Best of the Maldives: Spacious Entries – Cheval Blanc Randheli

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Cheval Blanc Randheli sliding doors

 

 

If One and Only brings the bedroom into the pool, Cheval Blanc Randheli brings the pool into the bedroom. It has made an entire wall of its villa openable for an expansive vista from within. I love this design element which was have been thinking of adding to our own house (replacing the back floor-to-ceiling windows of the dining room with French doors that open up to our back yard). The approach melds the best of both the gorgeous outdoors with some of the comforts of inside.

The architecture of the villas also features record-breaking entry doors themselves. The previous tops was The Haven’s 4 meter high doors, but Randheli features“An architecture sequence of 7-meter high doors in each villa [which] creates a spectacular space.”

No worries about bumping my head on the frame there then.

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Best of the Maldives: Bunk Beds – Constance Halaveli

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Constance Halaveli bunk beds

After all that horizontal tandem activity, Constance Halaveli brings a new vertical dimension to some tandem rest. Our kids always enjoyed a bit of “sleep over” ambience on our holidays where they invariably stayed in the same room and chatted surreptitiously in the dark while Mom and Dad got in a few more chapters on the deck. Despite their camaraderie, except at the very youngest age, they started to want their own beds, but often twins were hard to come by at resorts. Sometimes one could improvise sleeping on a couch or day bed. But Halaveli’s bunks are a great solution that my children would have adored (though definitely would have prompted many fight over who gets the top bunk).

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Best of the Maldives: Clothes Hangers – Gili Lankanfushi

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Gili Lankanfushi - coat hangers

 

This Best of the Maldives piece is possibly my most archetypal. I say that because when I am describing to people the extent of the esoterica that I investigate and write about I often cite the “Clothes Hangers” example. These are the sort of obscure distinctions that I adore. They are the subtle details that some resort designer or marketer has been inspired to provide.

As wood is the traditional gift for the 5th anniversary, I thought that today would be an appropriate occasion to finally post this distinction that I have mentioned in conversation so many times.

Clothes hangers are a fine example of a pedestrian item that can be made colourful and remarkable with a little creativity and panache. I’ve seen painted hangers, padded and scented ones, but nearly all of our hangers at home are wood. I’ve seen other wooden ones in the Maldives, but none quite a funky and fun as Gili Lankanfushi’s bamboo collection.

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Best of the Maldives: Private Jetty – Angsana Velavaru

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Angsana Velavaru deck 1

 

From longest day to longest private quai. One of our favourite parts of staying in a water villa is walking along the jetty to the room looking down in the shallows of the lagoon at the various marine life cavorting below. Velavaru extends that promenade out the back of its villas with your own private jetty to a special lounger set even more remotely in the middle of the ocean.

 

Angsana Velavaru deck 2

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Best of the Maldives: Private Beach – Nika

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Nika villa beach

 (picture courtesy of Rainbow Cheung)

Take me away…and everyone else too!

The utter seclusion of the remote Maldives resorts attracts a big group of the “get away from it all” crowd. Especially, getting away from the crowds. Also, for the big celebrity contingent, privacy is a big plus. And of course, romantic celebrations always place a premium on intimate seclusion. Dhonakulhi even names itself “Island Hideaway”. For many, the treasure to be hidden is themselves.

Recognizing this appeal, many resorts offer pretty good degree of privacy. Maldives resorts are not packed holiday camps nor crowded beaches. And most resorts take measures to strengthen the privacy with various screens and foliage and private areas (Baros is especially effective at this). Many resorts have villas with large enclosed back areas where people can lounge in the sun or even swim in pools in complete isolation. Some even enclose their villa grounds with compound-like walls for complete shielding (eg. Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru, Jumeirah Vittaveli)

Nika has made ‘Privacy’ the over-arching concept to the entire resort. That is all very well and good to assert, but how does one actually distinguish one’s private paradise from so many other well secreted hide-aways? The villas are indeed well segregated with private paths to their front doors and dense foliage between plots.

The one distinction Nika offers is extending this “privacy” and delineated segregation all the way into the water. First of all this means that every villa beach is a private beach. On just about every other resort, you can make the villa itself as private as you like, but the beach itself is open area that any guest can stroll on.

How does Nika pull off this feat without having oppressive beach guards or unsightly warning signs? It exemplifies a principle that is the focus of my other big blog pursuit – embracing failure. Nika has taken what is a necessary downside to so many resorts – island preserving groynes – and turned them into an asset. Many feel that these man-made structures jutting out from the beach detract from the idyllic natural feel of an island. Some make efforts to minimise the impact. But Nika has actually embraced them and exploited them to create this distinctive feature of privacy. That is because each villa is planted directly between two groynes so they form a natural delineation into the water of the villa’s beach AND swimming area. Taking an ocean dip does feel like you have you own like personal slice of paradise.

It’s not going to be the best resort for people who like to walk around the circumfrance of an island. Of course, you can always swim/snorkel/boat around the periphery (so there is no guarantee that your sunbathing will be completely free from prying eyes or that you will never see another human being).

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Best of the Maldives: Hideaway TV – Baros

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Baros hideaway tv

To TV, or not to TV…that is the question.

The Emmy’s last night celebrated the very best of television, and yet one of the great debates about Maldives holidays are whether ‘TVs’ are a good thing or not. Part of the allure to this enchanting destination is its remote “get away from it all” feel. The “no shoes, no news” ethos implies no network broadcasters droning on about the depressing headlines of the day. There is a school of Maldives purists who think that any such modern contrivances have no place in the idyllic archipelago.

I’m more of the “to each his own” school. I have always focused on very individual tastes and preoccupations that people have that are catered for by 100+ different islands in the resort. We have never really watched any TV during our visits to the Maldives and never missed it. But we can appreciate the people who might. We empathise with people whose busy lives mean they never get a chance to just chill in front of a favourite show. Sometimes holiday is the only opportunity for these folks to treat themselves to a little boob-tube that we all take for granted.

One big challenge is the kids. Not just in the Maldives, but anywhere and at home. When the glowing, rectangular shrine beckons will it override all other opportunities for exploration and experience? It is a pervasive balancing act.

Baros has come up with a clever and stylish way to have your cake and eat it too on the TV front. Taking a page from the pirate world, it has devised a way to hide the electronic treasure by burying it in discrete hideaway unit (see hidden below and in use above). For families wanting to remove the temptation from the younger ones (or themselves), the unit can be tucked away out of sight. But if there is a special game on or the weather has gone a bit sour, it pops up easily for a bit of video chilling.

Now you watch it, now you don’t.

 

Baros hideaway tv 2

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Best of the Maldives: Largest Water Villa – Soneva Gili

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Gili Lankanfushi - Private Reserve aerial

 

The Summer Solstice brings us the sweet longest day of the year today. And in the Maldives, if not the world, the longest suite of all is the Gili Lankanfushi Private Reserve at a whopping 76 metres.

The Private Reserve is also long on its own distinctions.

  • Largest – Not just the longest, but the largest water villa in all of the Maldives (1,400 square metres)
  • Long Stays
  • Longest Glass Floor (see below)
  • Largest Bathroom – the 100 square meter bathroom is larger than over a quarter of the entire villas in the Maldives

A water suite of Stonehenge proportions.

 

Gili Lankanfushi - Private Reserve glass floor

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