Back in the swinging sixties the French word for shop began to be associated with elite fashion outlets where George Best would meet up with Twiggy to quaff champers over their big eyelashes.
In the designer 80's 'Boutique' took on a new lease of life as a description of intimate, luxurious or quirky hotels which were smaller than hotels in the big faceless chains of the time, often housed in historic or unusual buildings and furnished in a themed, stylish and often aspirational manner.
And there's the key – aspirational – most of us want to live a lifestyle that's 
perhaps a tad different to our workaday normality and what better place to live it than on holiday. You see that girl on the left, she's lounging about in the Ocean Drive Hotel at Marina Botafoch and I want to be her. Well not her exactly, but I want to be in the Ocean Drive, louche, with a Manhattan, and gangster shoes, and Chet Baker playing, and style all around. No wonder they're sometimes known as lifestyle hotels!
Because of their less than gigantic size, normally less than 50 rooms, Boutique hotels combine, style, elegance and uniqueness with welcoming and personable service. Here in Ibiza, despite the island's small size there's quite a good choice of Boutique Hotels in all styles, shapes and sizes.
There's a touch of art Deco Miami, pastel shades but no Don Johnson, in the Hotels Es Vive (photo above) and Ocean Drive on either side of Ibiza town. The cobbled streets of Dalt Vila are home to the 'palatial' La Torre del Canonigo where you can live like the higher echelons of the Roman Catholic Church did hundreds of years ago, errr, quite well I believe. Meanwhile the effortlessly elegant Mirador Hotel was once the home of one of Ibiza's most famous families – Fajarnes.
Would be Rock Stars and DJs can live out their fantasies at The Ibiza Rocks House (photo above) where a young George Michael still had to blow his own trumpet when making the Club Tropicana video and at Pacha's El Hotel which is the ultimate in cool clubbin' design.
In the countryside – never far away from the main towns and villages – can be found Ibiza's Rural Boutique Hotels, sometimes known as Agroturismos, though far removed from the basic rusticity of mainland agroturist establishments. Can Pere or Es Trull de Can Palau (photo below) make perfect get away from it all retreats, but are near to it all too!
If we've whetted you appetite for a stay away from conformity then just click on our Cool & Stylish and Country Hotel sections.
