PRICE:
Frommer's Very Highly Recommended

Small-scale and luxe, Hôtel Villa Belrose is set within a sloping garden in Gassin, an upscale residential neighborhood within a 10-minute drive northwest of St-Tropez. It was built in 1997 in an ocher-and-white-walled replica of a rambling private villa, with views that sweep from most of the bedrooms out over the gulf of St-Tropez. Bedrooms in this hideaway are lavishly and opulently accessorized with fine linens and lots of upscale toiletries in the bathrooms, but there's no disguising the fact that they fall midway along the spectrum of being either cozy or cramped, depending on your point of view. In many cases, glass doors open onto private terraces, a well-landscaped garden with plenty of botanical surprises and charm, and those magnificently ethereal views. Much of the establishment's identity derives from its elegant restaurant, open daily for lunch and dinner to nonresidents with reservations in advance. Chef Thierry Thiercelin prepares fixed-price menus that focus on Mediterranean cuisine that's as chic as St-Tropez itself.

Copyright: Excerpted from Frommer's Provence & the Riviera, 6th Edition, (c) 2008, Wiley Publishing, Inc.

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