Top Five Motels in the USA, According to Casey from Spruceton Inn 🌲
A motel owner on the stays she returns to, remembers, and recommends
This winter we’re starting a new rhythm in Escape Club: every other week, we ask someone with real experience or insight to share a quick “Top 5” from their world — design, hospitality, food, nature, and the quieter corners of culture that shape how we travel. It’s a chance to hear directly from people who actually live and breathe these places, and a small bonus for our paid subscribers.
For the first of the series, we’re speaking with Casey Scieszka — writer, innkeeper, and one of the owners of Spruceton Inn — our featured expert (and motelier) on the best motels across the USA.
Ask a Motelier: Casey from Spruceton Inn on Her 5 Favorite Motels in the USA
Spruceton Inn has this way of making you slow down the second you pull in. Nine unfussy rooms, a meadow that glows at golden hour, hammocks, fire pits, and a creek you can hear from your bed if the windows are open.
Leaving Brooklyn behind, Casey and her husband, artist Steven Weinberg (whose work you can check out here), bought the Spruceton Inn in 2013. Over time, the inn has stayed true to its roots: family-run, open May through November, artist residencies in the quieter shoulder seasons, and a tiny bar in Room One where half the profits go to climate and social justice work. It still feels genuinely “Catskills” — little-to-no cell service, an untouched landscape, and a fun mix of locals and travelers passing through.
Casey is a writer and an innkeeper, and her first novel THE FOUNTAIN — about a secretly 200-year-old woman who returns to her Catskills hometown to figure out what happened to her so she can finally die — comes out this March. She’s lived and traveled all over, including Beijing, Fez, and Timbuktu, and every winter, once the last residency wraps, the family heads back out into the world.
A while back she mentioned that they love staying in motels while traveling, which immediately stuck with me. Who better to talk about memorable motels than someone who has built a hospitality world of her own?
Below, find the list, following Casey’s criteria for a great motel: “Highbrow/lowbrow energy. A funky on-site bar. Shoulder season quiet. Places that don’t take themselves too seriously.” You’ll see some editor’s notes from me, too.
Enjoy, and leave a comment or hit reply if you enjoy the series! As our treasured paid subscribers, we’d love to know what other topics you’d like to see here.
Stay warm out there,
-Erin