The Ray Hotel Delray Beach, Curio Collection

The Hotel

The Ray Hotel opened in October 2021 on NE 2nd Avenue, two blocks north of the Atlantic Avenue spine in the Pineapple Grove Arts District, and is the first ground-up luxury hotel built in Delray Beach in roughly a decade. The architect (KAA Design Group, Los Angeles) drew on Old Florida idioms, low-rise stucco, deep loggias, hand-set terrazzo, sliding teak shutters, and set them against contemporary lines and a courtyard-rooftop circulation that the prior Delray properties simply do not have. The building is a Curio Collection by Hilton property, the upper-tier of the Hilton soft brand, which gives it the operating standard of a Hilton flagship with the curatorial freedom to be specifically of place.

The 141 rooms run from 350-square-foot Deluxe Kings to 1,800-square-foot two-bedroom Penthouse Suites, with the bulk of the inventory in the 380 to 500 range. Materials are unusually considered: ivory plaster walls, terrazzo or wood floors, custom oak millwork, brass fixtures, and a colour palette held to off-white, sand, sage, and the occasional terracotta accent. Bathrooms feature deep tubs in the upper categories and oversized walk-in showers throughout, with Diptyque amenities. Every room has a private balcony or French doors onto a Juliet balcony; the pool-facing rooms are the strongest pick for a short stay, the avenue-facing rooms are stronger for a longer one. WiFi is genuinely fast and the in-room technology (Sonos in suites, USB-C bedside, Nespresso) is current.

The food and beverage layer is the Ray's other defining feature. Akira Back, the South Korean Japanese chef, operates the rooftop sushi and robata room as one of only a handful of mainland US locations of his global brand; the rooftop runs at capacity most weekends and is the property's social anchor. CIVIL Liquors handles the lobby cocktail and small-plate programme; Ember Grill runs the daytime bar with a coffee operation that pulls a credible flat white. The rooftop pool deck (the only true rooftop pool in Delray Beach) is the visual signature of the property: a 70-foot infinity strip on the eighth floor with cabanas, food and beverage service, and a sunset crowd that has displaced several Atlantic Avenue terraces as the after-work room of choice. A complimentary shuttle runs to a private beach setup on Ocean Boulevard throughout the day.

The Ray earns its third-rank position in Delray on design quality and rooftop programme rather than amenity breadth (no on-site spa of consequence, no resort-grade family layer). It is the right booking for a couples weekend, a small group celebration, a single-business traveller who wants a serious work environment with serious food, and any guest whose priority is the room and the public-space design rather than the beach minutes. The Curio brand operating standard means the service holds at a high level across long peak weeks; the operating team has unusually low turnover for a 2021-build property, which is the quiet signal that the operation is well-run.

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