Chic upgrades for S.F. accommodations

Whimsical design elements — including graffiti art, poetry revealed by black light and, in some guest rooms, record turntables — celebrate the city’s beatnik era and other countercultural traditions.

The 196 rooms and suites come with midcentury lounge chairs and this-century 55-inch LED flat-screen TVs, while the street-level Zeppelin Cafe, open to the public, serves Sightglass Coffee, Dynamo Donuts and Jane pastries and other provisions.

Hotel Zeppelin is managed by Viceroy Hotels and owned by Pebblebrook Hotel Trust, which also recently spent $32 million on a cheery remodel of the 361-room Radisson Hotel Fisherman’s Wharf, at 250 Beach St. Reopened in June as Hotel Zephyr, the waterfront hotel’s 2,200-square-foot Game Room provides a pool table, table tennis and interactive art on SmartTVs, while the Yard, a nearly 10,000-square-foot space, sports fire pits made from recycled soda cans, life-size Jenga and Connect Four game pieces, and what’s said to be the city’s largest periscope.

The largest hotel on the West Coast, the Hilton San Francisco Union Square, recently completed a $25 million makeover that includes updates to its 1,911 guest rooms (dark woods, ocean colors), the new Herb N’ Kitchen cafe and culinary market, and bridge-inspired steel artwork and a remodeled bar in its 30,000-square-foot lobby, among other upgrades.