The rocky Maine coastline at Kennebunkport, where weather-beaten shingle buildings have stood against Atlantic winters for well over a century, provides the setting for one of New England's most enduring small hotels. White Barn Inn, now part of the Auberge Resorts Collection, grew from a nineteenth-century farmstead into a property of around 37 rooms and suites spread across the main house, cottages, and outbuildings — its shingled exterior and fieldstone chimneys sitting against the tidal estuary with the unhurried confidence of a family compound assembled across generations rather than conceived as a single gesture. The interiors navigate two distinct registers with considerable ease. Guest rooms in the cottage buildings lean into coastal domesticity — painted iron beds, striped ticking benches, stone fireplaces with wrought-iron screens, and coffered ceilings washed in soft slate blue, with botanical wallcoverings that feel sourced from a well-stocked linen cupboard rather than a hotel catalogue. The main house rooms take a warmer, more layered approach: ebonized four-poster beds, camelback sofas in oatmeal wool, buffalo-check draperies layered over bamboo shades, and rush-seated ottomans arranged on sisal. The restaurant, housed in a converted nineteenth-century barn, is the property's architectural centerpiece — original timber framing, hand-hewn post-and-beam construction, and a tall glazed gable end flooding the room with garden light while antique farm implements and wooden pulleys remain fixed overhead, untouched.

1hr 30min drive from Boston; 40min drive from Portland, Maine

Located in the beautiful coastal town of Kennebunkport, White Barn Inn has been a beloved local landmark for over 150 years, synonymous with warm New England hospitality, rustic charm, and uncompromising attention to detail. Just a 90 minutes' drive north of Boston, this inviting property is renowned as one of the country's most distinctive getaways. At the White Barn Restaurant, award-winning dining and expertly choreographed service unfold.