Gurney’s Star Island Resort & Marina
Hamptons
With hotels opening from Montauk (aka The End) to Bridgehampton, you no longer need to be someone’s houseguest. The long-awaited renovation of the old Montauk Yacht Club was revealed on Memorial Day weekend as Gurney’s Star Island Resort & Marina, a 107-room property that’s truly a full-on resort. With three pools, a kid’s club, a private beach, and Jeremy Blutstein–helmed restaurant, Showfish—not to mention the largest marina in the Hamptons—it will be the place to see and be seen this summer. Bonus: You can take the resort’s yacht service to the brand’s Newport, Rhode Island, property. More low-key is Bridgehampton’s A Room at the Beach, set on a property originally owned by Alexis Stewart (Martha’s progeny). The 10-room hotel stands two miles from the beach and emphasizes wellness (as opposed to hedonism, like more easterly Hamptons retreats), with picnics in the redwood allée, daily yoga classes, and Serena & Lily bikes to borrow. Manhattan summer transplants come in the form of people but also restaurants: Upper East Side steak house TBar will set up shop in Southampton; New York’s hip omakase restaurant, Shuko, will have a pop-up in East Hampton (try the kampache handrolls); and Il Mulino will add a 20-seat garden to its Wainscott outpost.
Scribner’s Catskill Lodge
Hudson Valley
Forget what you’ve seen in the movies about the Catskills; locals are now rebranding towns like Kerhonkson “Kerhamptons” for all the chichi creatives moving up for the summer. There’s now a Jitney-like business-class bus, Line, with Wi-Fi and cappuccinos, plus hipster microbreweries such as Arrowood Farms, where festival bands like Guster perform in summer. Airbnb-ing is allowed in most towns, but for a truly refined stay, book one of the 38 rooms at Scribner’s Catskill Lodge in Hunter. Opened just three seasons ago, it extends a Brooklyn-minimalist vibe but with high-quality everything, including an authentic Italian restaurant, Prospect, by A Voce–trained chef Alex Napolitano. Fill your bags for the bus ride back with sartorial designs by Rick Owens and Yohji Yamamoto at Kasuri, easily Hudson’s best high-fashion boutique.
Goop
Nantucket
The elegant Mandarin Oriental, Boston has recognized the difficulty of jumping over to the Atlantic island, so its team created a New England vacation experience that includes three nights at the landmark White Elephant and two nights in the big city. Tickets to all the best museums are gratis, plus you’ll get a gift card for Lilly Pulitzer, so you can dress in your preppy best. If you already know the island well, just hop on the ferry to The Wauwinet, whose 32 rooms built around 1875 just emerged from a face-lift courtesy of Boston-based Gauthier-Stacy. Look for four-poster beds topped with Pratesi linens and bathrooms done almost entirely in Carrara marble. Then go with the glow at the first pop-up shop, MRKT, from Gwyneth Paltrow’s cult brand, Goop. Set in the heart of Nantucket, MRKT goes for a general store/beach house vibe, with a minimal Shaker-meets-Scandi aesthetic, chock full of athletic attire by Alo Yoga, Caravan linens, pool floats from The Nice Fleet, and, of course, Goop’s own line of skin care.
