On a visit to Charlottesville it doesn’t take long to realize that everything in town has ties to Thomas Jefferson. From the stately Rotunda on the campus of the University of Virginia to Monticello, the grand mountaintop home of our third president, to all the vineyards throughout Virginia’s wine country it’s easy to see the influence Thomas Jefferson has had on Charlottesville. The legacy of Thomas Jefferson also lives on at the Dinsmore House Inn, a boutique hotel with centuries of history in downtown Charlottesville.
I was graciously hosted by the Dinsmore House Inn but as always all opinions remain my own.This post contains affiliate links, when you make a purchase or book a hotel through these links the Casual Travelist receives a small commission that helps support this site at no additional cost to you.
The Dinsmore House Inn was originally built by John Dinsmore, Thomas Jefferson’s chief architect and master carpenter. In addition to building Thomas Jefferson’s masterpiece home Monticello, John Dinsmore was also the master carpenter for James Madison’s Montpelier as well as many of the buildings on the campus of the University of Virginia including the Rotunda and Anatomical Theatre. In 1835 he built a townhome on Main Street that lives on to today as the Dinsmore Inn.
The Dinsmore House Inn has been hosting guests as a boutique inn since 2003 and renovations in 2016 made the Dinsmore even more welcoming. The Dinsmore has 9 tastefully decorated rooms with care taken to maintain historic architectural details. We stayed in the Jefferson Suite, which in addition to a king sized bed also features a sitting room with a pull out couch that was perfect for our group of three. This is a touch that I wish more smaller properties offered as we still want the charm that comes with an inn when traveling with three. The bathroom was compact but the stand up shower was powerful and the Molton Brown toiletries add a touch of luxury.
Being a historic property its good to know that second floor rooms are accessed by steep, narrow staircases and may not be suitable for anyone with mobility issues.
All stays at the Dinsmore House include brunch from their onsite restaurant Farm Bell Kitchen. This farm-to-table restaurant sticks to a “local is better” ethos for it’s menu of elevated southern favorites. We started the morning with a batch of banana beignets, crispy fritters filled with creamy banana and smothered with a sinfully good bourbon caramel sauce that had me wanting to lick the bowl clean. I also enjoyed the avocado egg bake, two eggs baked into avocado halves served with toasted baguette for a different take on avocado toast. Farm Bell Kitchen also serves dinner and with offerings like fried green tomatoes with housemade mozzarella and chamomile-seared scallops I’ll definitely have to add it to my Charlottesville dining list.
Kinga Gorski says
Fascinating! How cool that a single individual can influence a town so immensely.