Would you love to take an ecofriendly holiday, but can’t face the hairy hemp bed linen and papier-mâché slippers? Don’t worry, there are plenty of hotels that know how to provide luxury and do their bit for the environment. Here are some five-star suggestions that will turn even climate-change sceptics green . . . with envy.

For information on booking train travel to the European hotels below, see the related link below

EILEAN SHONA, Argyll

Don’t wait for Richard Branson’s Necker to turn carbon-neutral – head for his sister Vanessa’s eco-chic island off the west coast of Scotland. The five-minute ferry ride to Eilean Shona seems to take you back about 100 years. It has no cars, no shops, no television; instead, you walk through moss-covered woods, chase waves on the bone-white beach and spot otters and red squirrels. The house oozes style, with Jackson Pollock murals in the dining room, a place where you’ll eat far too many plump oysters from the island’s own beds. No wonder JM Barrie loved it here.

01967 431249, www.eileanshona.com; £140 per adult per night, full-board (£70 per child); sleeps up to 18

PENRHOS COURT, Herefordshire

This 700-year-old manor farm in wild border country is like a walk through Architectural Digest. For the medieval A-frame construction, bent oak trees were sawn in half from top to bottom, then opened; there is also Elizabethan chequerboard flooring. The hotel has 15 bedrooms, some with four-posters. There’s an award-winning organic restaurant, and if you’re inspired by the nettle soup and elderflower cheesecake served there, you can sign up for cookery courses. How green is this valley? Al Gore has signed the guestbook.

01544 230720, www.penrhos.co.uk; doubles from £121, B&B

STRATTONS, Norfolk

A Palladian villa just off Swaffham high street, Strattons is sumptuous: rooms have carved four-posters, a tented bathroom and stained-glass trompe-l’oeil panelling. The hotel also has the most delicate of ecological footprints: it even offers a 10% discount to guests who arrive by public transport. It’s a favourite haunt of Stephen Fry and Hermione Norris; apparently, Mick Jagger wanted to stay, but the hotel was full – and, of course, staff politely explained that they couldn’t bump another guest.

01760 723845, www.strattons-hotel.co.uk; doubles from £150, B&B

ECOLODGES, Yorkshire

Picture it: you’re standing in your own 50 acres of private woodland and ancient meadow, a mile from the Georgian market town of Richmond. “Darling, is our self-catering holiday home made from sustainable materials?” “Yes, dear.” “Is that a living plant roof I see?” “It is.” “Do we have an environmentally friendly wood-chip boiler?” “We do.” “And a thoroughly ecological reed-bed sewage system?” “Of course.” “Yet is it truly luxurious, with flatscreen TV, bespoke kitchen and posh bathroom?” “Yes, indeedy.”

0870 909 9500, www.dales-holiday-cottages.com; the Bluebell, Bramble, Celandine and Sorrel lodges, each sleeping six, start at £463 for a week

MATFEN HALL, Newcastle

Golf is hardly ecofriendly, but Matfen Hall’s 18 greens are greener than most. The grey-stone gothic pile has flora and nesting boxes around its course, and a 220-acre organic estate to encourage wildlife. Your conscience will be further eased, as you soak up its traditional splendour, by knowing that it has strict buy-local and energy-saving policies. Matfen has also achieved a unique double – it won the Enjoy England Best Small Hotel title in 2002, then expanded to 53 rooms and, last year, took the Best Large Hotel gong, too.

01661 855708, www.matfenhall.com; doubles from £170, B&B

MOSS GROVE, Cumbria

This grand, gabled Victorian house is green and gorgeous. The vast, pass-the-satnav beds are made from reclaimed timber, the flamboyant wallpapers have been made with natural ink, and the trendy bathrooms use water that has been filtered to remove chlorine and pesticides. And, right on the doorstep, there’s Grasmere, which Wordsworth declared “the most loveliest spot that man hath found”.

