Crafted at Powdermills, a four-star boutique hotel in Battle, East Sussex, is catering to the growing demand for 'raw travel' with its lakeside wellness offerings, wood-fired saunas, and garden-to-table dining. The hotel, located near the site of the Battle of Hastings, provides a retreat where guests can disconnect from digital life and reconnect with nature, a trend supported by research showing that 81% of Brits are using travel to slow down and de-stress.
Lakeside Wellness and Digital Detox
Upon arrival, the absence of smartphones is notable, with guests lounging on terracotta-striped towels and engaging in face-to-face conversation. The hotel's amenities include a saltwater pool, a freshwater lake, a communal hot tub, a wood-fired sauna, and an alfresco cold plunge pool. One guest, met in the pool, described spending her day rotating between these facilities, embodying the hotel's 'life-friendly' ethos.
The trend toward off-grid and analogue experiences is driven by a desire to escape constant connectivity, as more travelers reject social media's high-speed, checklist style of travel. The hotel's design supports this, with an indoor-outdoor living concept that blends modern folk decor with organic local timber, ensuring guests feel connected to the natural surroundings at all times.
Forest Feasts and Farm-to-Table Dining
Crafted's 'everything natural' philosophy extends to its culinary offerings. The hotel hosts monthly 'Forest Feasts' during summer, where up to 40 guests gather at a permanent table beneath the trees, enjoying seasonal ingredients cooked over open flames. Though the feast had just passed, a dinner at the hotel's pub featured smoked mussels, burnt aubergine croquettes, chicken schnitzel with walnut pesto, and a seafood chowder, all prepared based on produce grown by Head Grower Lucy.
The farm-to-table experience is seamlessly executed by Lucy and the chefs, who build menus around what is currently growing in the garden. This approach aligns with data indicating that spending time in nature can lower cortisol levels by 20%, a key factor in the hotel's design and programming.
The Rise of Raw Travel
Chelsea Ross, Founder of Goddess Retreats, a women-run wellness company, explains that early social media travel focused on speed and snapshots, but a collective digital exhaustion has shifted preferences. 'People are realising that online connection or a surface-level photo spot doesn’t offer the emotional depth of real life,' she says. 'Visiting beautiful locations means little if you didn’t actually feel present in any of them.'
Ross notes that travelers are choosing to do less to experience more, putting away phones and connecting with themselves, local culture, nature, and others. 'It’s an internal shift, and that’s something you can’t capture on film,' she adds. Crafted at Powdermills delivers this transformative experience, offering rooms from £305 per night. The hotel is accessible via a direct train from London Charing Cross to Battle, taking 1 hour and 20 minutes with fares averaging £30, followed by a complimentary electric shuttle service from the station.
