The Inn Crowd

Twenty-plus independent inns across the Northeast, each one built by someone who left another career to do this instead — Bobbi Brown's Georgian Revival hotel in Montclair, a former J.Crew menswear head running a white-columned guesthouse, the woman behind the American Girl doll now assembling an entire village of historic properties in upstate New York. If you've ever dreamt of escaping your life and opening a Bed & Breakfast, let this be the sign you've been hoping for.