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Made up of three conjoined Georgian townhouses on a quiet corner of Bloomsbury, this is the kind of bolthole where even non-guests, fresh from the British Museum, Oxford Street, or King’s Cross, will want to come for whispered conversations over a French 75 cocktail or small plates in its characterful, speakeasy-style salon. The 43 rooms, including three suites, boast parquet flooring and wooden textures. The lowest category “classic” rooms are white-walled, neutral-palette affairs and, at 129–194 square feet, pretty snug, with the wood-paneled king-size beds dominating the space. The pick of the suites is the Philosopher’s Quarters. A Georgian smartness pervades the space, with its originally corniced high ceiling and antique 18th-century map of the Holborn area, but there are also modern touches.
You’ll be hard-pressed to find more atmospheric places to eat in Bloomsbury than at Ottie’s Salon. Its plushly upholstered furniture and valance curtains lend a cozy parlor-turned-speakeasy ambience, in a nod to the Bloomsbury Set era. Guests spill out onto the three-part terrace, with its overhead heaters, barbecue space, and The Cigar Garden, where tobacco lovers can take their pick of Havanas from the humidor and lose themselves in a smoky haze until closing time. —Noo Saro-Wiwa
Address: 4-6 Bedford Pl, London WC1B 5JD
Closest tube station: Russell Square
