Bassam Shlewet, this small hotel brings ‘great service’, chic style and impressive cuisine to a picturesque stretch of the Thames Path.