Portland, Maine, Just Got Its First New Independently-owned Hotel in 20 Years — Here’s What It’s Like to Stay

The Longfellow helps you feel like a local in Portland's West End, with an inspired spa, a hip lobby bar, and an in-house driver for exploring.

If you want a taste of the visitor’s life in Portland, Maine, you might post up somewhere in the Old Port, the touristy heart of town right on the waterfront, lined with shops and jammed each summer with cruise-ship daytrippers and license plates from every state. But suppose you want to feel like a local. In that case, you’ll head to the West End, a dreamy residential neighborhood studded with handsome Victorians and a mansard roof on every block, where a square brick building with "LONGFELLOW HOTEL" painted in black and white emerged this year in what had previously been a parking lot.

The Longfellow, so named for Portland’s native son, Henry Wadsworth himself, is the first relatively large hotel to colonize this corner of the city, which, until now, has been home to a handful of intimate guesthouses and B&Bs and only one hotel, the 15-room Francis, right across the street. The arrival of the Longfellow — a project of Uncommon Hospitality, the creators of the Francis, with design by hotel heavy-hitters Post Company — unlocks this part of town in a new way, inviting interlopers “from away,” in Maine parlance, to pull up a chair and experience what makes this little city by the sea so special.

The hotel bills itself as wellness-focused, so in the name of journalism, I kicked off my stay in the Astraea spa with the meditation experience. This 30- or 60-minute service showcases the upside of technology infiltrating every corner of our lives. An attendant tucked me into an imposing Mind-Sync Harmonic Wellness Lounger under a weighted blanket and eye mask, leaving me to my meditation. I donned a giant pair of headphones, adjusted the chair to zero gravity (“Ah, so this is exactly what astronauts feel like,” I thought correctly), selected a stress reduction program on the touchscreen, and drifted off into the single most relaxing half-hour of my life. The soundscape synced with vibrations in the chair, traveling head to toe and gently massaging every ounce of skepticism out of my body. I floated away from the experience, deeply certain that I needed a $12,000 Mind-Sync Harmonic Wellness Lounger for my living room. If there’s a nicer way to start your vacation, I don’t know of it — Champagne at check-in certainly can’t compare.

Some hotels draw guests into their orbit at the expense of the outside world, inundating them with so many on-site activities and amenities that dragging yourself away feels like a chore. The Longfellow Hotel, by contrast, enfolds visitors in comfort while gently nudging them to see the city. Despite my urge to book several back-to-back hours of meditations, the hotel guide on my bedside table — with its love letter to Portland and tightly edited by an unimpeachable collection of recommendations — coaxed me out the door. There are bicycles available for guests and a BMW i7 with a driver at the ready to ferry you around the peninsula, but this being one of the prettiest parts of the city, I decided to stroll, soaking up the syrupy afternoon light and relishing the cawing of seagulls and the hint of salt on the air.

The Longfellow is most compelling in the evenings when the lobby lounge transforms into Five of Clubs. With its constellation of gilt-framed artwork and massive windows gazing out onto Congress Street, the space feels stately yet modern and utterly at home in Portland, whose residents have already seemed to claim it as a gathering spot. A delightful menu by chef Wilson Suliveras is the highlight and feels like a worthy addition to Portland’s top-notch dining and drinking scene. Don’t sleep on the tuna tartare, which is by turns bright and savory with additions of verjus, white soy, caviar, and yuzu kosho, and the zucchini cake, which blows every other version you’ve tried out of the water and, thrillingly, is also available as a breakfast option.

Portland’s West End is urban New England at its most charming, and the Longfellow Hotel is a rarified slice of local living right in the heart of it all. Read on for the full review.

Longfellow Hotel

• The lobby lounge and bar’s chic design matches with inventive, always-delicious drinks and food.

• Thoughtfully designed rooms have plenty of sleep-supporting touches, such as smoke detectors that dim automatically when you switch off the lights and Loftie alarm clocks with white noise for a restful night and gentle wake-up.

• A compact but considered spa is home to seaweed treatments that nod to Maine’s coastline and a tech-forward meditation room experience.

• The property's focus is on wellness: adaptogenic mocktails on the bar menu, light therapy cycles in the suites' soaking tubs, and a Nordic-inspired private sauna and rainshower room in the spa, among other things.

• It's in an ideal West End location — right on Congress Street next to Tandem Bakery — that makes you feel like part of the neighborhood, plus an on-demand hotel car service to take you to and from other must-see spots on the Peninsula.

The Rooms

An understated yet elegant design sensibility reigns at the Longfellow Hotel, and nowhere more than in the rooms themselves. The property, designed by Brooklyn-based Post Company, comprises 44 king rooms and four suites across the three top floors of the building. The rooms are pared-down, minimal, but stylish, with white walls, pale wood floors, navy velvet tufted-channel headboards, brass sconces, ceiling medallions, and black wood accent pieces. Local elements are woven throughout the design, showcasing the sophisticated side of Maine artwork and craft: Photographs by Maine-based photographer Jonathan Levitt hang on the walls, as do paintings by artist Timothy Wilson, who lives nearby in the West End. Swans Island blankets adorn the beds, and you’ll sip your morning coffee from a Campfire Pottery mug made in nearby Gray and sold at the Portland shop Ember.

