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The best hotels in the Lake District
Like Beatrix Potter herself, the Lake District is a national treasure–the wildly beautiful embodiment of pastoral Britain, where walkers, rock climbers or mountain bikers are rarely deterred by showers and squirrel nutkins dart between trees lining the vast lakes. Declared a Unesco World Heritage Site in 2017, this splendid, poetic landscape naturally hosts some superb hotels, some of which are charming enough to be included in one of Potter’s storybooks. There are certain Lake District rituals you can enjoy here: the just-so afternoon tea, the Cumbrian sausage (a local hero) and the sticky toffee pudding (a Francis Coulson creation), to name just a few. From aristocratic piles lording over Wordsworth-ian lakes to cockle-warming pubs with rooms, here are the best hotels in the Lake District. If you absolutely require a spa, take note, there are one or two included here, or you can look at our round-up of the best spa hotels in the Lake District. And if self-catering in a charming cottage appeals, then check out our guide to the best Lake District Airbnbs to book now.
What is the best area to stay in the Lake District?
There's an area for everyone, really. Whether you're more a Wordsworth type or a wild swimming enthusiast. Ambleside is the perfect jumping off point for your Lake District trip, full of fabulous shops, restaurants and hotels. Walkers and climbers, too, will particularly enjoy Ambleside's easy access to some of the area's finest trails and rocky hills (do pay a visit to the Stock Ghyll Force, a spectacular 70-foot waterfall!). Follow our guide on the Lake District's most beautiful towns and villages for a longer read.
The best hotels in the Lake District
1/8Rothay Manor, Ambleside
This Ambleside Regency villa will appeal both to the traditionalists, with its prim-and-proper dressed manor house, and the modernists who will relish the new Pavilion’s Art Deco-designed suites. Their blend of primary green wood panelling, scalloped lampshades and merlot velvet headboards strike a stylish rather than faddy note, one that will age well. Period features, cushioned window seats and fantastical wallpaper deck the classic rooms in the main villa, whose symmetrical, shuttered facade and pretty wooden balcony spanning the length of the building evokes the sense of a Victorian riviera.
The colours of the interiors reflect the soft landscape enveloping the hotel: sage greens, oat, buttermilk and creams. And there’s a sense that bona fide country life, dogs-n’-all, can exist amid the sumptuous furnishings (there’s a washroom for muddy hounds and a dog-friendly restaurant, The Brathay Room, with a no-nonsense menu). Indeed, food sits front and centre at Rothay Manor, particularly in the imposing main restaurant, where seasonality is a guiding force and the Lake District's bounty is on offer. Expect local classics with Japanese and Scandinavian flourishes from star chef, Dan McGeorge, whose 2021 win on BBC Two’s Great British Menu comes as little surprise once you’ve dipped your proverbial toe in his tasting menu. Walkers bound for Ambleside and Windermere fuel up on proper coffee, kedgeree and truffled mushrooms and avocado on toast at breakfast before setting off on picturesque romps.
- Doubles from: £200 (from £400 in the Pavilion)
- Address: Borrans Rd, Ambleside LA22 0EH
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2/8Langdale Chase, Windermere
This grand Victorian house on the shores of Lake Windermere makes for a deeply comfortable place from which to explore the beauty of the Lake District. For me, the recently renovated hotel was a perfect lure to entice my family to dip their toes (literally) into the Lakes for the time.
On a warm summer’s evening having a drink or dinner on the long terrace with its grand balustrade overlooking England’s largest lake, I imagine you could fool yourself you were actually on Lake Como. Right on the waterfront, you can swim from the jetty below the hotel and there is so much to do and explore within a short drive but you could easily get away with never venturing beyond the hotel’s grounds. The staff are chatty and helpful and keen to make sure you get the most out of your stay.
