30 Most Unusual Hotels in the World, Extraordinary Stays You Won't Believe Exist

The world has too many beige hotel rooms. If you’re reading this, you already know there’s another way — accommodation so original that the stay itself becomes the centrepiece of the trip. We’ve catalogued the most extraordinary examples across every conceivable category.

These are hotels where the answer to “how was the room?” takes twenty minutes to give.

Maldives | From $8,000/night

The Muraka is the world’s first two-storey underwater hotel suite, with the bedroom sitting 5 metres below the surface of the Indian Ocean. You fall asleep to reef sharks and Napoleon wrasse gliding past the curved acrylic window that forms your bedroom’s ceiling and walls. The upper level — living room, bathroom, private deck — sits above water. Occupancy is extraordinarily limited: one suite, booked months out. This is, definitionally, unlike anywhere else you will ever sleep.

Pemba Island, Tanzania | From $1,500/night

Floating 250 metres off the Tanzanian coast, this singular structure consists of a surface-level deck and lounge, and a submerged bedroom that puts you at eye level with the open Indian Ocean. There are no walls: just ocean in every direction. At night, underwater lights attract plankton, which attract bait fish, which attract larger fish. You watch the entire food chain from your bed. No other guests. No electricity for entertainment. Just ocean.

Lake Mälaren, Sweden | From $300/night

Conceptual artist Mikael Genberg’s submerged room sits 3 metres below the surface of Lake Mälaren, accessed by a ladder from a floating hut on the surface. This is art as much as accommodation: sparse, eccentric, and completely memorable. Fresh water fish replace the ocean drama, but the concept remains extraordinary and the price is among the most accessible on this list.

Finnish Lapland | From $450/night

The glass igloo that launched a thousand imitations. Kakslauttanen’s thermal-glass bubbles were designed with a heated coating to prevent condensation and snow accumulation, giving you an unobstructed view of the aurora borealis from your bed. The resort sits at 69°N latitude in Finnish Lapland, with some of the darkest, most aurora-rich skies in Europe. The original and still the best of its category.

Provence, France | From $280/night

France’s leading bubble hotel places transparent PVC spheres in forest and countryside settings across Provence, the Luberon, and Normandy. Each bubble has a proper bed, heating, and a private terrace — but the entire structure is transparent, meaning you sleep under an open sky of stars with the forest surrounding you. Blackout curtains are provided for morning light (or modesty). A more accessible and less extreme version of the glass igloo experience.

Swedish Lapland | From $500/night

Treehotel’s bubble room suspends a transparent sphere among the pine trees, accessible by a suspension bridge from a neighbouring platform. The net floor allows you to look directly down through the forest. In winter, it combines treehouse elevation with full-sky aurora viewing. In summer, midnight sun filters through the canopy in extraordinary light. Part of the wider Treehotel complex, which deserves its own entry in any unusual hotels list.

Swedish Lapland | From $300/night (ice room)

The original ice hotel, built every winter from blocks of ice harvested from the Torne River, and rebuilt entirely differently each year. No two rooms are the same; artists from around the world compete to design the suites. The temperature inside is a constant -5°C (23°F). You sleep in a thermal sleeping bag on a bed of ice covered with reindeer hides. The ICEHOTEL also now offers permanent heated suites for those who want the experience without the cold. The ice church hosts actual weddings. Open December–April.

Alta, Norway | From $350/night

Norway’s answer to the Swedish ice hotels, Sorrisniva is built fresh each winter on the banks of the Alta River — itself famous as the world’s first designated UNESCO World Heritage Site river for its prehistoric rock carvings. The suites have elaborate ice sculpture themes, and the location puts you directly under the Norwegian aurora belt. Alta averages some of the highest aurora activity of any accessible destination.

Québec City, Canada | From $400/night

North America’s leading ice hotel, rebuilt annually at the Village Vacances Valcartier just outside Québec City. The scale is impressive: over 30 rooms, ice sculptures, an ice bar, and a chapel. The Canadian winter context means temperatures are genuinely extreme, making the -3°C interior feel almost warm by comparison. A singular experience made richer by the extraordinary winter culture of Québec.

Swedish Lapland | From $500/night

Four mirrored panels suspended 10 metres above the forest floor reflect the pine trees so perfectly that birds regularly fly into them (padding is now installed to prevent collisions). Inside: a minimalist double room with panoramic windows. The invisibility concept — a hotel room that disappears into its environment — remains one of the most radical architectural ideas in hospitality. This is why Treehotel Sweden is mentioned in every conversation about world architecture, not just unusual hotels.

Vancouver Island, Canada | From CAD $200/night

Three handbuilt wooden spheres — Eve, Eryn, and Melody — hang by cable from Douglas firs on British Columbia’s Vancouver Island. Tom Chudleigh has spent decades refining the concept: the spheres are genuinely beautiful objects, and the experience of sleeping suspended in a west coast rainforest, rocking gently with the wind, is unlike anything else in Canada. Book months ahead; there are only three spheres.

