How the Highlands became cool

Our writer checks into the seriously stylish Boath House in Scotland

This is the first time I’ve stayed somewhere that I thought was a bit too cool for me. And, with every sense of my own ridiculousness, I think I’m fairly cool. Boath House was built in the late 1820s as a fancy family home, with handsome dome-vaulted ceilings, curved wooden doors set into similarly curved walls, and glitzy ionic pillars in the hallway. For too long in recent times, it was a dump of a hotel. There are pictures lurking online, taken before it changed hands, showing unlovely rooms with the heavy patterns and colour of a vaguely posh, absolutely dispiriting, retirement home.
It was taken over in 2022 by the team behind Sessions Arts Club in Farringdon (one of my default London lunch spots, at least until chef Florence Knight left). The newcomers tarted it up, or rather down, into a minimalist refuge of spartan interiors, with big-name contemporary art, artfully arranged apples that will never be eaten, and strategically placed copies of Kinfolk magazine. This year, there were more changes. Knight was here, now she isn’t. Taking over in the kitchen: Philip Mcenaney and Katie Austin, moving from Michelin-starred Trinity in London’s Clapham. When I was staying, dinner had a full house, with far more people there than could have been in residence. It’s become the place for a special meal in this part of the Highlands. And dinner here is special. 
I had the “experience” tasting menu (seven courses), but you can choose two courses (£32) or three (£42) from the shorter “artists” menu. I’d probably opt for the latter for a lunch, but a leisurely evening here, enjoying a series of small, delicious plates, arranged like mini sculptures, with bright colours and floral touches, is a joy. The flavours and textures are fresh and surprising – a turret of steak tartare with crisped leek, topped with blossoms, is one of the best things I have eaten this year. Everything that landed on my table was impressive, although I wanted to tidy up some of the sewing on the jackets the staff were wearing. That aside, service here is wonderful, and it’s a happy place. I noticed that the waiters had been schmoozed into serving pizzas (usually only available from the garden café outside) to the children at the table behind me. When the youngsters left to run around the grounds, the parents devoured the leftovers.
Boath House doesn’t quite work as a hotel. It is an elevated restaurant with rooms. There’s a nice drawing room in the main house, but you often won’t see staff for quite some time. There was, apparently, an honesty bar, but that seems to be gone. There is, however, a spa and screening room area in the basement of the main house. If you want something during the afternoon, you can feel somewhat adrift. There was also no turndown in my room before bed and no towels on arrival. Still, a lot of thought has gone into what Boath House should look like and be in the 2020s. And the art dotted around the place provides a fun way to join the dots, room to room – looking for Luke Edward Hall, Ryan Gander and Julian Schnabel.
I was staying in the Drawing Studio, a short walk across the grounds. There’s also a Writing Studio near the café, reached via a stroll through some of the most beautiful landscaping and flowers I’ve seen in Scotland. You could, indeed, do what the names of the rooms suggest you do, for quite some time. They’d make for a lovely retreat, with ornate woodburners and good Bluetooth speakers. There’s drama in the minimalism, too: my bathroom wasn’t just dark, it was sepulchral – lit during the day with narrow, Caravaggio shafts of sunshine from above.
Every room at Boath House is different, and while there are the freestanding tubs you would expect in the bathrooms of a romantic country-house retreat, the overall mood is hard-edged – it’s more austere than a lot of places you may have been to. Whether you love this or not depends on you. I like it. I certainly adore the food. But it’s not cosy. It has a raw glamour. It’s the kind of place where they use the simplest, cheapest white candles – no scents, no beeswax. They are confident enough to strip things down to basics, and tell you that less is more, and that’s modern luxury. And maybe with grounds this pretty, and food this good, they’re right. Maybe.
Doubles from £395, including breakfast. There are no fully accessible rooms.
Boath House, Auldearn, Nairn IV12 (01667 454896)