4 Best Hotels in Southern Vermont, Vermont

This renovated 19th-century manse, once the residence of the town's pastor, incorporates a modern boutique aesthetic into the traditional-style inn, especially in the attached gastropub, which features a long, polished metal bar and backlighted marble. Guest rooms maintain a nice balance of old and new in furniture and decor. The 6-acre property also includes several cottages, tennis courts, a pool, and an outdoor patio with a firepit.

This 1801 classic encourages you to linger on its wraparound porches, in its authentically Colonial common rooms, or with a book by the fire in its old-fashioned library, but those who want to get outside can access the nearby Grafton Ponds Outdoor Center and its 2,000 acres of trails, forests, and fields. The main building, with two-story columns gracing its front, contains 11 guest rooms; the rest are dispersed among three other close-by buildings.

Though not lavish, the guest rooms in this 1938 art deco building have the original sinks and tiling in the bathrooms, and many overlook Main Street, with New Hampshire's mountains in the background. The lobby has original and notably colorful terrazzo floors, and downstairs you can catch a movie under the zodiac ceiling of the Latchis Theatre or walk a few blocks to most of Brattleboro's shops, restaurants, and pubs.

Vermont's only Kimpton, which opened in 2015, attempts to walk the fine line between its corporate boutique design and a Vermont flavor—the latter of which is distilled, quite literally, in the Copper Grouse, the hotel's on-site enclave of seasonal plates and craft cocktails. In many aspects, it succeeds in highlighting Vermont's inherent character, with a wraparound porch, wood floors, vintage photography and prints, sleek, contemporary guest rooms decorated in subdued light browns and greens, and gas fireplaces that keep the mood bright and upbeat.