Mafia Island, Tanzania | From $400/night all-inclusive

Seven treehouses set in the ruins of an Arab trading settlement on a tiny island off Tanzania’s southern coast. Built directly into ancient baobab trees, these structures have no electricity, no glass windows, and no doors: just lanterns, mosquito nets, bucket showers, and some of the most magnificent stars on the African coast. The surrounding Mafia Island Marine Park is outstanding for diving. Profoundly simple, deeply affecting.

Matera, Italy | From $400/night

Matera’s ancient sassi — cave dwellings inhabited for 9,000 years and briefly declared a national embarrassment in the 1950s before becoming a UNESCO World Heritage Site — now house some of Italy’s most extraordinary accommodation. Sextantio Le Grotte della Civita preserves the cave structure entirely: rough stone walls, cave proportions, original elements, while installing underfloor heating and beds of genuine quality. Breakfast arrives in your cave. One of southern Italy’s great travel experiences.

Coober Pedy, Australia | From $150/night

Coober Pedy is the world’s opal mining capital, a sun-blasted outback town where residents moved underground to escape temperatures that regularly exceed 50°C. The Desert Cave Hotel continues this tradition: rooms carved directly into the sandstone, naturally cooled to a comfortable 24°C regardless of the surface temperature. It is functional, historical, and genuinely fascinating. The underground city of Coober Pedy — including the underground church and underground homes — is unlike anything else in Australia.

Cappadocia, Turkey | From $200/night

Cappadocia’s fairy chimneys — volcanic rock formations created by millennia of erosion — have been carved into by humans for thousands of years. The finest cave hotels here have transformed ancient dwellings into suites of real luxury: hammam bathrooms, antique furniture, private terraces overlooking the extraordinary landscape. Pair with a sunrise hot air balloon flight over the valleys for one of travel’s genuinely unmissable experiences.

County Mayo, Ireland | From $450/night

A 13th-century castle on the shores of Lough Corrib in County Mayo, now one of Ireland’s leading luxury hotels. The renovation has been careful: medieval stonework, original range, and genuine antiques alongside contemporary comfort. The estate offers falconry, horse riding, and clay pigeon shooting. A genuine fortress with a genuine moat, now serving afternoon tea.

County Clare, Ireland | From $350/night

The ancestral home of the O’Brien family — descendants of the High King of Ireland, Brian Boru — is now a five star hotel surrounded by 450 acres of woodland and a private lake. Golf, fishing, falconry, and the kind of baronial grandeur that makes Ireland’s castle hotel scene the best in the world.

Sutherland, Scotland | From $900/night (member rates vary)

Where Madonna married Guy Ritchie. Skibo is technically a private members’ club (Carnegie Club) rather than a conventional hotel, but non-member stays are available in limited windows. Set in 7,500 acres of Highland Scotland with its own beach, it represents the pinnacle of Scottish castle accommodation. Fishing, golf, and complete seclusion.

Nairobi, Kenya | From $650/night all-inclusive

The Rothschild giraffe population of Nairobi considers Giraffe Manor their domain, and the hotel encourages this arrangement entirely. Giraffes regularly push their heads through the first-floor windows to eat breakfast with guests. The manor house itself is beautiful colonial-era architecture. It is one of those wildlife encounters — intimate, unhurried, absurdly photogenic — that simply cannot be replicated anywhere else. Consistently one of the most sought-after hotel experiences in the world.

Maasai Mara, Kenya | From $1,500/night all-inclusive

Richard Branson’s Kenyan camp sits on a private conservancy adjoining the Maasai Mara, meaning you have the game without the crowds. Twelve tented suites overlook a valley, and the migration corridor runs directly through the property. Full all-inclusive with guides, vehicles, and a level of service that justifies every penny.

Noonu Atoll, Maldives | From $2,500/night

The retractable roof over the master bedroom — through which you watch the Milky Way from your bed, or catch phosphorescent plankton on a moonless night — makes Soneva Jani the most architecturally interesting overwater villa in the Maldives. The water slide from the upper deck into the lagoon is either ridiculous or wonderful, depending on your perspective (it is both). One of the world’s genuine landmark hotel experiences.

Bora Bora, French Polynesia | From $1,800/night

Split-level overwater villas with Mount Otemanu filling the view from the outdoor plunge pool. The St Regis brings genuine five star service to French Polynesia’s most iconic lagoon. The glass floor panels above the lagoon, the butler service, and the extraordinary sunset position make this one of the Pacific’s best.

