Hotel Saul

A White City Plot, Used to the Last Metre

Tchernichovsky Street is an ordinary Tel Aviv street: apartment blocks, a few shops, cars parked at angles the municipality tolerates. Number 17 is the exception, and it takes a moment to see why. Dan Troim designed the building in the spirit of the White City, clean lines and no ornament, then let industrial materials meet domestic ones inside so that the lobby feels lived in rather than staged. There is a café on the ground floor, a lounge that catches the cross breeze, and a roof that opens onto the rooftops of the neighbourhood. Thirty four rooms sit between them.

Why It Works

We kept Hotel Saul because it gets the small things right at a scale where they are noticed. The categories are honestly named and honestly sized, from a fourteen square metre Mono to a patio room with eight square metres of private outdoor space. The desk works in eight languages, which on a property this size is a decision rather than an accident. It is also the first boutique hotel in Tel Aviv to hold Green Key certification. More than a thousand guest reviews put it at 9.3 out of ten, a figure earned across a great many stays.

Why This Location

Tchernichovsky sits between the sea and the market, which is the useful part of central Tel Aviv. The beach is a short walk west, the Carmel market roughly the same distance the other way, and Rothschild Boulevard, the Habima theatre and Meir Garden are all within reach on foot. This is a residential street rather than a nightlife one, so evenings are quiet at the door and busy two streets away, which is the right way round. The hotel has parking, a real consideration in a district where kerb space is contested.

Fast Facts

• Price: Premium

• Vibe: White City, understated, easy going

• Rooms: Thirty four across five categories, from a fourteen square metre Mono to a deluxe with balcony and a room with its own patio

• Best For: Couples, solo travellers, guests with a dog, anyone who wants the beach and the city in the same day

• Our Favorite Thing About the Hotel: The patio room, which buys eight square metres of private outdoor space in a part of the city where almost nobody has any

• Dining: Café in the lobby, lounge, rooftop

• Amenities: Rooftop, lobby café, meeting and banquet facilities, parking, lift and wheelchair accessible rooms, pets accepted, Green Key certification

• Attractions: The sea a short walk west, Carmel Market, Rothschild Boulevard, Habima Theatre, Meir Garden

Five Categories, from Mono to Patio

The ladder is short and clear. Mono rooms are fourteen square metres with a queen bed, Cozy seventeen with a king, Roomy nineteen with a king or super king. The Deluxe Balcony adds twenty two square metres plus three outside. The one to ask for is the Patio: seventeen square metres indoors and eight outdoors, private, at ground level. Across the categories the fittings hold steady, with Egyptian cotton bedding, a Nespresso machine and an Apple TV, which reads like a list until you have spent a wet evening somewhere that has none of it.

The Lobby Café, the Lounge and the Roof

The public rooms carry this hotel. The café on the ground floor opens to the street and does the work a hotel bar usually does badly, which is to give guests somewhere to sit that is not their own room. The lounge is where the building breathes. The roof is the reward at the end of the day, with the low skyline of the surrounding blocks and the sea somewhere past it. The Green Key certification sits behind all of this, in the systems rather than in the signage.

What to Know Before You Book

Check-in from 15:00, check-out at midday. There is a lift and there are wheelchair accessible rooms, unusual in a neighbourhood of walk ups. Children and dogs are both accepted, and meeting facilities exist for guests travelling for work. The desk handles Hebrew, English, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Latvian and Georgian. If outdoor space matters to you, book the Patio or the Deluxe Balcony by name: the other three categories have none.