THE RESORT SERIES
How we choose
The Resort Series celebrates independent and owner-led hotels, resorts and retreats: places with a sense of origin, a point of view and people who genuinely care. These are the criteria we use for new guides. Our founding set of guides was chosen on similar grounds. Not every guide meets every criterion, but none of them can be bought.
Each guide shows the recognition it actually holds, so you can see at a glance where it stands.
1. Independent and owner-led
We look for places shaped by an owner’s vision rather than a corporate template: family-run islands, estate lodges, restored heritage houses, retreats built by people who fell in love with a coastline. We choose independent hotels, resorts and retreats, most of them owner-led, that offer exceptional service, setting and care.
2. Independent recognition
We look for recognition from people who don’t work for the property, such as MICHELIN Keys, the MICHELIN Guide’s distinction for exceptional hotels, awarded by its inspectors, or another respected award. It gives readers an independent benchmark alongside our own judgement. A guide shows a Key or other award, with its year, only where the property holds one. We review the series when new awards are announced.
3. Real photography of the real place
New guides show the property as it is, through real photography of its rooms, grounds and table, supplied with permission or licensed and credited. We never use generated or digitally fabricated images to depict a property. If we can’t show a place honestly, we don’t feature it.
4. Chosen on merit, labelled with care
A place in The Resort Series can’t be bought, and no property can sponsor the series. Sometimes a property hosts our stay or we’re compensated for a guide. When that happens, the guide is always labelled Partner content, and it never buys a place or a verdict. Every property meets the same criteria, our editors write every word, and properties don’t approve what we write. Advertising may appear around the series, but it never affects which properties are chosen or what we say. Read our Advertising, guest and partner content disclosure.
How a guide comes together
- Research. Our Travel Desk draws on the property’s published information, the MICHELIN Guide and other independent sources, and, where possible, conversations with the people who run it.
- Honesty about how we know. Our guides state how they were compiled, including whether our editors have stayed and whether the stay was hosted.
- The useful details. Who it suits, when to go, how to get there, what it costs to start, and how to book directly.
- Kept current. We revisit guides when prices, openings or awards change, and show the date of the last update.
Suggest a property
Know an independent hotel that belongs here? We’d love to hear about it through our contact form: choose Reader note or story idea. Suggestions are always welcome, and every place is judged on its merits.