She Left L.A. for This California City and Isn’t Looking Back

Plus, Central Park's Designers Had a Favorite NYC Park—and It Wasn't Central Park

Manage newsletters View in browser The entire world in your inbox. Hello all–   Happy March! In the spirit of spring cleaning, I have a couple of housekeeping notes. First, I am acquiescing to popular demand and our series on exciting new hotels, currently The New Room with a View, will now be called Room Key. Nearly every email I get about the series uses that as its name, so Room Key it is. Our latest for the series showcases the brand new sister hotel of Cartagena's most iconic property—the Sofitel Legend Santa Clara.    Second bit of programming news is that later this spring we're going to be expanding our coverage of food and drink as it relates to travel–so writers and publicists with Beast-y ideas, hit me up!      Don't miss the latest feature from our It's Still a Big World series on underrated destinations. Kevinisha Walker tried living in Los Angeles, and it just wasn't the right fit. But on a visit to Long Beach, she fell in love and she shares her story of what captivated her in what is now her home city.   I particularly love the excerpt we're running this week from Architects of an American Landscape: Henry Hobson Richardson, Frederick Law Olmsted, and the Reimagining of America's Public and Private Spaces. It reveals something I didn't know until I read it–that Central Park was not Olmsted's favorite park he ever designed. Instead, it's one in Brooklyn (where I used to take my dog)!   Finally, I hope you enjoy the tale of one of the chicest houses I've ever been to–architect Eliel Saarinen's residence just outside Detroit. Sometimes when you visit a house museum you daydream about what it would have been like to dance, drink, or eat within its confines, but I think I might have been too intimidated here!   —William O'Connor, Travel Editor America's Chicest House is Just Outside Detroit It's a home that pulls from every thread of design history, a stark contrast to the anti-history ideas about to take over architecture. Central Park's Designers Had a Favorite NYC Park—and It Wasn't Central Park Brooklyn now rivals Manhattan as a great place to live, work and visit—and its city park is at least the equal of the famous Central Park. I Left L.A. for this California City and Am Not Looking Back Just south of L.A., there's a city where it's slightly less expensive to live, the traffic is not nearly as terrible, and the people are friendly. Cartagena's Most Famous Hotel Just Got a Sibling For years, tourists have made visiting the Sofitel in Cartagena a must. Now the group has a brand new beachfront property up the coast. "A closer look at the reality of vanlife, however, shows that it isn't always as glamorous as it appears on Instagram. For those dedicated to it, vanlife is a complicated mix that includes a daily frustration with the simplest of things, while also providing opportunities for personal discovery." – Brandon Withrow takes a closer look at one of the more popular movements in travel over the last decade, van life. OMG I Want to Rent This House!      Maison Grace, New Orleans, LA (Vrbo): One of the most distinctive things about New Orleans is the history that runs through every street, every sound, every tasty morsel that comes out of city. It's a characteristic that should be embraced in every way possible when you visit the Big Easy, especially during Mardi Gras season. Sure, you can do this by enjoying some jazz on Frenchmen Street and visiting the French Quarter and eating all the beignets at Cafe du Monde. But you can also embrace this spirit by choosing to stay in a place that embodies the rich history of the city—say, a former mid-century warehouse converted into a spacious home in a neighborhood that was originally settled in the early 19th century.   Let's get the most important thing out of the way first: the pool. Sultry, southern Louisiana has the tendency to get a little warm, even in the winter. Since taking a dip in the Mississippi isn't advised (strong current, vast expanse, muddy quality… the list goes on), it's a treat to have access to your own private source of still water to cool off in right outside your back door.   Book Your Stay: Maison Grace, New Orleans, LA $1,350/night via Vrbo   Don't miss previous OMG, I Want to Rent This House posts, which spotlight the most spectacular and unique homes that you can actually stay in.  Check out the full archives.  Travel the World Through One of the Most Spectacular Design Obsessions   Some people travel for a good time, others do it because of an obsession–climbing the world's tallest peaks or seeing every Vermeer painting. Our latest selection for Just Booked (our series on gorgeous coffee table books) is Dragons & Pagodas: A Celebration of Chinoiserie and it's a way of traveling the world through a double layer of obsession. The book is a world tour based on the author Aldous Bertram's obsession with chinoiserie, which itself was a 17th and 18th century design craze based on a European obsession with the Far East.   The book, published by Vendome, is a visual delight, which is no surprise to anybody who is familiar with Bertram through his curated Instagram feed. Dragons & Pagodas traces the history of chinoiserie and the variety this obsession produced, whether it be elegant bathrooms in Wales, tea houses in Rhode Island, or wonders like the pyramid ceiling in Lisbon's Santos Palace.   Bertram has managed to produce a coffee table book that will make you not only whip out a notepad to write down all the palaces and houses you now simply must visit, but also leaves you far more knowledgeable about such an influential and lasting component of the decorative art world. 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