|
|
|
|||||||
|
|
Southern Vermont Expatriate Brits Ann and Barry Poulter had enjoyed renovating houses in their spare time, but this was something else: a rundown, 24-room ski lodge and restaurant that catered to the bus group trade. The couple spent three years and several million dollars renovating what a fellow innkeeper termed “a dump” into an almost all-new, fifteen room, generally upscale inn that aforementioned innkeeper calls “the best rooms in the valley.” Certainly the common rooms and eight of the guest rooms rank among the best in this stark white, two-level structure that looked quite unremarkable from the road upon opening in 2003. The interior is another story. “We gutted it and started over – Ann designed and I constructed,” said Barry, a former Manhattan ad agency art director who did much of the renovation work himself. The main entry opens into a foyer with a wood-paneled bar that proved so inviting it doubles as the reception area. Across the way is a stunning living room with massive fieldstone fireplace, plush dark brown sofas and chairs in one section and lighter furnishings in the front section. Dividers topped by colorful teapots separate the two sections from each other and from the expansive rear breakfast room, sunny and elegant with individual tables draped in yellow and white. It opens onto a lovely back deck overlooking the North Branch of the Deerfield River and woods beyond. Several more small common rooms are scattered here and there through the various wings of the inn. The most deluxe guest rooms are six above the main-floor common areas in the South Wing, plus two in North Wing. All have step-up king or queen canopy or poster beds, gas or wood-burning fireplaces and modern baths with jacuzzi tubs. Five have private balconies. Each is individually decorated by Ann, who is partial to subtle floral wallpapers, 300-count bed linens, down comforters, Molton Brown toiletries from England and TV/DVD players concealed in armoires. Five are “demi-suites” with substantial sitting areas or alcoves behind arched doorways. The cathedral-ceilinged honeymoon suite comes with surround sound, flat-screen TV and a jacuzzi for two in the bedroom. Seven standard rooms in the North Wing with queen beds, shower baths and table-top TVs are modest in comparison. The Poulters serve a full breakfast, ordered off a menu. Choices include challah french toast, buttermilk pancakes with “blueberries we pick ourselves,” eggs any style and the house specialty, baked eggs in ham crisps. (802) 464-8303 or (877) 531-4500. Fax (802) 464-3323. E-mail: seasons4@sover.net. For more information: www.thefourseasonsinn.com. Nine rooms and five demi-suites with private
baths. Winter and foliage: doubles $165 to $250 weekends, $150 to $220
midweek; suites $275 to $325 weekends, $130 to $275 midweek. April to
mid-September: doubles $130 to $180 weekends, $120 to $160 midweek;
suites $195 to $235 weekends, $175 to $195 midweek. Two-night minimum
weekends. Material excerpted from Inn Spots & Special Places in New England, by Nancy and Richard Woodworth. Copyright 2004. Wood Pond Press E-mail feedback to: Home
page |
Full destination index | |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
