Escape Plan: Canada’s Coolest Summer Design Destinations 

When it comes to summer travel, Canada rarely reads as escapist—too vast, too stable, perhaps even too sensible. But while much of the world wilts under high-season excess, this country runs on a cooler frequency, geographically and otherwise. It’s leaning into its strengths: biophilic builds in the woods of Muskoka, Michelin-caliber tasting menus in Montréal, and floatplane lodges in Tofino that feel shaped more by terrain than trend. Museums are reopening with curatorial nerve. Boutique hotels—many housed in restored relics—are trading flash for function, layering material clarity with regional nuance. 

The result is less a grand tour than an insider’s cut: high-contrast, low-key, and uninterested in the performance of luxury. Below, Galerie maps a design-forward journey across the country, from landmark exhibitions and adaptive reuse projects to properties where the architecture restores as much as the landscape. Whether it’s a neoclassical art hotel in Montreal, a converted post office in Caledon, or an airfield-turned-culture-park in Toronto, the throughline is clarity of vision—and the reminder that escape isn’t always about leaving. Sometimes it’s just a better view of where you are. 

British Columbia: Design that Listens to the Landscape 

Coastal British Columbia doesn’t rush. It moves on fog time and tidal logic—an operating system that has quietly shaped its built environment. Vancouver-based designer and architect and Galerie Creative Mind Omer Arbel, co-founder and creative director of the design house Bocci, sees the city’s essence not in its mirrored high-rises but in the structures that came before them—buildings that absorb their surroundings rather than reflect them. Chief among them are Arthur Erickson’s Robson Square and the Museum of Anthropology—the latter currently mid-restoration—both masterclasses in how architecture can breathe with its site. The landscape, he says, spills in from every side, punctuated by a secret stair to Wreck Beach that only the initiated notice. His preferred urban reset is the recently refurbished Kitsilano Pool. “It’s a sublime experience,” he says. “Mountains, ocean, pool—it’s a triple horizon of blue.” At 450 feet, the saltwater lap pool reads like an optical illusion; swimming it feels like crossing through distinct weather systems. 

To escape the city, Arbel decamps to retreats like Galiano Island, where cedar cabins at Bodega Ridge appear to emerge from the bedrock, with weathered siding and floor-to-ceiling windows that dissolve the boundary between indoors and out. At Pilgrimme, the island’s signature restaurant, meals follow a similarly elemental logic: fermented broths, sea lettuces, and fire-roasted everything that tastes unmistakably of the coast. On Vancouver Island, Victoria’s new Rosemead House reinterprets Pacific design through a maximalist lens. The approach alone sets the tone: guests pass through the actual Buckingham Palace gates used on The Crown’s London set before climbing a tree-lined drive to the 1906 Samuel Maclure Arts and Crafts estate. Inside, the inn leans into character—leaded glass, coffered ceilings, carved wainscoting—layered with 1,500 antiques and design pieces, including original props from the Netflix series, which filmed on-site. 

Farther west in Tofino, Clayoquot Wilderness Lodge offers off-grid perfection by way of floatplane. Guests toggle between heli-hiking, hydrotherapy, and cedar-smoke dinners under canvas. On Chesterman Beach, The Wickaninnish Inn takes a more grounded approach: custom driftwood furnishings, hand-adzed red cedar panels, and beach-pebble votive holders root the Relais & Châteaux stay in place. The newly opened Fawn Bluff Private Lodge—originally built for Michelle Pfeiffer and David E. Kelley—pushes remoteness to its apex. Available only as a full buyout for 12 guests across 320 acres, it includes a 49-foot Coastal Craft yacht for Salish Sea excursions and Indigenous-led bear-spotting expeditions. For those chasing a more expansive frontier, Luminara, the third yacht from The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection, begins Alaska-bound voyages from Vancouver in 2026, pairing glacier flyovers and seafood foraging with wilderness chefs, with stops in Wrangell, Klawock, and Icy Strait Point. 

Alberta: Cultural Altitude Meets Alpine Calm 

Half-priaire, half-rockies, Alberta is steadily rewriting its cattle-and-oil reputation with Calgary taking the lead by fueling its sun-filled summers with cultural accessibility. The Glenbow Museum—currently closed for renovations—is the first major Canadian institution to offer free general admission. David Adjaye’s $165 million overhaul frames Indigenous futurism and contemporary craft within a bronze-clad facade that mirrors prairie light and downtown glass in equal measure. Inside, more than 33,000 works are recontextualized through intuitive gallery flows that privilege material depth. 

Roughly an hour west, Banff delivers the alpine counterpoint. With mild summer highs hovering around the low 70s Fahrenheit, the season is ideal for exploring Cascade Ponds, Two Jack Lake, and Lake Minnewanka—minus the frostbite and high-season crowds. Opened earlier this year in the quieter Uptown district, the Otter Hotel offers a clean-lined take on the mountain lodge. Wood-paneled suites, extra-comfy beds, and understated finishes let the views do the heavy lifting. Rooftop hot pools offer front-row seats to the Rockies, while smart perks—complimentary ROAM bus passes for Lake Louise, underground parking, and local coffee from Suddenly Sally—make it a savvy home base for design-minded adventurers. 

Ontario: Rethinking Urban Scale 

Long defined by vertical ambition, Toronto is now recalibrating around spatial intelligence—less skyline-chasing, more context-aware design. In the Entertainment District, Nobu Toronto sets a new benchmark with the city’s largest hotel suites, each outfitted with hinoki soaking tubs, heated floors, and uninterrupted views from the CN Tower to the Islands. Studio Munge fuses Japanese architectural cues with local grit: exposed brick, industrial steel, and layered materiality. Two blocks from Union Station, The Union Hotel transforms a dormant 1920s tower into a cultural anchor. Solid Design & Build honors the structure’s bones while sourcing materials—raw maple, Prince Edward Island wool, Georgian Bay stone—that root the interiors in regional provenance. 

