The Breakers Palm Beach

The Breakers Palm Beach

The lobby ceiling here runs two hundred feet, hand-painted by seventy-five artisans brought over from Italy when Henry Flagler rebuilt his fire-damaged hotel in 1926, modeling it after Rome's Villa Medici. Shultze and Weaver, the New York designers who later built the Pierre and the Waldorf Astoria, called their work here "the acme of perfection in design and magnificence" when it reopened. The Breakers sits a short walk from Worth Avenue's shops and the Palm Beach Memorial Fountain, and it holds a distinction none of its neighbors can claim: it is Palm Beach's only luxury oceanfront resort. Four pools, five whirlpools, a private beach and championship golf keep the 534 rooms across seven floors from ever feeling crowded, and nine restaurants and bars, from the raw bar at Seafood Bar to steakhouse dinners at Flagler Steakhouse, mean guests rarely need to leave the grounds. Families get a kids club and playrooms built for handing children off for an afternoon, and golfers and tennis players have a course and courts on site; guests chasing quiet corners will find them harder to locate among 534 rooms of organized activity. A $200-a-night damage deposit is due by bank transfer on arrival, a $30 valet parking fee applies each night, and spa treatments need booking ahead. This is not a boutique hideaway, and anyone hoping for one should look elsewhere along the coast. What it offers instead is scale with a pedigree: a hotel old enough to have hosted Rockefellers and Vanderbilts, updated enough after a $250 million renovation to feel current, and confident enough in its oceanfront position to not need to explain it. The Breakers is Palm Beach's only luxury oceanfront resort, a 1926 rebuild modeled on Rome's Villa Medici with 534 rooms, four pools and a private beach. It suits families and golfers more than anyone chasing quiet; a $200 nightly deposit and $30 valet fee apply.