Art Hotels
6 hotels, told by the way in

The arrival

Zermatt keeps ordinary cars out, so the way up is the Gornergrat rack railway, climbing above the village in stages.

You leave it at Riffelalp station, high on the slope, where the resort runs its own short tramway along the terrace toward the house.

The last hundred metres

The tram runs level while everything around it falls away, so the last stretch is a straight line held against a mountainside.

Snow is banked at the edges in winter; in summer it is grass and larch, with the Matterhorn standing opposite the whole way.

What the building does with that

The house meets the tram with a plain door rather than a forecourt, because there is no road to make one for.

Inside, the plan turns toward the south terrace, and the mountain you travelled past becomes the thing every room is arranged around.

The arrival

The coast road along the Amalfitana runs high on the rock, cut into the cliff with the sea below and villages hung on either side.

Conca dei Marini appears as a bend and a gap in the wall, and the convent stands just under the roadway.

The last hundred metres

From the road you go down rather than along.

Steps and terraces drop through the garden, one level at a time, with the sea widening at every turn. It is the old convent circulation, kept as it was, and it puts arrival below the traffic.

What the building does with that

The house receives you through thick walls and a small vaulted hall, which is what a convent has instead of a lobby.

Rooms open off the old corridors, and the terraces do the work a forecourt would do somewhere flatter.

The arrival

West of Benderloch the road leaves the main route and works its way down through farmland toward the sea loch.

Signposts thin out, hedges close in, and the last junction delivers you not to a car park but to the near end of a single bridge.

The last hundred metres

The bridge is iron, narrow and old, wide enough for one vehicle and no more.

Crossing it is the moment the visit changes: water underneath, trees closing ahead, and behind you a mainland that is suddenly a separate place.

What the building does with that

Beyond the bridge a wooded drive delays the house a little longer, then the baronial front appears with its porch and steps.

The entrance is domestic in scale, and the island itself, not the lobby, is what the building hands you first.

The arrival

Adirondack roads run long and dark between stands of pine, and the turning for the lake is deliberately quiet.

There is no forecourt announcing anything; the drive slips off the public road into trees and continues until water starts appearing between the trunks.

The last hundred metres

The final part runs beside the shoreline, gravel under the wheels and Saranac Lake on one side.

Great Camp buildings show themselves gradually, low among the pines, timber and stone, and the lake stays in view until the drive stops.

What the building does with that

There is no reception desk waiting, because the camp was built as a private house and still behaves like one.

You are taken in through a door of ordinary size into rooms with fireplaces, and the shift from outside to indoors is deliberately small.

The arrival

The Anambas islands lie out in the sea between the Malay peninsula and Borneo, and no road reaches them.

Travel is by seaplane over open water, with the archipelago appearing as pale rings below, and the final movement between islands is made in a boat.

The last hundred metres

Landing is on the lagoon itself, so the last part of the way is water and then a jetty.

You walk in from the sea on timber, over shallow reef, with the island's forest in front and no hard surface anywhere behind you.

What the building does with that

There is no wall to pass through at all.

The reserve receives arrivals under open roofs at the head of the jetty, built from timber and thatch, so the boundary between the sea, the path and the room is left deliberately unclear.

The arrival

Above Soufrière the island road climbs in tight bends, gaining height quickly with rainforest on both sides and the Pitons showing and disappearing at every turn.

The way up is continuous work for a driver, and the ridge arrives before you expect it.

The last hundred metres

The last stretch leaves the public road for a short private climb, steep and green, ending on the narrow spine of the ridge.

There is very little flat ground; the site is a line rather than a plot, with the land dropping on both sides.

What the building does with that

The house is open to the west by design: rooms have three walls and a missing fourth, facing the gap between the Pitons.

Arrival is therefore straight into open air, and the building never quite closes behind you.