Towns can be unforgiving when their cultural landmarks are turned into hotels, shops and restaurants. It comes as quite a surprise, then, when I hear locals popping into the newly opened Chapel House, telling proprietor Susan Stuart: “You’ve done a lovely job,” and “It needed this.”

I never experienced the heady days of Penzance Arts Club (1993-2011), a members’ club with a restaurant and rooms, but I have no reason to doubt it was a much-loved institution. Fortunately, Stuart – who worked in the City for 30 years and fell for the Cornish town after repeated visits – is keen to keep the place closely linked to town life. The public areas double as exhibition spaces for exquisite pieces from the Newlyn School of Art and, when we dine there on a Friday evening, local people are out in force, sharing mackerel bites and tucking into bowls of crab ravioli.

The two-year refurb, by Penzance architect Keith Bell, has produced stunning results. Chapel House is a beautiful Grade II-listed Georgian property with three main floors and a large basement that opens on to a walled-in garden and terrace. Plain-coloured walls and floorboards, a mix of Georgian and modernist furniture – much of it from Stuart’s former home in Stockwell, south London – and plenty of well-lit empty space get the very best out of the architecture’s clean lines.

Admiral Samuel Hood Linzee, who built Chapel House in 1790, wanted to be able to see the ocean that had made him famous, and gave his home lots of sea views. One of the loveliest is from the landing, where the harbour is framed by a tall, arched window. Fresh flowers, here and elsewhere, add splashes of colour.

There are six large guest rooms. My room, number two, has an ovoid Ashton & Bentley bath in the bedroom and a Pura rainforest shower in the en-suite. The bed is immense and there’s a grand antique wardrobe with a built-in chest-of-drawers and two stylish, cloth-covered armchairs. Cafetières and freshly baked cakes and biscuits are provided. There are good views of the sea, as well as Penzance’s glorious blue skies.

Breakfast is served in the basement and features berry and beetroot smoothies alongside croissants and rolls, cereals and toast. There is also a splendid full Cornish with a peppery hog’s pudding and delicious smoked bacon.

There is almost too much to do in and around Penzance for one weekend. I zip out to see Land’s End, only 15 minutes’ drive away. Skirting some unsightly shops, I drop by the hide at the RSPB Wildlife Discovery Centre to watch fulmars and choughs, and spot a seal bobbing in the frothy waves. The coffee at the smart LE Restaurant is fine, and the infographics on shipwrecks and marine life excellent.

Penzance itself is heaving with Mazey Day, the annual culmination of the week-long Golowan midsummer festival (19-28 June): it’s a community-led celebration of art, sculpture, live music, Morris dancing, and general quirkiness. Parades throng the streets throughout the day and even stately Chapel Street becomes a mini-Rio when samba drummers start to play. Where other towns in the south-west are stratified or packaged into niches – food, art, New Age living – Penzance is a mixed-up motley kind of place, and everyone seems to rub along very well at lively pubs like the Admiral Benbow and the Dock Inn.

Away from the mayhem, Penzance is a lovely town to walk around, with subtropical gardens, elegant avenues and the breezy prom, where it’s hoped the art deco lido, known as the Jubilee Pool – destroyed in the 2014 winter storms – will reopen in May 2016.

Another new opening for the town, Shore (dinner for two plus drinks from £80, 13-14 Alverton St, 01736 362 444), provides us with a superb dinner, with Scottish chef Bruce Rennie – who has worked at two Michelin-starred restaurants and with Gary Rhodes and Rick Stein – serving up stone bass ceviches and crab tortellini.

I leave Penzance via Tate St Ives, and its stimulating Images Moving Out Onto Space exhibition (until 27 September).

There might not be an arts club anymore, but there’s still plenty of art on the Penwith peninsula – and this new boutique gem of a hotel is a very stylish base from which to explore it.
• Accommodation was provided by Chapel House (Chapel St, 01736 362024, chapelhousepz.co.uk). Doubles from £150 B&B.

Ask a local

Martin Nixon, graphic designer and chair of Friends of the Jubilee Pool (Penzance’s art deco lido)

• Walk
Stroll along the South West Coast path from Marazion to Penzance with St Michael’s Mount and beautiful Mount’s Bay as constant companions.

• Takeaway food
The Cornish Hen Deli (27 Market Place) serves delicious homemade food, perfect coffee and the best pasties in Penzance.

• Secret spot
Tremenheere Sculpture Garden is an exotic wonder just two miles from Penzance. It has a Turrell skyspace light installation (one of fewer than 100 worldwide), a camera obscura and subtropical plants.