Hotels With a View

Put down your phone and look up. Some hotels exist because of their view, not in spite of it — perched on the right ridge, anchored to the right shoreline, oriented to the right horizon. Our editors apply one test: does the view earn the trip on its own?

The edit follows the geography. Above Lake Garda, Villa Sostaga commands a cypress-lined hillside from a 19th-century villa; on the rim of the Santorini caldera, Dana Villas spreads twenty-eight cave suites along the cliff edge of Firostefani, family-run since 1986. In Germany, Schlosshotel Kronberg occupies the 1893 royal castle built by Empress Victoria — Queen Victoria's eldest daughter — still owned by the House of Hesse and set in landscaped Taunus parkland. Further afield, Jade Mountain in Saint Lucia faces the Pitons through open-walled sanctuaries; Qualia commands the secluded northern tip of Australia's Hamilton Island; and Soneva Jani spreads overwater villas across the Maldivian Noonu Atoll. In Kenya, Elewana Kifaru House sits inside the Lewa Wildlife Conservancy with Mount Kenya beyond.

The view is half the reason to book. The other half is everything around it.