The house was built in 1890 for a wealthy Manchester businessman and is grand in scale and ambition with turrets, gables and stained glass galore. Everything revolves around the Great Hall, a double-height, panelled space, but all main reception rooms and bedrooms look out to the extraordinary lake view. The hotel sits in a six-acre garden laid out in 1890 and which is currently being restored and reimagined by Annie Guilfoyle. - Hatta Byng
- Rooms and Langdale Chase start from £166 for two people sharing, including breakfast.
- Address: Ambleside Road, Ecclerigg, Windermere LA23 1LW
3/8Askham Hall, Askham
This turreted and rather austere medieval family seat-turned-hotel on the quiet northern fringes of the Lake District’s big hitters, Askham Hall refreshingly swaps stiff family portraits for modern art and creates an unexpectedly warm atmosphere. Deep mullion windows in the bedrooms and sitting rooms frame bucolic views of the surrounding countryside. Sun-bleached heirloom rugs warm original flagstone floors, fireplaces are suitably sooty and elegant sofas and cushioned ottomans are the comforting trappings of an old-money country pile.
Much of Richard Swale’s Michelin star tasting menu is plucked from the estate’s kitchen gardens and 40 acres of meadows and woodland. Expect plates such as Lowther red deer with local cep and kale, North Sea hake with mussels and clams or an Askham Hall garden salad with sheep’s curd and truffle. For a more casual supper, Askham’s garden cafe opens from spring through to the end of summer, serving hearty, kitchen garden salads and wood-fired pizzas.
Aside from serious hikes or lake cruises at nearby Ullswater or fishing expeditions to the estate’s own beat, Askham’s main event is its gardens, whose manicured lawns are framed by vibrant flowers and whose fields are home to wandering hens, ducks and goats.
- Doubles from: £150
- Address: Askham Hall, Askham, Penrith CA10 2PF
4/8Another Place, The Lake, Ullswater
While several hotels offer views of the lakes, or well-trodden walks through the fells from their front door, Another Place sits right on Ullswater. Various watersports are within reach from the hotel’s private jetty and a glass-encased infinity pool appears immersed in the surrounding green splendour. As sister hotel to Cornwall’s Watergate Bay, Another Place shares its resolve to make the most of the setting, with wild swimming sessions into glassy Ullswater, kayaking and stand up paddleboarding.
While a pocket-sized spa, hot tub and board game stocked library are solid insurance for days of endless drizzle, the form here is to jump into a wetsuit or walking gear, locate the dog lead (pooches are welcome) and head outside. Filled to the brim with endorphins and fresh, Lake District air, guests can retreat to lavish rooms that blend modern shapes and prints with cushioned-and-carpeted old fashioned decadence.
Six swishy shepherd’s huts and a treehouse marvel are a more rustic-luxe proposition, with glass roofs for star gazing above the immensely comfortable beds, copper baths, fire pits for roasting marshmallows or warming cold toes, and sweeping lake views.
- Doubles from: £210
- Lake District National Park, Another Place The Lake, Ullswater, Watermillock CA11 0LP
5/8The Samling, Windermere
With its privileged perch at the northern tip of Windermere, amid acres of garden, field and forest, The Samling is a justly beloved Lake District hotel. The Georgian building’s grandeur is softened with pretty wooden parapet carving and a jolly white exterior amid the surrounding green. Walls in muted colours are adorned with eyebrow-raising artworks, including a Matisse and Chagall.
A mere 12 rooms - spread across the main house and surrounding cottages - ensure an excellent level of service, whether you're booking into the hot tub after a long walk (some suites have their own), organising a boat trip from the jetty or a wine list conveniently appearing having been engulfed by the velvet sofas. A glass-encased cube of restaurant has been added to the original Gothic house, revealing the remarkable lake views and setting the stage for sublime fine dining theatre. Here, Robby Jenks’ team has artfully curated a three or five course locavore tasting menu (expect veal sweetbread, hoggart with turnip and sorrel–all lathered in colourful sauces). The Gathering is a more low key à la carte affair in a reimagined Dutch barn, though it shares the same beautiful vista over the lake.