Perhaps the deepest care lies in what you don’t see — or hear. The team designed the rooms to give guests the best sleep of their lives, which means even the boring stuff didn’t go overlooked: The smoke detector lights go dim when you switch off the overhead, and the heating and cooling are the quietest available, with a fan that can be set to continuous mode so you aren’t jarred out of a doze when the white noise switches off. The good-sleep commitment continues with Loftie alarm clocks, should you like to drift off to a sound bath and wake up gently. And for dedicated lovers of luxurious baths, it’s worth booking a suite just for the tub: the enormous soaking tubs are equipped with high-tech features like chromotherapy lights, heated backrests, and massage-jet cycles.

Food and Drink

The lobby area, a sophisticated lounge space with soaring ceilings drenched in a soft gray-blue, transforms into Five of Clubs in the afternoons and evenings, a bar named for Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s collegiate social club. There, Chef Wilson Suliveras, who cut his teeth at the White Barn Inn and the much-lauded Elda in Biddeford, is serving a menu of small plates that are tightly edited yet ambitious in scope. Every dish — right down to the bread, a crackly-crusted sourdough served with roasted garlic, chile, and leek butter — feels meticulously crafted, and even seemingly simple options sing with complexity.

The cocktails, too, are excellent, and a robust selection of zero-proof options (each with a line boasting of its health benefits, be it sleep-supporting melatonin from the addition of tart cherry juice or antioxidant-rich wild blueberries) ensures even sober guests are included in the fun. In the mornings and early afternoons, the space becomes Twinflower Café, a wellness-minded spot with easy breakfast options and sandwiches, including a brown-rice-and-vegetable breakfast bowl that feels virtuous yet is so tasty I was craving it for the whole week after my stay. If you’re a food lover, don’t miss the chance to chat with the chef himself; his delight in the culinary creative process is contagious.

Activities and Experiences

This being an ideally situated city hotel, the on-property activities are limited. There’s a small but impressively well-equipped fitness center, in keeping with the hotel’s wellness focus, which offers multiple stationary bikes, a rowing machine, a treadmill, kettlebells, and barbells, among other essentials. A fleet of bicycles, complete with helmets and locks, is available for guests. Henry’s Study is a sun-soaked room on the top floor with a large conference table, a comfortable option for cranking out a few hours of work in peace.

Otherwise, the focus is on getting out and about in Portland, and each room contains a charming in-house guide to exploring the city, with suggested stops and itineraries that even the pickiest of locals would cosign. An easy one you shouldn’t skip: Tandem Bakery right next door, which serves the best breakfast sandwich this side of the Atlantic.

The Spa

The compact yet considered Astraea Wellness Spa leans into the hotel’s wellness-forward approach with amenities and experiences that feel shockingly tech-forward for a small city boutique hotel. In the standalone Nordic spa suites, privately booked spaces ideal for couples, a private compact infrared sauna sits adjacent to a rain shower that mimics the random droplets and frequency of a natural summer downpour. In another room, zero-gravity MindSync chairs equipped with binaural beat meditation programs sync the vibrations of a soundscape played through headphones with the massage features in the chair itself to elicit a full-body kind of zen. While the treatment selection is tightly edited and mostly massage-focused, the offerings nonetheless feel thoughtful — see the heavy use of seaweed in treatments like the herbal compress wrap, a nod to Portland’s maritime roots — and the well-curated spa boutique is a welcome diversion during a city getaway.

Accessibility and Sustainability

A handful of ADA-friendly rooms are available in different categories, including a Grand Standard room, a balcony room, and a suite. All include roll-in showers, grab bars, lower vanities for wheelchair users, and a floor plan navigable on two wheels. Sustainability, meanwhile, is a high priority — you won’t spot any single-use plastic on the property, and that goes for details right down to the bars of hand soap and the room keys. In the shower, bulk dispensers eliminate the need for hundreds of tiny shampoo bottles, while glass water carafes and mugs from local brand Campfire Pottery eliminate the need for disposable water cups and coffee containers. Other, more easily overlooked elements have been made eco-friendly, too: Rooms were designed to be ultra-well-insulated, the garage offers multiple EV charging stations, and the town car that shuttles guests around the peninsula is electric.

Location

This stretch of Congress Street offers easy walkability to restaurants and activities on this end of the Peninsula, but for any further-flung adventures, the Longfellow has a BMW and chauffeur ready to whisk you to and fro when you summon by text. Parking in some parts of town can be limited, so skipping the car rental and relying instead on the in-house driver (or Ubers for farther-flung adventures since the car service is primarily for in-town use) is the way to go.

Portland is the closest airport, just a 10-minute drive from the property. Alternatively, you could fly into Boston-Logan and catch the Concord Coach bus, which has near-hourly departures directly from the airport to the Portland Transportation Center, just over a mile from the Longfellow Hotel. If you’re a road tripper or can’t fathom going carless, the property offers valet parking for $45 per day.

How to Get the Most Value Out of Your Stay

The Longfellow Hotel isn’t part of a larger hotel brand, so your Marriott rewards, alas, are no good here. You can book with credit card points through Chase and other providers, but your best bet for finding a deal is to visit during the off-season. Portland isn’t as seasonally focused as some other Maine tourist towns, so you can still eat well and explore the city in November or March when you’ll bypass peak-summer room rates — if you don’t have your heart set on beachgoing, it’s a great way to save several hundred bucks. Or, if you’re eligible, AARP members get five percent off room rates, while military members with an active ID qualify for a 10 percent discount.

For more Travel & Leisure news, make sure to sign up for our newsletter!

Read the original article on Travel & Leisure.