At the Art Gallery of Ontario, “Moments in Modernism” (through August 25) inserts Tomie Ohtake and Norval Morrisseau into a conversation with Rothko and Warhol, surfacing unexpected crosscurrents. “Painted Presence” (through September 22) gathers seven authenticated Rembrandts—some never before shown in Canada. Rebranded as YZD as of this summer, the 370-acre site formerly home to the Downsview Airport is being transformed into a cultural and residential hub, with a slate of free programming—farmers’ markets, outdoor cinema, Indigenous-led workshops, and an art-lined runway—anchors the site’s transition from airfield to imagination lab.  

Elsewhere in Ontario, a smattering of new retreats reflect similar intent. The Liberty Inn in Caledon reimagines an 1855 post office with five suites, infrared saunas, curated vinyl, and a cedar hot tub. Kingston’s Belvedere Hotel threads Art Deco and midcentury cues through a 29-room limestone mansion and basement bathhouse. And in Muskoka, The Ritz-Carlton Residences (opening 2026) marks a new chapter in high-end “cottage country”—32 architecturally distinct, boat-access-only lakefront homes built from site-sourced granite, where structured luxury meets pine-draped wilderness. 

Québec: Where Culture and Counterculture Collide 

Québec’s culinary scene earned its first Michelin stars this year, formalizing what locals already knew: Montréal cooks with conviction. Among the newly anointed, Jérôme Ferrer’s Europea leans theatrical—molecular flourishes applied to Québécois ingredients—while Patrice Demers’ Sabayon turns pastry into sculptural fine art. Design-led dining also has a foothold. Hiatus, perched in I.M. Pei’s glass-encased Place Ville Marie, brings skyline views and yuzu lobster dumplings to Montréal’s most iconic modernist tower. Local firm Tux Creative integrates suspended greenery and modular lighting into an elevated indoor canopy that nods to nearby Mount Royal. Wellness receives a similar design-forward treatment. In the Village, Sabbya Spa blends travertine, terrazzo, and gold-veined marble into a sensorial environment for Indigenous-inspired treatments updated with European technique. Outdoor destination spas, including the floating Bota Bota and outdoor thermal retreat Strøm Spa Nordique, round out Montréal’s growing wellness vanguard. 

Cultural programming keeps pace. Cirque du Soleil’s LUZIA returns to its hometown through August 24, 2025, transforming the Old Port into a dreamlike homage to Mexican folklore and athleticism. Designed by Scéno Plus, the purpose-built amphitheater ditches spectacle-for-spectacle’s sake in favor of proximity, bringing audiences deeper than conventional circus formats allow. Meanwhile, the Montréal Museum of Fine Arts stretches in several compelling directions. “Berthe Weill” profiles the under-recognized Parisian dealer who championed early careers of Modigliani and Picasso. “Bad Girls Only” reinterprets Dutch and Flemish masters through the lens of transgression, while Worlds of Wonder gives long-overdue space to Québécois surrealist Alan Glass, whose painterly dreamscapes shaped a generation of local artists. 

Montréal’s new hotels reflect the city’s cultural voltage. On pub-lined Crescent Street, the reimagined Vogue Hotel nods to Montréal’s layered identity—historic, academic, and fashion-forward. Now part of Hilton’s Curio Collection, the 142-room property was overhauled by Sid Lee Architecture with Turkish travertine, Venetian plaster, and brushed brass fixtures by Lambert & Fils. Nearby, SonoLux takes a more experimental route as Québec’s first “immersive art hotel,” transforming its neoclassical shell into a responsive environment through projection mapping, lighting cues that shift with mood, and an omakase-style counter by chef Graham Hood. Beyond Montréal, rural and regional retreats continue the design dialogue. In the Eastern Townships, Manoir Hovey delivers lakeside nobility: antique-filled suites, a four-season spa overlooking Lake Massawippi, and Québécois fine dining. In Québec City, the newly opened Hôtel Maurice injects bold personality into Price Manor, a onetime political haunt turned boutique stay on Grande Allée. The interiors lean unapologetically Art Deco—velvet banquettes, marble finishes, iridescent showers, and color-blocked walls—creating a cinematic backdrop for the city’s nightlife.  

Atlantic Canada: Edge-of-Map Escapes 

At Canada’s easternmost edges, isolation is the point. And in summer, when wildflowers overtake the cliffs and temperatures hover in the brisk-but-pleasant range, the payoff is maximal. Nowhere channels that better than Fogo Island Inn, a modernist stilted structure perched above jagged Newfoundland rock. Designed by Todd Saunders, its form evokes both sculptural restraint and maritime resilience. This August, renowned author Ann Patchett leads intimate readings and workshops; fall brings heli-tours along the coast and traditional cod fishing excursions that root guests in the island’s heritage.

In Nova Scotia, Ridge on the Chimney leverages the season’s long light and clear skies. Perched above Chimney Corner Beach on Cape Breton Island, its quartet of cedar-clad “bunkies”—designed by MacKay-Lyons Sweetapple Architects—appear to float above the landscape. Inside, the palette is quietly coastal: organic Obasan linens, PEI-spun wool throws, and floor-to-ceiling windows framing oceanic drama. In a region where fog and wind often steal the scene, summer lets the architecture—and the views—speak clearly.