The Best Design Hotels in San Francisco
In artsy San Francisco, it’s no surprise that there are myriad hotels offering interior inspo in spades, with sultry cocktail bars and lively eateries to match. Whether you’re after a nautical hangout or one of the city’s trendy millennial hotspots, these design hotels in San Francisco have you covered.
1. Hotel Zeppelin
Boutique Hotel, Luxury
Somehow both elegant and kitsch, The Zeppelin is the perfect bolthole for its theatre district locale. As dramatic as its surrounds, rooms are modern and minimalistic, with forest green walls, impeccably designed furnishings and wooden floorboards, but with dashes of theatre-kid quirk with graffiti-style paintings and bathrooms wallpapered with classic 70s typeface. The lobby is all the more extroverted – an enormous newspaper-wrapped peace sign and neon-lit red reception desk are just two of the joys to be found.
2. Argonaut Hotel
Boutique Hotel
3. Hotel Kabuki
Boutique Hotel
5. San Francisco Proper Hotel
Boutique Hotel, Hotel
Proper Hotels are known for their impeccable sense of style, and Kelly Wearstler has taken her expert design touch to this building. No surface, wall or floor has been left to chance – floral wallpaper clashes with pinstripe bedspreads, an enormous floral mouth-shaped couch lounges next to Bauhaus-style furnishings, and wallpaper in shades of mauve suddenly makes the color seem fashionable again. The cherry on top is the bar, sitting pretty on the roof with candy-striped lounge chairs, an enormous fire pit and sparkly city views.
6. Hotel Emblem San Francisco
Boutique Hotel, Chain Hotel, Luxury
Paying homage to the Beat Generation which began in San Francisco in the 1950s, Hotel Emblem San Francisco is a little slice of social history in the heart of the city. Seamlessly combining modern and retro design sensibilities – think contrasting primary colours, brass finishings and floral headboards – the interiors hit that sweet spot between quirky and traditionally cool. In-house eatery and bar The Obscenity Bar & Kitchen (named after the trial that resulted from beat poet Allen Ginsberg’s work Howl) serves up snacks and cocktails alongside paintings of Ginsberg and the movement’s most famous writer, Jack Kerouac.
7. Palihotel San Francisco
Boutique Hotel, Chain Hotel
Palihotel San Francisco is a chintzy-industrial feast for the eyes that looks plucked from an interior design Pinterest board. It ticks off all the modern-day design boxes: bright velvet furnishings, mid-century-style armchairs and contrasting floral patterns, all of which is brought together with lofty ceilings and oodles of light. Rooms err on the contemporary side, with exposed brick walls and simple scandi-style wooden beds, while in-house eatery and bar Fisher Loft is popular with locals and serves a modern-American fare in an equally trendy setting.
Visiting San Francisco on business? Check out our guide to the best hotels in San Francisco’s Financial District, bookable on Culture Trip.
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