It wouldn’t be a Sugar & Cloth travel post recap if I didn’t make you wait for it, right?! But seriously, my girls trip to Chattanooga, Tennessee is worth any wait on account of The Dwell Hotel alone. I mean, it’s an Instagram lovers retro paradise.

My friend Brittni met us in Chattanooga since it was the halfway point between Atlanta and my quick weekend trip to Nashville for Jared’s sister’s bachelorette party. She shared allll of her pretty photos and recs right here, so I’ll keep it short and sweet on what I loved most about our stay!…

For starters, we barely left the hotel! For real. As beautiful as the endless outdoor options are in Tennessee, we milked the pretty hotel and lack of vacation plans for all they were worth.

Instead, we made sure to eat at all of the cute places and hit up not one, but two different spas. Only one of which, The Woodhouse Spa, would I recommend. I wouldn’t touch the second spa again with a 25 ft pole, but we’re not here for slamming the unfortunate, so let’s move on to the rest of the good stuff!

The hotel bar and restaurant — Matilda Midnight and Terra Mae — were delicious, so we have more than one meal and drink at those during our stay. Luckily the city is very walkable and we found several really cute spots around town that we could easily get a few breezy (thank you, April weather!) steps in along the way.

Now fair warning that my actual list of things to do in Tennessee consisted of eating everything in sight and multiple spa treatments (feel free to judge me for this sentence), so the following recommendations of things to do are at your own discretion…

For those of you traveling with kiddos through Chattanooga you should also check out their Children’s Museum! Apparently, it’s really great, but we didn’t go ourselves since I’m just now jumping on the baby train, haha.

Hopefully this gives you a little unexpected design inspiration from the South! Be sure to let me know what other secret gem design hotels you might know of around the U.S.! Be sure to check out Brittni’s recap for

Be sure to check out Brittni’s recap for even more travel recs!