Many luxury travelers recoil at the thought of staying at an all-inclusive hotel, thinking of it as a vacation factory with routine buffet food, indifferent service, and ho-hum rooms. There is such a thing as a luxury all-inclusive, however, and in Mexico the best examples are three notable Velas properties: two in the Puerto Vallarta region and one in the Riviera Maya region.

I had the pleasure of revisiting Grand Velas Nuevo Vallarta last week and was just as impressed as I was a few years ago. If anything, the operation has improved, despite the challenging tourism environment the past year and a half in Mexico. The staff is polished and bilingual and the rooms are some of the most impressive of any resort in the region. At all the upscale Velas resorts the food is a big draw. I wasn’t able to eat at Frida, Piaf, or Lucca—all AAA 4-diamond a la carte dinner restaurants—but in this resort even what I sampled at the lunch buffet was amazing, especially the fresh seafood, ceviche, and quality wine from Chile. And no need to rush down to snag a poolside lounge chair in the morning: just reserve what you need through the pool concierge. When you arrive he’ll get your reserved chairs ready, bring water or whatever else you need, and even furnish a loaded loaner iPod if you want.

Casa Velas, situated next to a golf course (but with its own private beach club), is a more intimate affair. With only 80 rooms and no buffet meals at the restaurants, this feels like one of the Small Luxury Hotels of the World that it is, but everything is wrapped up in one price, including excellent meals, bottles of wine, and top-shelf liquor. The Presidential Suite pictured here may be the best bargain in the whole region: $1,200 for two plus $300 for each additional guest. It sleeps up to eight in its four spacious bedrooms with private bath and there’s a huge terrace with a plunge pool. The rate includes not only meals and drinks, but a stocked bar, a round of golf, a private dinner, and a spa treatment.

Meanwhile, for the other coast, I snagged this dessert photo from this OMG! Yummy blog post on a stay at the Grand Velas Riviera Maya. I can confirm from experience that the food is spectacular there—easily on par with any a la carte restaurants in the region.

With tourism in Mexico still way off from the level it was before the cable news networks started acting like the whole country is one big Ciudad Juarez, the Grand Velas hotels are frequently running deals that make them an undeniable value. All all-inclusives are not created equal and these are a in a different league altogether.

See more luxury hotels in Puerto Vallarta and Punta Mita.

Sir James Goldsmith still looms large in the Costalegre region of Mexico, between Puerto Vallarta and Manzanillo. His legacy touches all the high-end resorts in the area and some are connected to his different offspring, including Las Alamandas and Hacienda San Antonio in Colima.

Cuixmala was a great Goldsmith mansion in a nature reserve that was once only available as a private rental. Now it is an intimate retreat open to individual guests—but still requires some deep pockets for the air of exclusivity.

Cuixmala’s magic lies in its pristine natural setting. On an early morning lagoon tour in an electric boat you can spot Roseate spoonbills, blue herons and dozens of other birds and butterflies. Coatimundi, wild boars and endangered jaguars are said to roam the land far from Goldsmith’s luxurious tile-domed palace. The beach is somewhat secondary, given the attractions on land. Caleta Blanca, Cuixmala’s secluded beach club with palm-shaded hammocks, cushioned lounges, and clear, calm water is a 15-minute drive north, and there’s a smaller beach on the property. But the most enjoyable activity (other than hours of blissful relaxation) is a horseback ride or Jeep tour through the property.

Lodging choices range from casitas with a view to the main house with private pool and butlers, at the tune of 10 grand a night. Naturally, you can fly in with your own plane and land on a private airstrip.

See our full detailed review of Cuixmala in Mexico.

Where are the world’s most expensive hotel suites? On this luxury travel blog I’m usually discussing the scene in Latin America, but since that whole region is a great value, the prices there don’t make the cut.

The Wall Street Journal recently did a big feature story on the Ty Warner Penthouse at the Four Seasons New York City. If you want to book this lavish suite with panoramic Manhattan views, you’d better be loaded. It’ll cost you $35,000 a night. Don’t even think about asking for a discount and forget any party plans: because of all the expensive furnishings, no more than 10 people are allowed in at one time. Read the whole article to see all the expensive features that go into this price. But for a start, there’s a $120,000 chandelier, Thai silk with gold threads on the canopy bed, and an energy-hogging 850 light bulbs.

This is the most expensive suite in the Americas outside Las Vegas. Some there go for an even higher rate, but are frequently given away free to high-rolling whales with an account of half a million or more. Here are some of the other expensive suites from around the world listed in the article:

Hugh Hefner Sky Villa/Palms Casino Resort in Las Vegas – Price per night: $40,000

Bridge Suite/Atlantis, Paradise Island in the Bahamas – Price per night: $25,000

Royal Auite/Burj Al Arab in Dubai – Price per night: $19,000

The Ritz-Carlton Suite/Ritz-Carlton, Moscow – Price per night: $13,900

How does Latin America compare? Well the only suite I can find in our reviews that tops $10,000 per  night is really a house: the four-bedroom Villa Cortez at the One&Only Palmilla in Los Cabos, Mexico. It has a top rack rate of $12,000, but that includes a private staff of 12 (with two chefs), the huge private infinity pool pictured below, a big cinema room, a full office, and a prime spot on the beach.