015394 35251, www.mossgrove.com; doubles from £125, B&B

LE MANOIR, Côte d’Azur

On the French Riviera, wild most often prefixes the word party, except when it describes the woolly island of PortCros. It was gifted to the nation by Marcel Henry in the 1960s on condition that it be preserved as a marine park; his family have now turned his 18th-century home into a lovely shabby-chic hotel, run with an environmental awareness of which M Henry would surely have approved. Cars, bicycles and raking the beaches are all banned under the island’s conservation measures. So is smoking . . . though not in the hotel. This is France, after all.

00 33 4 94 05 90 52, monsite.wanadoo.fr/hotelmanoirportcros; doubles from £195, half-board

LUTE SUITES, Amsterdam

The seven sexy suites in this 18th-century gun factory on the city limits are perfect for the eco-aesthete. The decor is by Marcel Wanders (an Elle Decoration designer of the year, and includes tables made from recycled bin liners and his MoMA-exhibited macramé chairs, knotted from resin-soaked rope. Peter Lute runs the highly acclaimed Lute restaurant, which produces delicious breakfasts, delivered to your door in a groovy – and ecofriendly – wooden box.

00 31 20 472 2462, www.lutesuites.com; doubles from £185, B&B

VIGILIUS, South Tyrol

A supercool spa with rooms like creamy cocoons – lots of natural stone, zen wooden baths and retro leather club chairs, draped with the softest woollen blankets to curl up under and watch the Dolomites turn pink at sunset. And it doesn’t just do you good: ecofriendly measures include a grass-covered roof and a heating system that burns locally sourced wood.

00 800 37 468357, www.designhotels.com; doubles from £150

CASA CAMPER, Barcelona

Camper shoes are cool and quirky, as is the company’s hotel. Minibars are scrapped in favour of a 24-hour complimentary cafe, and the design, by Fernando Amat (Spain’s answer to Terence Conran), echoes Camper colours: red, white and very green. Guests get a mini lounge with hammocks, as well as a bedroom with walk-in solar-heated showers that have individual water-recycling systems. You can even explore the city on one of the hotel’s wooden bikes.

00 34 93 342 6280, www.casacamper.com; doubles from £140, B&B

MASSERIA TORRE COCCARO, Puglia

This whitewashed 16th-century farmhouse, beloved of the likes of Daryl Hannah, offers that soft-focus version of Italy Hollywood is so keen on. Rooms may be in a hay loft or a dreamy grotto, or have a private orange grove, while food comes from the organic kitchen gardens; even the olive oil and salami are homemade. The hotel has a waste-water recycling system, and the spa, which features the organic Aveda range, offers treatments based on your mood – which, in this case, is likely to be chilled out and guilt-free.

00 39 080 482 9310, www.gesthotels.com; doubles from £165, B&B

LA FUENTE DE LA HIGUERA, Ronda

Tucked into the rugged Andalusian sierras, this eco-chic boutique hotel’s classic Spanish architecture is softened with billowing muslins, oriental rugs, snazzy bathrooms and modern art. It offers laid-back luxe, with a yoga pavilion and an honesty bar stocked with treats such as Häagen-Dazs ice cream. The restaurant specialises in traditional ensaladas and tapas, using organic ingredients, many home-grown. Originally an 18th-century olive mill, the building was renovated with locally sourced natural materials, and the owners took the opportunity to install an ecofriendly sewage system.

00 34 952 11 43 55, www.hotellafuente.com; doubles from £90

LOCANDA DELLA VALLE NUOVO, Le Marche

Set on an impeccably organic 185-acre farm, where you can peek through the truffle woods to Renaissance Urbino, this hotel is smart but unintimidating – and the estate’s pets will adopt you for the duration of your stay as enthusiastically as will their owners, the Savini family. Signora might greet you with flour-covered hands from making that day’s bread and pasta. In the evening, after some authentic home cooking using the farm’s own produce, daughter Guilia will tempt you with dozens of homemade liqueurs. Oh, go on: they’re organic, so they won’t give you a hangover. Well, it’s a good theory ...

00 39 0722 330303, www.vallenuova.it; doubles from £70, B&B

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