The William Vale

The William Vale stands on legs. Albo Liberis designed the white tower, open since 2016, and raised it on struts angled into V's, so that from the street it looks braced to stride off towards the river. Every room has floor-to-ceiling glass and a balcony, and in a neighbourhood of low brick blocks that is most of the reason to come: across the street is Brooklyn Brewery, and across the water is Manhattan.

It is a great Brooklyn hotel, and we came to it as locals: we were living in New York, and this was a staycation, in March. We had a suite with a balcony that wrapped round the corner, Brooklyn spread out below it and the view running down to the Williamsburg Bridge. Friends came over, and the hotel was relaxed about it, as a hotel in Williamsburg ought to be; there was a small party in the room, and later that night we went out to one of Brooklyn's hotspots.

Bougie is the word for it, and the hotel would not argue. The lobby is marble underfoot, with a pair of staircases of floating marble treads climbing either side and, on the wall between, a big sculpture like a sheet of painted colour crumpled and pinned up. The rooms are quieter, a brown sofa and abstract pictures, and leave the colour to the city in the window. The restaurant downstairs was wonderful: that is Leuca, Southern Italian, from Andrew Carmellini, a James Beard award winner. On the roof is Westlight, a very good bar to end an evening in, with the Manhattan skyline across the river.

Williamsburg is best on foot. Six minutes from the door, East River State Park lays a lawn along the waterfront, with Smorgasburg on it in season, and the L from Bedford Avenue, eight minutes' walk, has Midtown about 25 minutes away. Anyone who has brought work can buy a day pass to The Malin, the co-working space on the ninth floor, which on a staycation would rather miss the point.

The bigger suites sleep four and cots come on request, so children are welcome, and so are dogs. The Vale Pool, said to be the longest outdoor hotel pool in the city, is seasonal, and in March we left it alone. Winter has its own arrangement on the fourth-floor terrace: barrel saunas and cedar hot tubs, for over-18s only and two to a tub, a smaller party than ours.