To understand Charlie Palmer’s new hotel concept, it helps to know his adopted hometown of Healdsburg. The 67-year-old chef, considered one of the pioneers of modern American cuisine, has made the California wine-country town his base for the past quarter century, for both the ingredients and the inspiration that he finds there. “We’re 35 minutes from Bodega Bay, so the seafood is right there, and we’re surrounded by wineries and some of the greatest craftspeople who make those wines,” Palmer says. “But it’s the agriculture—and the attitude of the people—that really makes this place special. Healdsburg’s the kind of place where anything is possible.”

Raised in upstate New York, Palmer gained international acclaim at Aureole, his Manhattan restaurant that earned 13 Michelin stars during its three-decade run. In 2001, he ventured west to open Hotel Healdsburg and its Dry Creek Kitchen restaurant on the plaza of the then under-the-radar town in Sonoma County. The restaurant helped establish Healdsburg as a dining destination, a reputation burnished by more recent additions including the Michelin-three-star SingleThread and the local favorite the Matheson.

Getting to know this unquestionably abundant town—and the Russian River Valley, Dry Creek Valley, and Alexander Valley wine regions that surround it—is the central tenet of Palmer’s new Appellation Healdsburg hotel. Opened last September, the 108-room property is the first hotel created by Appellation, the hospitality brand that Palmer co-founded with longtime Four Seasons executive and fellow Healdsburg local Christopher Hunsberger. The brand’s “culinary-first hotel” concept is custom made for the duo’s hometown. “It’s all about place,” Palmer says. “[Appellation] takes what’s very special about a place and folds it into an experience where people, no matter where they’re coming from, really get the idea of what it’s like to be in a place like Healdsburg.”

The hotel occupies an 8.5-acre site a few miles from the town plaza. Its California farmhouse–style structures share the space with two vineyard-view swimming pools and a collection of decorative and culinary gardens. A five-treatment-room spa utilizes herbs and botanicals grown in the gardens, and guest rooms are stocked with locally sourced treats (including a pour-over kit featuring Wolf coffee). More than 50 classes and workshops—from cheesemaking to painting—are offered throughout the year as part of the hotel’s Crafted at Appellation program. Further connecting guests to their surroundings, bicycles are available to take for a spin to the plaza, and a walking path at the hotel links to the adjacent Foss Creek Trail.

The attachment to place is most pronounced at Folia Bar & Kitchen, where Palmer’s son Reed is the chef de cuisine. Reed’s résumé spans continents, from Amass in Copenhagen to Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Pocantico Hills, New York. Folia marks a return to his roots. “It really came down to the idea that he grew up here, and he now understands that this is the place to perfect his craft,” Palmer says. “Coming back here, he understands why this place is so special.”

Mirroring Reed’s career journey, Folia brings the Appellation concept full circle. An open, warm, and inviting space just off the lobby, the restaurant reflects Reed’s philosophy of progressive American cuisine, anchored in live-fire cooking and fresh ingredients plucked from local farms and waters. Starters like house-cured charcuterie and Hog Island oysters (farmed in Humboldt and Tomales bays) might lead to a beet salad sourced from the hotel’s gardens and a roasted duck from Bassian Farms in nearby Petaluma. Much of the menu’s beauty is in the details, including condiments like house-made “Tabasco” sauce and spicy mustard.

The focus on local quality continues at Andys Beeline Rooftop, a clubby, contemporary cocktail bar just upstairs from Folia. Overlooking the hotel gardens and adjacent vineyards, the bar pairs ceviche and other seafood-driven bites with local wines—including Silver Oak by the glass—and inventive cocktails made with rooftop-grown ingredients.

Beyond Healdsburg, Palmer has ambitious plans for Appellation, with properties already in the works in Petaluma and Morgan Hill, California, as well as Park City, Utah. Still, it had to start in his hometown. “It’s just the beginning in Healdsburg—not in a sense of growth or commercialization, but of specialization,” he says. “I truly believe that this is one of the most special places in California.”