Sacred Valley, Peru | From $450/night

A transparent capsule bolted to a cliff face 400 metres above the Sacred Valley. To reach your room, you either via ferrata up the cliff face (a series of iron rungs bolted into the rock) or zipline down from above. Inside: a clear polycarbonate pod with beds, dinner, and extraordinary views of the valley and Andean peaks. This is not for the faint-hearted. It is absolutely for the adventure-obsessed.

Utah, USA | From $2,500/night

Technically not a cliffside hotel, but the relationship between this extraordinary resort and the Utah canyon landscape puts it in the same category of “geology as architecture.” Amangiri wraps around a rock formation in the southern Utah desert, with the sandstone literally incorporated into the building. The minimalist design, the swimming pool cantilevered over the rock, and the Grand Staircase-Escalante wilderness around it make this one of America’s most extraordinary resort experiences.

Phuket, Thailand | From $700/night

Tent-pool villas and bird’s nest villas suspended in the Phuket rainforest, with private plunge pools and extraordinary views across the Andaman landscape. The bird’s nest concept — a woven rattan structure with a pool suspended inside it — is one of the most visually dramatic room designs in Southeast Asia.

Europe | From $2,000/night

Not a hotel in the conventional sense, but the original blue-and-gold carriages of the Venice Simplon-Orient-Express are among the most atmospheric sleeper accommodations in the world. Mahogany panels, white linen, Art Deco marquetry: and Paris, Verona, or Vienna sliding past the window. The Paris-to-Venice route remains the benchmark. A genuine journey rather than a transfer.

Scotland | From $2,500/night

Scotland’s most luxurious train journey traverses the Highlands over 2–7 nights, stopping for excursions to distilleries, castles, and coastal villages. The carriages date to the 1960s and have been restored to a level of Edwardian grandeur. Small enough to feel personal — maximum 36 guests — with Scottish produce, single malts, and proper Highland scenery as standard.

Uluru, Australia | From $1,800/night all-inclusive

The definitive Uluru experience. Fifteen tented pavilions face the rock directly, positioned so that you watch Uluru change colour through sunrise and sunset from your private deck. The dining tent serves exceptional Australian food and wine. The guiding programme — cultural, geological, astronomical — is the most informative available at Uluru. This is how you see one of Earth’s great natural monuments properly.

Agafay Desert, Morocco | From $300/night

Forty minutes from Marrakech, the Agafay is a rocky desert plateau: not the sand dunes of the Sahara, but a stark, elemental landscape with the Atlas Mountains as backdrop. Scarabeo Camp’s luxury tents have real beds, electricity, and excellent food, while the setting retains genuine remoteness. One of the most accessible luxury desert experiences in the world.

Rajasthan, India | From $1,500/night all-inclusive

Ten Mughal-inspired tents in the Ranthambore wilderness, one of India’s best tiger reserves. The combination of opulent canvas accommodation — hand-embroidered fabrics, copper bathtubs — and serious wildlife access (tiger sightings are common) makes Aman-i-Khás one of India’s most compelling luxury experiences. All-inclusive includes game drives and guided nature experiences.

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The hotels above represent every budget from $150 to $8,000+ per night. The common thread is not price — it is the singularity of the experience. Many of the most memorable (Utter Inn, Coober Pedy, Free Spirit Spheres) are among the cheapest.

When evaluating an unusual hotel, ask:

• Is the unusual element the stay, or just the marketing? (A “cave hotel” that’s been plastered over is not a cave.)
• What’s the booking lead time? Properties with only one or two rooms book out extremely quickly.
• What’s included? Remote locations often include meals because there’s nowhere else to eat.

What is the most unusual hotel in the world? By most measures, the Conrad Maldives’ Muraka (a fully submerged underwater bedroom suite) and the Skylodge Peru (a transparent capsule bolted to a cliff face accessible only by via ferrata) represent the two extremes of conventional hotel design. Which is “more” unusual depends on whether you find the ocean or the vertical rock face more radical.

Are unusual hotels more expensive than conventional ones? Not necessarily. Utter Inn in Sweden and Coober Pedy’s Desert Cave Hotel both offer genuinely extraordinary experiences for under $300/night. The price premium at unusual hotels tends to come from remoteness, exclusivity, and the high construction costs of unconventional structures — not simply from being unusual.

How far in advance should you book unusual hotels? Properties with only one or two unique rooms — the Manta Resort Underwater Room, Free Spirit Spheres, Skylodge — often book out 6–12 months ahead. Most glass igloo and ice hotel properties sell winter dates by July or August of the preceding year. For any specific unusual property, earlier is always better.

Which unusual hotel category is most family-friendly? Castle hotels and safari lodges are generally the most family-friendly unusual category: plenty of space, organised activities for children, and the “unusual” element (medieval fortress, giraffe at the window) is viscerally exciting for younger guests. Underwater rooms, ice hotels, and cliff face pods involve practical considerations — cold, altitude, age restrictions — that make them more suitable for adults.