- Doubles from: £490
- Address: Ambleside Rd, Windermere LA23 1LR
6/8L’Enclume, Cartmel
One for the gastronomes. Simon Rogan’s Michelin-starred restaurant-with-rooms is the epitome of elevated simplicity, with Nordic furniture filling a traditional cottage canvas of flagstones, exposed beams and bumpy plastered walls. Rooms are scattered throughout the village of Cartmel in the southern Lakes. These range from cottages to suites in a fine town house, with period features, rich, decadent hues and zeitgeisty furniture. It's fun to stay in the village as opposed to a gated hotel, getting up close to its artisanal boutiques and getting lost in the warren of lime washed and stone-built houses and inns. These coalesce around a vast Norman Priory (worth a visit) and provide the perfect setting for L'Enclume’s fabled lunches.
The alchemical theatre takes place in the former forge’s two restaurants, where seasonal-local trailblazer Simon Rogan crafts flawless and fiercely innovative tasting plates such as fritter of Duroc pig and and smoked eel with lovage and fermented sweetcorn, Duncan cabbage cooked in buttermilk with Welsh truffles and frozen Tunworth cheese with malt crumb and greengage. This culinary rhapsody is beautifully paired with finely-tuned wines. When you're done, take a long afternoon romp through Morecambe Bay’s melancholic mudflats and vast expanse of sand (just over half an hour’s drive away).
- Doubles from: £130
- Address: Cavendish St, Cartmel, Grange-over-Sands LA11 6QA
7/8The Drunken Duck Inn and Restaurant, Ambleside
Another gastronomic destination, The Drunken Duck is the characterful pub with rooms that foodie ramblers long for and, once discovered, will dictate walking routes and itineraries forever. Having traipsed around the shores of Windermere, it's heaven to pitch up here for a venison suet pudding or celeriac pie lunch, rounded off with the pub’s own ale, brewed on site. Then it's boots back on for afternoons spent pootling around nearby Ambleside and Hawkshead (of Beatrix Potter lore). A substantial revamp downstairs has spruced up this beloved pub without losing any of its character (see the olive beams festooned with brassworks and hops and the walls covered in framed Victoriana pictures). The rooms above the pub and in the courtyard are traditional with a touch of quirk, such as the odd splash of purple or French boudoir style headboard.
- Doubles from £99
- Address: Barngates, Ambleside LA22 0NG
8/8Gilpin House Hotel and Lake House, Windermere
This Lake District stalwart has cleverly reinvented itself, rejecting fustiness for something decidedly more au courant. The family-owned hotel has added to its original Edwardian main house with a group of Scandinavian flavour lodges and garden suites, along with a cleverly designed and fiercely private Lake House (fashioned from an old fishing lodge), which sleeps up to six people.
Positioned on the fringes of the National Park, Gilpin may not peer over Windermere but its various walking routes centre around the lake, which lies within easy reach. The main house has undergone an extensive facelift, opting for a modern classicism in the rooms and communal areas, while preserving a degree of log-fire cosiness for Lake District first timers.
Lodges and garden suites - with plenty of glass, wood and indoor fires - are a magnet for city types with glossy notions of rural escapes, featuring their own hot tubs or saunas. The food here is top-drawer: a bold interplay of Indian and Asian flavours and the Lake District’s fabled local produce. The hotel is taking its culinary reputation to new heights with Ollie Bridgwater (ex Fat Duck), Aakash Ohol (ex HRiSHi at Gilpin) and Tom Westerland (ex Lucknam Park) the trio mooted to place Gilpin at the very top of the British foodie map. SOURCE will replace the former restaurant HRiSHi, Spice remains unchanged and the newly opened Glöo at the Lake House will together be sufficient reason to chug north, lakes and luxe lodges aside.
- Doubles from: £295
- Address: Crook Rd, Windermere LA23 3NE
