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When it comes to unexplored areas of the Caribbean, there isn’t much to speak of. But when it comes to underdeveloped or unimaginatively developed boxy, boring resorts, we can think of way too many. That’s what David Ames, Chairman of Buccament Bay Resort, set out to change at his property in St. Vincent and the Grenadines. New to the hotel game, he’s approached the development of it as a customer would, focusing on activities, food, and in true British fashion, sport. Launched just four months ago, we checked in with him to see how things are going.

When Richard Gere went looking for a nice place to enjoy his horsies on an afternoon, he stumbled on Bedford, New York. The village’s proximity to New York City, its genial, upscale population, and acres of open land, make it irresistible to equestrians. After spending time there, Gere and his wife Carey Lowell decided to open their version of the good life to the public. Their hotel, The Bedford Post Inn, has become a local institution, hosting holiday parties, weekend getaways, and weddings, as well as something as simple as a great Sunday brunch. They’ve brought on significant new staff within the last year or so, including executive chef Jeremy McMillan, who loves partnering with local farmers to stock his pantry, and general manager Oscar Henquet, who’s bringing his background in hotels like the St. Regis and the Four Seasons, and restaurants including The Monkey Bar and Rouge Tomate, to a much more intimate scale. Just two months into the job, we checked in with Henquet to get his first impressions of his new property:

Creating a giant resort in a popular destination is a massive undertaking. Trying to fill it in six months is even harder, leaving barely enough time for word-of-mouth to spread. But that’s exactly what travel portal Design Hotels is trying to do with their pop-up, the Papaya Playa Project, located in Tulum, Mexico.

You may have loved it when it was The Whiskey, the first bar from the powerhouse Gerber Group, or you may have loved it as Underbar, its most recent incarnation, but from today onward, you’re going to love it as Lilium, the company’s 25^thvenue worldwide, and a fresh reinterpretation of its original property, in honor of its 20^thanniversary.

Ashley Isaacs Ganz IS the founder & CEO of Artisans of Leisure, a bespoke travel planning company that offers luxury trips all over the world. Planning out full itineraries for a discerning customer requires a deep understanding of all the things that make a trip memorable, from big hotels to small discoveries along the way. Ganz has that understanding. We spoke with her about her new travel hot list for 2012, and her own latest travels.

From Bugsy Siegel to Frank Sinatra, the Las Vegas Strip has gone through multiple evolutions, and it’s possible to enjoy one kind of a trip there without ever experiencing any of the city’s other lives—foodies can hole up in great restaurant after great restaurant, club kids can dance to DJ after world-famous DJ, gamblers can spend the night in the eternal midafternoon of the casinos, and hotel junkies can bounce from room to room. But many of those have never sampled classic Las Vegas—and that’s something the Flamingo is looking to change.

Keeping up with what’s new and trendy as well as checking in with old favorites is the balancing act that is the job of a hotel concierge—after all, the buzziest restaurant in town may mean a long wait and lousy service, which translates to unhappy customers who would have been happier with a tried-and-true standby that still offers them a taste of the city. We went bicoastal find out what the pros at the Thompson Hotel Group are recommending these days. This is what Kelsey Wilson, a lead concierge at the Thompson Beverly Hills in LA, and Paul Salvatore Petersen, head concierge at 60 Thompson in NYC, had to say:

Paris in the springtime gets a lot of press, but Paris at Christmas has its own special magic. Now, the Mandarin Oriental Paris has opened 39 beautiful suites to serve as your home base in time for the holiday season. Of the spacious refurbished rooms, the standouts are quite obviously the seven duplex suites located on the seventh and eighth floors, with spectacular views of the rooftops and monuments of Paris from their private terraces. Designed by French interior designer Sybille de Margerie, she marries Parisian haute-couture details with understated lines and refined materials that echo the hotel’s Oriental influence.

If the news coming up from south of the border has had you crossing Mexico off your destinations list the last few years, it’s time to reconsider. Hotels are putting their money where their mouth is and constructing new properties to satisfy every aspect of your vacationing needs, and many of them are opening just in time for a winter getaway. Here are the four newest:

Budget Travel has rounded up twelve people who spend their lives travelling the world, and asked their insights on some of the world's less-trodden destinations. There are some off-the-map suggestions, but we're going to focus on accomadations here, since that's what we do.