The 102-year-old dowager countess of Boston hotels, the 383-room Fairmont Copley is enviable for its high-end aura. JFK's grandfather, then the mayor of Boston, threw a party for 1,000 when it opened. Read more.
A hipper member of Boston’s higher-end, the W’s 235 rooms can actually start in the relatively affordable $200s, so long as you book at least a few days in advance. The hotel portion on floors 3-13. Read more.
The 256-room, five-star hotel helped change the whole area, though it still has the feel of being out there on the water’s edge in the best and worst senses (i.e. fabulous views, but isolated). Read more.
A boutique hotel in the converted 19th-century brownstone. It's near some of Boston's most prime shopping spots, and therefore is popular with tourists who aren't going to do the Freedom Trail. Read more.
The building started life in 1922 as a Federal Reserve, and became the Langham as we know it in 2003. You'll note that the second-floor rooms all have soaring ceilings, a la the old bank milieu. Read more.
The old Ritz-Carlton is for the business traveler with a formidable expense account or the tourist going all out. Rates start at more than $200 and amp up quickly, with the Taj often sold out. Read more.
Custom House has bones going back to the mid-19th century, though the tower wasn't plunked there until the 20th. Perfect for business travelers in town for a while or those relocating to the region. Read more.
More for tourists than for business travelers, a solid historical choice (it’s housed in the old Charles Street Jail, for one thing). The Liberty’s 300 rooms start as low as the low $200s. Read more.
The Charles-side complex has 470 rooms, including 11 suites, and offers plenty of meeting space as well as a 24-hour fitness center. All rooms generally fall within the $200 to $300 range. Read more.
Opened in 2002, smack-dab in the middle of downtown Boston. It combines luxury amenities, like personal shoppers by request, with a sort of buzzy contemporariness that the city needs more of. Read more.
Promises "simple, chic" rooms, and pretty much delivers that: a kind of budget luxury hotel, with rooms start at just under $200. Not to be confused with its newer "sister hotel," Chandler Studios. Read more.
When this 114-room inn opened at the tail end of last decade just north of the Financial District, it was noted for being a hip redo of an 1889 building—a trendy envelope-pusher. Read more.
This boutique on Back Bay’s western borderlands always garners props for its quiet elegance. The 95-room inn is more than a half-century old. This might be the best boutique on a budget in Boston. Read more.
Opened in 1998 and seriously redone in 2009, this 428-room hotel is a ground-breaker in green. Big with business travelers as it’s near the World Trade Center and the Innovation District. Read more.
The 471-room hotel opened in early 2008 as Marriott’s attempt at a boutique-y inn in Boston. That largely still holds, though it’s unlikely the business travelers really notice the boutique part. Read more.
Since its opening in 1984, the 294-room inn has been a rite of passage for M.I.T. and Harvard parents—and proof you can charge $350-plus a night outside of downtown Boston. Read more.
The boutique recently spent $2.3 million redoing its lobby, bar and lounge; and the Onyx is finishing up a renovation of its guest rooms. Rates usually range in the $200s. Read more.
The 214-room Lenox sits smackdab in the middle of choice Back Bay, with its shopping and tourist-y spots. Rates remain, however, affordable, starting in the $200s. Perfect for tourists in the summer. Read more.
