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hotel
United Places Botanic Gardens
Melbourne
Melbourne is forever striving to outdo Sydney as Australia's coolest city, and United Places Botanic Gardens does this - and then some - by upping the style stakes with this minimalist home-hotel hybrid. Inside, it's all moody interiors with waxy concrete walls and stained-wood floors. Balconies here tickle the lush-and-leafy edges of the Royal Botanic Gardens or overlook the winding laneways of South Yarra. Each of the twelve apartments are appointed a butler who can arrange everything from picnics in the park to in-room pilates classes. Breakfast is served on your terrace each morning by your swish butler-cum-new-best-friend. Dining is an entirely Australian affair; expect oat-milk-soaked bircher muesli, chilli-spiked avocado atop just-baked sourdough and the finest flat white this side of the equator.