8 Panhandle Hotels Along Scenic 30A

Seaside, on the Florida panhandle, is where New Urbanism began. Robert Davis inherited eighty acres of scrubby coastal land from his grandfather in 1978 and asked the architects Andrés Duany and Elizabeth Plater-Zyberk to design a town rather than a subdivision — walkable, dense, with houses close to the street and a centre everyone could reach on foot in five minutes.

The tool was a building code. It governs porch depth, roof pitch, setbacks, materials and fence design, and it specifies that no two picket fences in the town may be alike, which is why walking the streets is more interesting than the density alone would explain. The streets were deliberately made narrow to slow cars; footpaths run between the houses; every street ends at the beach or the town green.

It was built from 1981 and it worked. It also looked so much like an idealised America that it was used as the set for The Truman Show in 1998, which is either the highest compliment the project received or the sharpest critique of it, depending on who you ask.

The other codes

Scenic Highway 30A runs about thirty kilometres along this coast and the towns strung along it are each governed by their own code.

Alys Beach is required to be white — lime-washed masonry, Bermuda-influenced, with courtyard houses and almost no visible colour anywhere. It is the most disciplined of them and slightly unsettling in strong sun.

Rosemary Beach is Dutch West Indies and St Augustine influenced, darker, with deep balconies and shaded lanes.

WaterColor is looser and more Florida-vernacular.

Grayton Beach and Seagrove predate the codes and are scruffier, which some people prefer.

The sand is the other thing. It is almost pure quartz washed down from the Appalachians, ground fine and bright white, and it squeaks underfoot.

An honest note on where you actually stay

Most accommodation on 30A is rental houses. The codes produced towns of cottages rather than hotel districts, and for a family of six a house is usually both cheaper and better. The hotels below are real and good, and they are the minority option here.

The eight below run west to east.

Destin and Sandestin

The western end, larger and more conventional.

The Henderson Beach Resort & Spa occupies a beachfront position at Destin with a rooftop pool, a spa and full facilities.

Hotel Effie Sandestin sits in the Sandestin resort with a rooftop, several pools and a design-led interior.

Hilton Sandestin Beach Golf Resort & Spa occupies a large beachfront site with several pools, a spa and a children's programme.

The 30A towns

Along the scenic highway.

WaterColor Inn & Resort occupies a position on the WaterColor town green with a beach club, a pool and the lake and the Gulf both a short walk.

The Pearl Hotel sits on the Rosemary Beach town square facing the Gulf, with a rooftop bar, a spa and the shaded lanes outside.

Camp Creek Inn occupies an inn at Camp Creek with a golf course, a pool and access to the wider club facilities.

Kaiya Beach Resort sits at Inlet Beach in a low property with a pool, a courtyard and a design drawn from the local codes.

The Lodge 30A occupies a small property on 30A with a handful of rooms and the beach path opposite.

What we have left off

The rental houses across all the 30A towns are excluded, and they are the dominant accommodation by a very wide margin, particularly for families. They are houses rather than hotels.

What to do

Walk or cycle Seaside and Alys Beach back to back to see two codes producing entirely different results on the same coastline. The Seaside amphitheatre, the Airstream food trucks and the post office are the set pieces.

Ride the Timpoochee Trail, a paved path running the length of 30A, which is flat and links every town.

See the coastal dune lakes, which are rare — bodies of fresh water separated from the Gulf by a narrow dune, which periodically breach and mix. There are only a handful of places on earth with them and fifteen of them are on this stretch.

Swim early. The sand reflects enough light to be genuinely hard on the eyes at midday.

Eat oysters and gulf shrimp, and drive to Grayton for the scruffier version of the coast.

Practical notes

Destin-Fort Walton Beach and Northwest Florida Beaches airports both serve the coast, twenty to forty minutes from 30A.

March to May and September to October are the best windows. June to August is peak, hot and busy with families. Spring break in March fills the western end. Hurricane season runs June to November.

The single road along the coast is slow in season.

What is New Urbanism?

A planning movement for walkable, dense, mixed-use towns. Seaside, begun in 1981, was the first built example and it is governed by a detailed building code.

Is the picket fence rule real?

Yes. The Seaside code requires that no two fences be alike, which is why the streets look the way they do.

Hotels or a rental house?

Most accommodation here is houses, and for families they are usually better value. The hotels are the minority option.

How many nights?

Five. Enough to see three or four towns and still spend days on the sand.

If you only book one