The Westhampton Seabreeze Motel, with its quilted bedspreads, white microwaves and mini fridges, is no more. Gone, too, is the Sands Motel, in Montauk, which was a tad swankier with full refrigerators and stoves that were off-white.
The motor lodges were the last of their kind, as the perimeter of the wealthiest of the wealthy Hamptons pushed outward to swallow up many of the remaining patches of affordability in the Long Island resort towns.
This summer, two new hotels are slated to open in their place with amenities more equated with luxury. Three Ducks, on the old Seabreeze site, will offer guests complimentary breakfast from a local farm stand and beach cruiser bicycles. At Offshore Montauk, which has risen where the Sands Motel once stood, guests will find a cabana-lined pool and a room for yoga and Pilates.
The new hotels embody the continued Hamptonization of all the Hamptons, a transformation of quiet coastal spots into chic, moneyed destinations. Both are in towns where housing prices have increased in recent years — the average home is now $1.9 million in Montauk and $1.56 million in Westhampton, according to Zillow. Guests can expect to pay as much as $795 a night at Three Ducks and $1,000 a night at Offshore on the weekends this summer.
In Montauk, what was once a low-key fishing village is now a summer playground for the wealthy, the famous and those who want to be close to them. Two other motels in town were bought last year by the owner of high-end boutique hotels in Nantucket and Martha’s Vineyard; both are now closed while they undergo renovations. And several clubs are moving to town this summer, including a restaurant that plans to charge a membership fee to get a guaranteed seat.
