Gairnshiel Lodge

Gairnshiel sits in Glengairn, in a dip of the valley where the River Gairn runs down through the Cairngorms National Park, with Balmoral as its nearest neighbour. Ballater is six miles east, with cafés, a butcher and the old royal station, and Braemar is twenty-five minutes on, home to the Fife Arms and its art collection of more than sixteen thousand works. This is Royal Deeside, so hill walking, salmon fishing and cycling start at the door, there are golf courses within reach, and three of Scotland's five ski resorts are close enough for a day on the snow. However you come, the roads narrow and climb and the moor opens out for the last few miles, which is part of the arrival.

The lodge was built in 1746 and spent generations as a sporting retreat, Queen Victoria among those who came to picnic and shoot grouse. When the family from Antwerp took it over in 2015 it was a hotel done up in tartan carpets and pink walls. They stripped it back until only the granite shell remained and started again from there, working with the interior architect Nathalie Van Reeth. The son, Maarten, studied interior design and worked for Axel Vervoordt, and it shows in the restraint: each room holds the objects it needs and few extras, in colours drawn from the heather and stone outside so there's as little contrast with the landscape as possible. The furniture collection is still played with, vintage pieces swapped in and out as they find them. The idea, as they put it, was a place where the old and the new sit in conversation. Shoes come off at the door, as the wooden floors mark easily.