Generator Paris, France
This hostel brand continues its expansion across Europe with the opening of its largest property yet: a 950-bed behemoth in the heart of Paris’s up-and-coming 10th arrondissement. Focusing on young travellers who want a smart place to stay but presumably care more about what’s outside their accommodation, Generator offers interiors design you’d expect from a boutique hotel – chic bar area, retro side lamps, funky seating – but at a fraction of the price. As well as dorms, there are smart private rooms – some with roof terraces and hammocks – and lively social areas (this is a hostel, after all), including a rooftop terrace bar with views across Montmartre.
• Dorm beds from €25, doubles from €98, generatorhostels.com
WellnessHostel 4000, Saas-Fee, Switzerland
It may sound like a new-age spacecraft, but this hostel, opened last September in the mountain village of Saas-Fee, aims to offer spa-style accommodation to the budget traveller. With a 25-metre indoor swimming pool, hot tubs, herbal steam baths and hydromassage facilities, the hostel is a welcome retreat for skiers and hikers looking to ease their stiff muscles after a day outdoors. The first five-storey hostel to be built in Switzerland using timber construction, the eco-conscious abode also features a restaurant and lounge, where you can enjoy Alpine tapas and a drink beside the open fire.
• Dorm beds from €45, doubles from €130 B&B, youthhostel.ch
Slo-living, Lyon, France
Lyon is a city on a high, fizzling with festivals, new museums and a £3bn project to transform its docklands area – and, since May this year, a direct Eurostar train from London which takes just six hours. Then there’s the food and drink: surrounded by some of France’s most famous wine regions and with over 4,000 restaurants, 15 Michelin stars and a market named after its most famous chef, this is a city that takes meal times very seriously indeed. In the midst of this gastronomic and cultural buzz is the design-conscious Slo-living; bright and airy with a patio where you can sit with your glass of wine from the bar. With a maximum capacity of 40, it’s easy to meet fellow guests here – something that’s encouraged over dinners featuring local produce and an emphasis on slow travel – with free, three-hour walking tours of the city on offer and staff ready with tips on favourite hangouts – from skateboard parks to record shops.
• Dorms from €26, doubles from €76, slo-hostel.com
Backstay Hostel, Ghent, Belgium
In the 1930s art-deco building that was once home to socialist newspaper Vooruit, the Backstay Hostel has a media spin inside as well as out, with rooms themed on major newspapers from around the world. The fact there’s a Guardian-themed dorm does, admittedly, win it favour in our office, but the hostel really is a well-appointed conversion, keeping the best of the original interior in the reception and stairwells, with contemporary fittings in the bedrooms. The dorms are pretty funky, but the private rooms are simple, cool and tasteful.
• Dorm beds from €20.50 , doubles from €68 B&B, backstayhostels.com
Basecamp Bonn, Germany
Bizarre in concept yet strangely beautiful in the way it brings it all together, Basecamp Bonn is a huge warehouse filled with vintage caravans you can stay in. There’s a Truman Show-feel to the former storage facility, with its fake blue-sky background and neat rows of mobile homes, including classic Airstream caravans and two VW transporters, each with its own outdoor area decked out with retro furniture. There are also two “artfully decommissioned” sleeper trains on the site. It must be a German thing, because over in the Alps, near Lake Constance, HutnBreakfast (huts from €65 a night) offers a similar thing; stay inside a shed which is inside a house. Who knew?
• Sleeper compartment beds from €22, caravans from €64, basecamp-bonn.com
The Hat, Madrid, Spain
One of the smartest, most delicately put together of the new wave of hip hostels, the Hat opened its doors last year, welcoming travellers into an impressively designed venue: concrete walls, low-slung filament bulbs, geometric tiled bar and contemporary furniture. The rooftop terrace is a place to chill out and mingle, while the Cave is a public venue with a programme of DJ nights and exhibitions. Of course, the Hat offers smart, private en suites, but even the dorms have an atmosphere of light and space that’s a world away from the claustrophobia of the usual city hostel dorm.
• Dorm beds from €18, doubles from €60 B&B, thehatmadrid.com
Ecomama, Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Sister to the boutique Amsterdam hotel Cocomama, this hostel is in a slightly more central location, on the edge of the red light district and a short walk from the main rail station and the Rembrandt museum. Its green credentials include a water saving system, green roof and cradle-to-cradle building materials but the overall feel is industrial chic with stylish furniture – Eames-style chairs, Smeg fridge – set against brick walls and exposed pipes. With a mix of dorms – including a female-only one replete with fuscia chiffon (because girls love pink, right!?) – a family room, and private en suite doubles, it attracts a cross-section of travellers, who are invited to socialise at dinner and movie nights and on brewery visits.
• Dorm beds from €23, doubles from €66 (shared bathroom), ecomamahotel.com
Wombat’s, London, UK
The building that houses the newest addition to the Wombat’s [sic] hostel chain (following Vienna, Berlin, Munich and Budapest) has a colourful history. Built as a seamen’s hostel in the 1860s (it is in east London’s Docklands), it then became a refuge for ex-convicts and drug addicts before reopening as mega-hostel with almost 600 beds, in December 2014. The dorms (some female-only) all come with wooden bunk beds, en suite bathrooms, free Wi-Fi and lockers; there’s an airy lobby-lounge, a basement bar with a vaulted brick ceiling and courtyard, and a roof terrace up on the ninth floor. Just over the road is the recently renovated Wilton’s, the world’s oldest working music hall and one of the most atmospheric gig venues in London. Tower Hill tube station is a 10-minute walk away.
• Dorm beds from £25, doubles from £80, all-you-can-eat breakfast £3.50, wombats-hostels.com
Blue Boutique Hostel and Suites , Estoril, near Lisbon, Portugal
This new hostel scores top marks for location, overlooking the Atlantic in the seaside town of Estoril, and the lovely old pale blue villa that houses it. The common downstairs rooms feel more like a hotel than hostel, with stylish furniture and rugs, parquet floors and art objects artfully strewn about. The bedrooms are simpler: dorms are plain white with dashes of colour from the pastel pink, blue or green bunk beds and furniture; most of the doubles have private balconies with sea views and two are en suite. Estoril has an air of faded seaside glamour about it: this is where rich Lisbonites used to come to play on the beach and in the casinos. The beach is just over the road from the hostel and Lisbon is a 20-minute train journey away.
• Dorm beds from €14, doubles from €29 (shared bathroom), blueboutiquehostel.com
Loft, Reykjavik, Iceland
The name, the bearded dudes on the roof terrace, the slow-brewed coffee … this place ticks all the hipster boxes. But who’s to knock it when it offers a bed for the night in one of the world’s most expensive cities from £24. A relaxed vibe in the lounge bar area brings in locals for happy hour (4pm-8pm) when a 500ml beer costs ISK600 (about £3) and a glass of wine ISK700 (£3.50), as well as clothes swaps, quizzes and gigs (check its Facebook page for upcoming events). Throw in smart private rooms, in addition to the dorms, free computer use and Wi-Fi, and its central location and it’s little wonder this was voted the best of the 32 Hi hostels in Iceland last year.
• Dorms from £24, doubles from £72, lofthostel.is
