Getting Hot + Heavy

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We’re writing our first miscellany with a few things in mind: beach retreats (because it’s been cold as **** in our neck of the woods), romance and engagements, and blissing out for a few days with friends.

Beach Blanket Bisou

Our recommendations for a perfect warm-weather getaway.

Maroma, A Belmond Hotel
You’ll fly into busy Cancun but feel a zillion miles away in this jungle-meets-beach haven along the Riviera Maya a mere half hour from the airport. The resort has just undergone an extensive renovation, which means you’ll find everything gleams — in style, sustainability, and substance. But because the casitas were built in the 1970s before newer construction regulations, you’re living — breakfast in bed, swinging on your hammock — much closer to the sea than you could at newer resorts that line the coastline. Everything you want for a relaxing, romantic break is here: expansive spa, swimming pools, beachside restaurants and bar, an elegant boutique, and fun experiences (snorkel the Mesoamerican reef; take a tortilla master class with chef Emmanuel Coatl and tortilla queen Olivia Cortes). Read more on Fathom.

Esperanza, Auberge Resorts Collection  
Baja, California, has really upped its resort game over the last few years, but in our view, not enough people are extolling the natural wonders of the region – mountains, Pacific Ocean, Gulf of California, Pueblo Magico (Todos Santos), the world’s largest cactus, and the lagoons where gray whales birth their young. Whoa. Even if you don’t get out to experience Mother Nature’s bounty you can just FEEL it while perched on a secluded bluff overlooking two coves at Punta Ballena; the romantic resort is one of the most private hotel properties in Cabo San Lucas. It’s all margaritas and fireworks. Read more on Fathom.

Golden Rock Dive & Nature Resort
How deep is your love? Explore that topic as you scuba through 36 amazing dive sites, including a reef made from a submerged school bus. The sustainable luxury resort on 40 plant-filled acres sits on a cliff at the base of a dormant volcano on St. Eustatius, the Dutch Caribbean island you’ve never heard of. (It’s a 15-minute hop from St. Marten.) 

An Urban Proposal: New York City

Turn up the romance this winter.

SPA

Strip down and sweat together.

The new Bathhouse Flatiron is taking reservations. (The original outpost, with dry and wet rooms and a plunge pool, is in Williamsburg.) Catch the 15-minute aufguss sauna ritual if you can stand the heat — it’s pretty entertaining.

Mudéjar-style lair Aire Ancient Baths offers candle-lit thermal baths and massages in Tribeca.

SMALL SHOPS

The boutiques themselves are little gems.

Drop dead over vintage showpieces and quiet stunners at jewelry store Doyle & Doyle. By appointment only in Union Square. Seriously special stuff.

Talk about engagements casually and try on all the jewels at Gray and Davis in the West Village.

SHOWS TO SEE

The theme is femme.

Terce: A Practical Breviary is an egalitarian, ragtag rethinking of morning mass in song — chant, gospel, New Orleans funk — centered around nature and the divine feminine (Robin Wall Kimmerer is a spiritual guiding force). Performed in an old church in Fort Greene by a community choir that plays hand games, serves tea, vacuums, and performs other tasks usually considered women’s work. Through Feb 4, 2024

In Arte! Arte! Arte! the ecstatic 80-year-old Argentine conceptual artist Marta Minujín showcases six decades of her playful, colorful, wild soft sculptures, neon paintings, and performance art happenings. Through March 31, 2024

Our disrespect for Mother Nature is laid bare in Broken Spectre, Richard Mosse’s art film chronicling the ecological devastation of the Amazon rainforest and its Indigenous peoples. On display for the first time in NYC in what will be the future home of the new Jack Shainman gallery. Through March 16, 2024.

SHARE PLATES

A transporting meal always feels like a grand gesture. 

NOMA alum Mads Refslund spent years and frequent flier miles before opening Ilis in Greenpoint. The space, a former rubber factory, is surprisingly warm, dominated by an open kitchen where teams of chefs prepare and serve plates almost too pretty to eat.

Pretend you’re living in Gilded Age splendor at Cafe Carmellini — especially if you nab a table on a Juliet balcony overlooking the tree-filled atrium. (They were designed for mischief.) The menu is as elegant as the surroundings — a meunière here, scattered osetra there. 

If Rome feels a little too far for dinner, head to SoHo and Roscioli, which has done an impressive job of recreating many features that make the via dei Giubbonari original so charming — a dining room in an intimate basement, a well-stocked bottega on the ground floor. 

Let’s not forget oldies but goodies, like One if By Land, Two If By Sea (people can’t help but propose here) and the always sexy Raoul’s.

SUBTERRANEAN SNUGGLE

When the night falls, it’s fun to go underground.Precision cocktails, “placebos” (a fun name for non-alcoholic drinks), and bites are served in Spygold’s dark, cozy, fire lit bar underneath chef Dan Kluger’s delicious Greywind. 

Sotto is a chic little Negroni bar below Nomad steakhouse Lupetto.

GREAT STAY

Our lesser-known romantic hotel picks.

The Lowell
Uptown’s five-star stunner with elegant fireplaces, a concierge ready to unlock the city for you, and over-the-top dining rooms for meals, tea, and cocktails. Feel your way around all the cashmere, marble, and polished oak.

Nine Orchard
So many cool NYC design people came together to create this beautiful hotel (case in point: Tyler Hays made the porcelain toilet paper holders) in a century-old bank building on the Lower East Side. Get dressed-up and order martinis in one of the half-moon booths in the elegant Swan Room.

The Marlton Hotel
The rooms are comically tiny but the living room fireplace is cozy as hell, the morning lobby scene is totally wild (picture O.G. Village residents and their lap dogs having tea); and the prime downtown location is a no-brainer for a spontaneous sleepover after a fun night on the town.

Fouquet’s New York
A quiet stretch of Tribeca. A screening room with overstuffed chaise longues. A secret/not-so-secret bar behind a door in the lobby wall. That whiff of Frenchy Frenchness. In short, it’s got everything you’d want in a glamorous hideaway lair. 

A Valentine for You and Your Friends

Play together, stay together.

On the East Coast …. The Ranch Hudson Valley
You’ll be among the first at the new outpost of the beloved Malibu hiking-and-wellness program, now available in shorter stints for busy city folk. Opening this spring. 

On the West Coast …. Indian Springs 
The historic Calistoga resort isn’t as fancy as other Napa spas nearby — and that’s exactly why we like it. And for the Olympic-sized, geyser-fed mineral pool and the restorative volcanic mud baths. Chill out afterwards in a bungalow around your fire pit.

In Mexico …. SHA Wellness Clinic
Boy, do we really wanna go here. The brand new beach location on Costa Mujeres in the Yucatan Peninsula, offers nature’s beauty plus a program of tailored-to-you medical disciplines, minimally invasive therapies, healthy meals, and natural treatments led by a team of experts.

Steam Up the Suitcase

Nice things to have and to hold.

Black tie pajamas — Super sleek pill case — Ideal brick red — Couples card game — Sex stone — A pourover candle

Have a good one, lovers.

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