Desert Motels in California

Desert Star

Palm Springs, CA

A 1956 Palm Springs Class 1 Historic Site with studios furnished in authentic mid-century originals, including Eames, Bertoia, and Nelson pieces. Full kitchens, private patios with gas fire pits, and a heated pool.

Hotel Wren

Twentynine Palms, CA

A 1940s frame reimagined as individually designed rooms, each with a private gas-fireplace patio on a heated saltwater pool. No televisions, adults 21 and over, and the kind of quiet that feels intentional.

Ingleside Estate

Palm Springs, CA

A 1922 Spanish Colonial Revival landmark hidden behind lush hedges on two and a half private acres, steps from downtown yet a world away. Dinner at Melvyn's piano bar, unchanged since Old Hollywood gathered here, is the ritual you build the whole stay around.

Sparrows Lodge

Palm Springs, CA

Trade winds instead of televisions, a saltwater pool, and a fire pit on the grounds of a 1952 estate with a deliberate sense of quiet. The closest thing to the Palm Springs that once was.

ARRIVE Palm Springs

Palm Springs, CA

Corten steel, raw concrete, and butterfly roofs around an adults-only compound with a coffee roaster on site. Every patio room has a private outdoor space with a gas fireplace.

Andruss Motel

Walker, CA

Knotty pine rooms and a fish cleaning station ten minutes from the river in a 1958 Eastern Sierra property that has never tried to be something it isn't. A pool at 5,400 feet elevation is a rarer thing than it sounds.

Azure Sky Hotel

Palm Springs, CA

A 1959 desert retreat where built-in beds float above stone tile and a twelve-person hot tub anchors a pool terrace built for lingering. The mountains rise right behind the water, and the whole place is tuned to a slow, quiet register.

Borrego Valley Inn

Borrego Springs, CA

Fifteen adobe rooms in the Anza-Borrego Desert, each with a private entrance opening directly onto an enclosed native desert garden of ocotillo and creosote, with two pool and spa areas set among the plantings. At night the inn sits inside California's first International Dark Sky Community, and the Milky Way appears with a clarity that makes the desert feel genuinely far away.

Casa Cody

Palm Springs, CA

The oldest operating stay in town, born in the 1920s and still centered on a 1910 adobe, with casitas layered in Zellige tile, dark wood, and deep desert color. Two pools, a hidden whirlpool spa, and a wine cellar with an opera-singer past reward guests who settle in.

Cuyama Buckhorn

New Cuyama, CA

A 1952 high-desert property restored in Mid-Century Western style with a farm-to-table restaurant, a barrel sauna, and Michelin Selected recognition in 2025. The design is specific to this particular stretch of California.

Fleur Noire Hotel

Palm Springs, CA

Every casita here is wrapped in a floor-to-ceiling floral mural, so choosing a room means choosing a painting to live inside for a few nights. A pink-doored champagne bar hides off the pool, and grown-up calm settles over the whole grown-up-only property.

Hope Springs Resort

Desert Hot Springs, CA

Natural mineral hot spring pools, Japanese-influenced minimalism, and no televisions in a mid-century desert frame made for this kind of quiet. Adults only, and a very different experience from what surrounds it.

Jacumba Hot Springs Hotel

Jacumba Hot Springs, CA

A Prohibition-era hot springs hotel restored in adobe and exposed vigas, whose three spring-fed mineral pools brought a bypassed border town back to life. Between the high-desert restaurant, the live music, and a painted vintage trailer at check-in, it feels less like a hotel than a place that was rediscovered.

Les Cactus

Palm Springs, CA

Named for a cheeky French pop song and dressed in the same playful spirit, this 1930s desert getaway keeps its bright pool humming with music and its rooms notably crisp. It trades polish for genuine cheer, the kind of easygoing stay you book once and keep coming back to.

