1 Hotels is the luxury hotel brand that has most successfully resolved the tension between environmental seriousness and commercial appeal — between the earnest sustainability commitments that typically alienate the luxury traveler and the design excellence and service quality that attracts them. Founded in 2015 by SH Hotels & Resorts, the brand has expanded from a single South Beach property to a global portfolio of ten-plus hotels by doing something that seemed counterintuitive at the time: treating sustainability not as a moral argument but as an aesthetic one. Reclaimed timber, living plant walls, natural linen, and raw organic textures are not primarily a commitment to reduced environmental impact; they are a design language that is, by any fair assessment, more beautiful than the gilt and marble of traditional luxury. The environmental benefits follow from the aesthetic choices rather than preceding them — and this sequence of motivation has made 1 Hotels the sustainable luxury brand that the luxury traveler actually wants to stay at. For a direct comparison with Six Senses — the wellness-led alternative — see our 1 Hotels vs. Six Senses comparison guide.
The 1 Hotels Design Philosophy
The visual language that Barry Sternlicht and the SH Hotels design team developed for 1 Hotels begins with a single premise: the finest materials available are not marble, gold leaf, and custom-woven carpets, but the materials produced by the natural world around the building's location. Reclaimed timber from demolished urban structures; stone quarried from the local geology; plants native to the surrounding landscape; textiles in natural, undyed fibres — these are not substitutes for luxury materials, they are an argument that the luxury hotel industry has been reaching past the finest materials available to produce interiors that are more expensive but less beautiful than the natural world would suggest.
The result is immediately distinctive: a 1 Hotel lobby is characterised by the soft textures of worn wood and organic linen, by the living green of the plant installations that run from floor to ceiling, by the particular smell of a building whose materials have not been treated with the synthetic finishes that most hotel construction uses. It is a sensory environment that no amount of gilt and marble can replicate, and it has proven compelling to a demographic — affluent, design-literate, environmentally conscious, urbanised — that the traditional luxury hotel has never fully served.
The Properties: Flagship to Latest
1 Hotel South Beach, Miami Beach
The flagship and the property that established the 1 Hotels brand identity. On Collins Avenue — in the Art Deco district whose 20th-century buildings are themselves an argument about the relationship between design and materiality — the South Beach property occupies a campus of restored Art Deco buildings with 426 rooms, a rooftop pool with Miami's finest skyline view, three pools total, and the Bamford Wellness Spa (a partnership with the British organic wellness brand that brings a specifically natural and botanical spa philosophy to the Miami market). The food and beverage program spans five outlets, including Matador Room — the hotel's signature restaurant whose Latin American–influenced menu draws on the neighbourhood's Cuban and Caribbean culinary heritage. 1 Hotel South Beach holds LEED Gold certification, making it one of the highest-certified luxury hotels in the United States. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel South Beach.
1 Hotel Central Park, New York
On West 58th Street — at the southern end of Central Park, in the block that houses the most concentrated luxury hotel presence in the United States (The Plaza is one block east; the Ritz-Carlton Central Park is across the park) — 1 Hotel Central Park applies the brand's biophilic design language to a Midtown Manhattan building. The 229 rooms face either Central Park or the Midtown skyline; the rooftop terrace provides one of the finest urban views in New York. The proximity to Central Park — which the hotel treats as an extension of its own green space, organising trail runs, birdwatching walks, and picnic programs through the park — makes the brand's nature-engagement philosophy specific to this location in a way that distinguishes it from a generic luxury midtown hotel. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel Central Park.
1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, New York
On the Brooklyn waterfront below the Brooklyn Bridge — with the most dramatic view of the Manhattan skyline available from any luxury hotel in New York, and a neighbourhood that has evolved from industrial to the city's most concentrated design, restaurant, and arts district in the decade since the hotel opened — 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge is the brand's most architecturally ambitious New York property. The 194 rooms are larger than standard Manhattan hotel rooms; the rooftop Harriet's Lounge is one of New York's finest bar settings; and the Bamford Spa program, the farm-to-table restaurant, and the brand's characteristic organic textiles and reclaimed materials apply the 1 Hotels philosophy to a building that is itself a landmark of adaptive reuse. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge.