The best suite at the Four Seasons Costa Rica goes for close to $10,000 in high season, but is also a villa with multiple bedrooms.

The top suite is under 5 grand at Capella Pedregal in Los Cabos, Mandarin Oriental Riviera Maya, Ritz-Carlton Santiago, and the Machu Picchu Sanctuary Lodge.

For more information on luxury travel and hotels outside of Latin America, see JustLuxe.com

Several luxury goods makers have reported an increase in sales recently, with the latest being a 19% increase in year-over-year sales at Hermès reported last week. This is on the heels of LVMH reporting an 11% increase earlier. April same-store sales at Saks were up 3.2%.

What’s interesting though is much of this rebound is coming not from established markets, but from the developing world. Apparently we’ve moved on to other things, if you believe the results from a groundbreaking survey last month. Conducted by Dwell Research (an offshoot of Dwell magazine), the participants making $200,000 or more annual aren’t engaged with the brands you would expect. Here’s how Advertising Age saw the results:

According to the survey respondents, “luxury” brands, per se, are no longer important to them, or even relevant; neither is “overall social status,” they say. This generation of nouveau riche is shunning “conspicuous consumption” in favor of brands that represent quality, aesthetics and authenticity. These attributes, along with uniqueness, integrity, design and performance, represent today’s “prestige” for these high-end consumers. And their emerging values and brand motivations make these consumers a more diverse group than one might assume.

This is interesting because it ties into the dramatic growth in luxury tourism in Latin America. People go to Peru, Brazil, or Belize for very different reasons than they go to Paris or Dubai and it has very little to do with showing off. The tours are more authentic, the hotels are more individualistic, and the experiences are more about doing than being seen. Perhaps it’s part of the reason why nowhere in Latin America is the upscale hotel scene dominated by international chains. Apart from the rare Four Seasons or Ritz-Carlton here and there, you stay in lodges or inns with a real sense of place.

A brand does not have to be expensive to attract New Affluents. What they’re now demanding from brands is a new and different kind of relationship. And, as supported by these findings, the days of controlled, top-down brand marketing are over, especially for this sector. These wealthy and would-be elites are actually looking for brand interaction — a dialogue — based on integrity, authenticity and performance. And not only are they equipped for interaction, they’re demanding it.

So what brands do New Affluents find meaningful, authentic and relevant? Apple, Sony, BMW and Ralph Lauren, unsurprisingly. But Crate & Barrel, Ikea, Whole Foods and Levi’s, too. Porsche, Lexus, Chanel and Viking. And Target, North Face, Volkswagen and The Gap. Missing from this segment’s 75 favorites list are classic luxury brands like Cadillac, Gucci, Louis Vuitton, Armani and Versace.

It may not surprise you, if you’ve spent time on adventure tours in Central or South America, that Gucci and Versace don’t make much of an appearance—except when you’re around upwardly mobile locals. What you will see on travelers are lots of are brands that are defined by durability and quality. North Face, yes, and also ExOfficio, Tilley, Keen, Eagle Creek, and Canon. Whether ungodly wealthy or just well off enough to travel in style now and then, we’re looking for brands that deliver and have integrity.

The one big caveat in this study is the median age was 45. So grandma may still care about the prestige of the label. If you’re looking to the future though, attributes like integrity, sustainability, and value are going to have to trump sheer cachet.

Here’s the full analysis from AdAge

What about you? Do luxury brands still matter, whether it’s Armani or Aman Resorts?

Banyan Tree Mayakoba

When luxury hotels do battle trying to one-up each other, the guests reap the benefits. Some amenities come and go—remember when suites had to have a fax machine? Others become so popular that they get folded into the requirements for AAA 5-diamond awards, like having three phones in the room or a shower stall separate from the bathtub.

According to this story in the Wall Street Journal, the real competition is taking place in the bathrooms. One new development has already popped up in the new St. Regis in Mexico City: a TV embedded in the bathroom mirror. It sounds kind of silly now, but maybe later we’ll be going, “Remember when you couldn’t watch the news while you shaved?”

The article says the Four Seasons group is making these embedded TVs and digital clocks standard in all new renovations and new hotels. You can expect a hotel owned by Kohler to set the tone on this, so they’re not holding back.

The American Club, a resort hotel in Kohler, Wis., owned and operated by kitchen and bathroom furnishings maker Kohler Co., is scheduled to complete the first phase of room renovations May 1. The renovations include revamped showers with multiple showerheads, including an overhead “rain” shower, two body sprays attached to the wall and a hand spray. Some higher-priced rooms include a “flipside handshower” that changes the spray pattern with a flip of the shower head, and one room features a large soaking tub for two people with a tiny-bubble massaging feature and chromatherapy.

You can see my favorite bathroom in this video tour of Casitas del Colca in Peru. Heated floors, big tub, indoor shower and outdoor shower. It barely edges out my second favorite one: the Banyan Tree Mayakoba, pictured at the top.

What gets you jazzed up in new hotel bathroom developments? What aspect is the most important to have?