Cool Hotels

International House

International House, a modern boutique hotel just a couple of blocks from the French Quarter in the Central Business District, incorporates stylized reflections of New Orleans’s cultural history in its decor. The airy lobby, with white slip covered furniture, is often peppered with colors and accessories that match the season, whether it’s the Voodoo Festival of RaRa in April or Louis Armstrong’s birthday in July.

The hotel also offers the Sanctuary of Love package for couples looking for romance, which incorporates a voodoo love ritual that includes a personalized altar set up for the couple as well as a bath of flower petals.

Popular with musicians, the International House is located on a quiet block away from the noise of the quarter, but all the fun is just steps away.

Loft 523

One of New Orleans's chicest hotels isn't in the French Quarter or the Garden District. Rather, it sits hidden in on a tiny side street in the humdrum, industrial Central Business District. Loft 523 represents a pinnacle of modern design in a city more apt at looking to the past than the future.  The spacious, airy loft rooms have the prerequisite exposed brick walls and polished steel detail, as well as utterly wonderful bathrooms.

My suite not only had a stand alone "spoon" bathtub but a huge shower with two shower heads. It also had a  California King bed, a tall mirror next to it. All of this sensuality made my platonic girlfriend and I feel the room was completely, totally wasted on us.

While Loft 523 is only a short walk from the French Quarter, the fact that is separate makes the place into a kind of serene oasis. When its time to sleep, the rowdy drunks of Bourbon Street won't disturb you. Yet, if you decide to go commune with them, you can. Or if you'd rather have a martini instead of a Hurricane, you can enjoy the hipster bar downstairs. While there's no restaurant on premises, many of the local places will deliver to your room.

Note: Loft 523 got kicked hard by Katrina, but it has reopened and all is well.

Soniat House

One of the best litmus tests for hotel coolness, especially if the hotel is located in a big city like New Orleans, is how well it blends into its surroundings. Because a hotel that doesn't have to advertise its presence, usually has something quite special to offer.

By that standard, the posh but decidedly low key Soniat House takes the prize because I walked past it about four times before realizing I had found the place.  No doormen or taxi stands here, just a pair of old school antique-looking double doors that lead to a restored French Quarter mansion.  Once I rang the doorbell, a gentleman's gentleman in a white jacket and gloves answered the door and led me into a almost silent gardened courtyard. It felt transporting, almost like stepping through a wardrobe or into Diagon Alley, except it was real and an authentically different world.

Once inside, everything seems designed to transport you back at least a century to the Creole New Orleans that no longer exists. Each room is decorated with original period antiques (think four poster beds armoires) and what few pieces of technology to be found are tucked away out of sight. It may not take you back as far as the 1870s, but it sure feels like the 1920s.  Oh, and breakfast served in that Garden? Very romantic.