1 Hotel West Hollywood, Los Angeles
On Sunset Boulevard — at the heart of the Sunset Strip, adjacent to the Chateau Marmont and above the city's most concentrated entertainment industry geography — 1 Hotel West Hollywood is the brand's most design-forward property, applying the organic material palette to a California context where the indoor-outdoor distinction barely exists. The rooftop pool deck faces the Santa Monica Mountains; the wellness program is oriented toward the particularly California-inflected wellness culture of breathwork, sound healing, and plant-based nutrition; and the ETARU Japanese-Peruvian restaurant (a Nikkei cuisine format) anchors the hotel's food and beverage program in one of the most competitive restaurant markets in the world. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel West Hollywood.
1 Hotel Hanalei Bay, Kauai, Hawaii
On the north shore of Kauai — facing Hanalei Bay, the most celebrated natural landscape in Hawaii and the location whose Na Pali Coast cliffs are among the most visually dramatic in the United States — 1 Hotel Hanalei Bay is the brand's most environmentally specific property: a hotel whose relationship with the Hawaiian landscape is more than aesthetic. The property's conservation programs engage with the native species and reef ecosystems of the Hanalei Bay watershed; the food and beverage program draws on Hawaiian agricultural produce with a specificity that the mainland properties' locally sourced claims cannot match; and the physical environment — the Pacific Ocean, the Kauai mountains, the endemic Hawaiian flora — makes the brand's nature-integration philosophy literal rather than metaphorical. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel Hanalei Bay.
1 Hotel San Francisco
In the SoMa neighbourhood — adjacent to the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) and the Yerba Buena Gardens, at the intersection of the city's technology, art, and finance districts — 1 Hotel San Francisco occupies a former Intercontinental building redesigned with the brand's full material palette. The city's proximity to some of the finest organic produce sources in the United States (Sonoma, Napa, the Central Valley) allows the food and beverage program to operate local sourcing commitments that are more substantive than in most urban hotel markets. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel San Francisco.
1 Hotel Nashville
In the Gulch — Nashville's former rail district, now the city's design and culinary centre — 1 Hotel Nashville represents the brand's most southern property and the one whose relationship with an emerging city rather than an established luxury market is most specific. The Tennessee landscape's agricultural heritage (Tennessee whiskey, country ham, the Appalachian botanical tradition) provides a specific local sourcing narrative; the Bamford Spa's treatment menu incorporates Appalachian botanical ingredients that are specific to this geography. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel Nashville.
1 Hotel Mayfair, London
On Albemarle Street in Mayfair — adjacent to The Royal Academy of Arts and within the most concentrated luxury hotel geography in Europe — 1 Hotel Mayfair is the brand's first and most significant European expansion. The challenge of applying a nature-immersion philosophy to a Georgian building in central London is met through the plant installations and organic material palette that the brand has refined across its American properties, combined with a food and beverage program that draws on the British seasonal produce tradition — specifically, the suppliers to the finest London restaurants who are increasingly the brand's kitchen's partners. The Bamford Wellness Spa (the brand's British partnership, whose flagship is in the Cotswolds) is particularly well-suited to a London context. Preferred partner perks at 1 Hotel Mayfair.
The Sustainability Commitments: What the Brand Actually Does
Beyond the design language, 1 Hotels operates substantive environmental programs that distinguish its sustainability commitment from greenwashing. LEED certification at multiple properties (South Beach holds Gold) requires measured performance across energy, water, materials, and indoor environmental quality — independently verified. The brand's food and beverage program operates a genuine local sourcing standard, with seasonal menus that change with what local agriculture produces rather than maintaining year-round consistency through imported ingredients. The Bamford Spa partnership brings the British organic wellness and beauty brand's commitment to natural, synthetic-free product formulation to all US and European properties. The plant installations throughout every property — which are not decorative choices but living organisms that improve indoor air quality and reduce the building's reliance on mechanical air processing — are maintained by horticulturalists rather than styled by interior designers.
The Loyalty Program: Inner Circle
1 Hotels operates the Inner Circle loyalty program — a points-accumulation system that rewards stays and spending across the portfolio with room upgrades, spa credits, and food and beverage benefits. The program is smaller than Marriott Bonvoy or Hyatt World of Hyatt, but the brand's concentrated portfolio means that frequent guests — particularly those who travel regularly to New York, Los Angeles, Miami, and London, where 1 Hotels has multiple properties — accumulate status and benefits efficiently. The brand's preferred partner booking through WhataHotel! delivers the standard preferred partner perks (breakfast, hotel credit, upgrade priority) at the same rate as direct booking, with full Inner Circle points earning on every stay.