Hotel Review • North America • United States • Maine • Portland
The Longfellow Hotel: Portland’s Artful, Wellness-Forward New Boutique Stay
Read our review of The Longfellow in Portland, Maine, a 48-room West End boutique hotel featuring private saunas, local craftsmanship, and thoughtful design.
Credit: Peter G. Morneau
BY LULU CHANG
Why it works
Hotel Snapshot
"Wellness hotel" may be one of the emptiest phrases in hospitality given that it usually means a yoga mat in the closet and a smoothie on the room service menu. But The Longfellow, which opened in 2024 as Portland's first independent full-service hotel in more than two decades, is the exception. This 48-room property in the West End takes the wellness thesis and runs with it all the way down to the water bottles. It's from Uncommon Hospitality, the family-owned Maine group run by fourth-generation brothers Nate and Tony DeLois, with interiors by Post Company, and it has since collected all the awards and accolades you could imagine, and has fully earned them.
Design & Character
The hotel takes its name from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, a Portland native, and Post Company's interiors read as New England restraint rather than nautical theme - wide-plank oak floors, ceiling medallions and moldings, monochromatic trim, contemporary pieces sitting easily against traditional bones. It nods to the West End's Victorian architecture without costuming itself.
What lifts it is how much of the room is actually from here. Shaker chairs by Windsor Chairmakers in Lincolnville anchor the lobby table. Paintings by Portland's Timothy Wilson and photographs by Jonathan Levitt hang throughout, ceramic lamps by ANK Ceramics in Camden are scattered across the public spaces, and the case goods came out of workshops in Portland and Brunswick. Design-forward hotels talk about local artisans constantly; this one can name them.
The Rooms
We were in a Standard King, and the space is thoughtfully laid out and notably well-proportioned. There’s plenty of room to sit and relax, work, and then sprawl out on the king-sized bed. My favorite thing in it was the window seat, which is the kind of detail that quietly determines how much time you spend in a room versus out of it.
The sleep engineering is not marketing. Mattresses are hand-made in New England, the alarm clocks are Loftie rather than a glowing brick, and indicator lights throughout have been darkened deliberately. Swans Island blankets, velvet-upholstered beds, custom TRNK armchairs. If you want more room, the Evangeline and Gabriel Suites add separate living space and freestanding soaking tubs with jets and chromotherapy.
Credit: Carley Rudd Photography
Food & Drink
Twinflower Café handles breakfast and lunch counter-service style, 7 a.m. to 2 p.m., with espresso, fresh-pressed juices, bowls and sandwiches, and real vegan, vegetarian, and gluten-free depth. You can order it up to the room by sending a text.
Five of Clubs is the reason to stay in at night. Named for the five-man literary society Longfellow ran, it's a salon-style lobby bar with an excellent cocktail program - including a serious zero-proof list - and beautiful seafood-forward light bites under executive chef Wilson Suliveras. We came back for the reverse happy hour, which is the correct move and the sort of thing most hotel bars can't be bothered with.
Spa & Wellness Scoop
Astraea, the 1,800-square-foot spa on the second floor, is where the whole proposition gets tested, and it holds. The design borrows from Scandinavian spa culture - local granite, limewash walls, natural wood, no frills - across two massage rooms, a meditation room with vibroacoustic loungers, and two private infrared sauna rooms.
The private sauna is the thing to book. I'd never had a sauna to myself before and it reframes the experience entirely, particularly with a partner: no negotiating with strangers, no clock-watching. The amenities are generous, the heat is a slow build rather than a slap, and you come out genuinely reset rather than just warm. The retail side leans on VOYA's seaweed-based line alongside work from Maine makers.
Amenities
The sustainability commitment is the most Portland thing about the place, and it's executed rather than announced. There is no single-use plastic anywhere - which in practice means a French press in your room, glass bottles of filtered water you refill yourself, and a real metal key at check-in instead of a plastic card. The guest pantry is the underrated amenity: snacks and filtered water, freely available, no minibar arithmetic.
Complimentary Priority Bicycles are available, and the house car down to the Old Port is the amenity that makes the location work. Henry's Study on the fifth floor holds fourteen for a meeting and opens up to guests when it's unbooked. There are EV chargers, and the hotel funnels support to local organizations including Preble Street and Spurwink.
Location & Neighborhood Recs
The West End is the right call. It's quieter than the Old Port and still walkable to galleries, shops, and restaurants, and with the house car running you never feel like you've traded away access for calm. For lobster, go to Luke's Lobster out on the pier - it will explain the fuss to you in one sitting. For dinner, Douro on the harbor is some of the best Portuguese food I've had outside Portugal. It comes from Prentice Hospitality Group and the team behind Twelve, with executive chef Ben Trusedell working alongside culinary director Colin Wyatt and chef de cuisine Jim Stein, and the menu treats Maine seafood with the plainspoken confidence of coastal Portuguese cooking. Order the Cataplana, the traditional stew that anchors the menu, or the seafood tower. The beverage program bills itself as The Wine Pub, which tells you the register: approachable, a little unserious, genuinely good. The room seats 100 in warm nautical textures and sun-soaked color, and it feels like a harborside café that got lucky with its address.
Fast Facts
Location: 754 Congress Street, Portland, ME (West End)
Vibe: Residential New England restraint with a wellness spine
Rating: 5 stars
Room Count: 48 rooms and suites
Pricing: From $200/night
Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel: A private infrared sauna you don't have to share and a killer reverse happy hour
Dining: Twinflower Café (breakfast and lunch, 7 a.m.–2 p.m.), Five of Clubs (lobby bar, 3 p.m.–close, reverse happy hour)
Amenities: Astraea spa with private infrared saunas and vibroacoustic meditation loungers, guest pantry, in-room French press, complimentary Priority Bicycles, house car to the Old Port, Henry's Study, EV chargers, zero single-use plastic
Nearby Attractions: West End galleries and shops, the Old Port, Portland Museum of Art, Casco Bay ferries, Eastern Promenade
Airport: Portland International Jetport (PWM), about 10 minutes
Gallery
A closer look
Credit: Carley Rudd Photography
Courtesy of The Longfellow Hotel
Credit: Carley Rudd Photography
Credit: Carley Rudd Photography
Courtesy of The Longfellow Hotel
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