A late Victorian Queen Anne house in Lexington, Massachusetts — the town where the first shots of the American Revolution were fired in April 1775 — carries that history with a lightness that most heritage properties fumble. The Inn at Hastings Park, set within a three-story clapboard residence dating to the 1880s, was transformed into a 22-room boutique hotel by the Bruett family and interior designer Elms Interior Architecture, who chose to celebrate the building's age rather than museumify it. The wraparound porch, steeply pitched mansard roof, and corner turret with its pointed finial remain intact, painted a composed blue-grey with white trim that suits the property's residential scale without tipping into precious restoration. Inside, the approach turns decidedly more playful. Guest rooms are individually wallpapered — one draped in a dramatic charcoal ground scattered with silver eight-pointed stars against a mustard-velvet tufted wingback bed, another wrapped in blue-and-white tropical toile paired with a celadon linen headboard — the effect closer to a well-edited townhouse than a country inn. The dining room deploys grey wainscoting, gothic arched windows, black Windsor chairs, and a distressed American flag as its organizing gesture, landing somewhere between colonial tavern and New England parlor. Beyond the kitchen garden, strung with Edison lights above long harvest tables planted among kale and flowering herbs, the outdoor dining space makes the strongest case of all for what the property is getting right.

No travel notes provided yet.

Just 15 miles from Boston, The Inn at Hastings Park is nestled in historic Lexington, MA and provides the perfect destination for exploring Lexington and Concord, Boston, Cambridge and other charming Boston area communities. For those interested in American history, Lexington is a must-see destination. Considered the Birthplace of American Liberty, the first shots of the American Revolutionary War were fired on the Lexington Battle Green, which is just footsteps away from The Inn. Guests can also visit nearby Walden Pond, where famous American author, poet and transcendentalist Henry David Thoreau lived. The 22 guest rooms and suites at The Inn at Hastings Park are arranged in three meticulously restored historic buildings: The Main House, originally built in 1888 as the private home of one of Lexington's first families; the Isaac Mulliken House, a private residence built in 1841 for the spirited local politician; and The Barn, which served as Mulliken's original carpentry shop.