Los Arboles Hotel

Palm Springs, CA

Step through the gate and Palm Springs mid-century gives way to a tiled Spanish colonial hacienda, restored from ruins into a hushed courtyard oasis of pool, hot tub, and hammock-strung patios. Wood-burning fireplaces and mature trees make it the romantic, quiet counterpoint to the desert's louder scenes.

Mahala

Palm Springs, CA

A pocket-sized courtyard retreat at the top of Palm Canyon Drive, wrapped around a heated pool with the San Jacinto Mountains rising just past the loungers. Bold custom interiors and a fridge full of complimentary treats make it feel like a stylish friend handed you the keys to their desert hideaway.

Miracle Manor Boutique Hotel & Spa

Desert Hot Springs, CA

A tiny 1950s desert retreat built over its own naturally heated mineral springs, with two geothermal pools, an in-house spa, and no televisions anywhere. Days here move at soaking pace, and the mountain views go completely quiet once the sun drops.

Mojave Resort

Palm Desert, CA

A 1957 Palm Desert motor court reborn adults-only in sunburnt orange, with a cocktail-shaker-shaped pool at its heart and fire tables that glow at dusk. Every door opens onto the courtyard, and a breakfast box waits outside it each morning, all a short walk from El Paseo.

Mojave Sands

Joshua Tree, CA

Rooms hand-crafted over a decade by a former furniture designer, with hand-sculpted black walnut bed frames, record players, and a koi pond in a gated desert courtyard. Every detail made here.

Orbit In

Palm Springs, CA

A 1957 courtyard compound furnished with genuine Eames, Saarinen, and Noguchi pieces, arranged around a quiet heated pool at the foot of the San Jacinto Mountains. Each afternoon the house Orbitini gets poured by the water, and design pilgrims trade notes on loungers as the light goes gold.

Pioneertown Motel

Pioneertown, CA

In the Hollywood Western film set town where Gene Autry, John Wayne, and Roy Rogers once filmed and stayed, with bed frames handcrafted on the property. Steps from Pappy and Harriet's, the kind of place that earns its own mythology.

Sands Hotel and Spa

Indian Wells, CA

A 1950s Indian Wells motor lodge reborn as a Martyn Lawrence Bullard design fantasy, where every room carries its own color story of zebra stripes, Moroccan tile, and custom fountains. Days drift between the cabana pool and The Pink Cabana, and the whole place feels like a set you get to live in.

The Hideaway

Palm Springs, CA

A hedged 1947 courtyard tucked into the Tennis Club neighborhood, where an unusually large lawn and generous pool give you room to actually spread out. Evenings gather at the fire pit under the San Jacinto Mountains, and the pool rarely feels crowded, so disappearing for a few days is the whole point.

The Joshua Tree Inn

Joshua Tree, CA

A 1949 Spanish Colonial hacienda where Gram Parsons spent his last night in Room 8 on September 19, 1973, and Room 8 can still be booked. Musicians, artists, and desert wanderers have come for more than seventy years. The desert outside that room is the same desert.

The Weekend Palm Springs

Palm Springs, CA

A meticulously renovated 1960s hideaway on a quiet Old Las Palmas cul-de-sac, where spacious suites with full kitchens open onto a palm-shaded pool framed by the mountains. The owner hosts personally and the courtyard stays calm, so a long weekend here tends to stretch until you are in no hurry to leave.

Trixie Motel

Palm Springs, CA

A proudly queer, everyone-welcome Palm Springs original from drag star Trixie Mattel. The former Coral Sands, reborn as an all-pink daydream: seven themed rooms around a courtyard pool, cocktails at the Barbara Bar, and record players instead of screens.

Holiday House Palm Springs

Palm Springs, CA

A 1951 Herbert Burns design reborn under decorator Mark Sikes, wrapped around a citrus-shaded pool courtyard with shuffleboard, misted loungers, and an afternoon ice cream cart. Downtown is a single block away, but the orange trees and mountain backdrop make leaving feel optional.