Escape to Thailand, where discretion meets camera-ready aesthetics
These days, discrete (and discreet) personal space isn’t just preferable—it’s essential. Luckily, there’s Thailand, where the tradition of the sala—a freestanding pavilion—is longstanding. What that translates to in hotel design is that the country’s resorts are rife with the modern interpretation of the indigenous structure: the private resort villa. Of course, you’ll find premium hotels the world over that offer freestanding accommodations, but they are all playing catch-up to Thailand and its mastery of the form. Case in point: Phulay Bay, A Ritz-Carlton Reserve.
DESIGN DRAMA
Located in coastal Krabi, this tropical retreat contains 62 villas and private pavilions — which means no shared entrances, hallways or elevators. It’s become a cliché to say that you don’t have to leave your villa. But last year when I visited Phulay Bay, the sense of discovery in my accommodations—Royal Villa 31—was so palpable that the cliché paled before my experience. Glass walls slid open to reveal the elements, a nod to the way the sala blurs the distinction between interior and exterior. My wraparound pool, which overlooked the Andaman Sea, was long enough to swim laps in, and I did. The pool was bordered by a shallow, step-up lip—shaped like a three-leaf clover—that housed rows of waterjets and was meant for lounging. It proved a fine vantage point to admire the copper lanterns hanging over the waterline, and the islands breaking the aqua surface of the sea.
The pool was just steps from the oversized king bed, which was the focal point of the villa. The architecture extended from it in several directions: To the left was a sun-filled office; to the right, a long, glassed-in gallery terminated at the edge of a vast soaking tub. Behind the bed, a series of keyhole-shaped arches led to the dressing room, the bathroom, the indoor and outdoor showers, and finally the garden. Get tired along the way? That’s what the hexagonal daybed—serenely set beneath a skylight—was for.
The only thing that managed to lure me away from my poolside Thai pad was the aforementioned island cluster. When I’m in southern Thailand, I’m always drawn to the karsts—the region’s limestone rock formations that stand like sentries in the glassy straits. So I hopped a longboat to Hong Island National Park and soon the captain, James Bond-like, was weaving his way through a series of inlets and lagoons encircled by sheer rock monoliths, their tops glossy green with tropical foliage. In time I was deposited on one of Ko Hong’s crescent beaches, where more longboats pulled up, brightening the sunny scene with flowers and ribbons adorning their sharp wooden bows.
A WORLD OF STYLE
I still had sand in my sandals the next morning, when it was time to fly out of Krabi and into Bangkok, the gateway back to the U.S. Layover time. I rarely take back-to-back flights anymore (something to consider as air travel becomes ever more complicated), so I’d booked a few nights at the Siam, interior designer Bill Bensley’s 39-suite masterpiece. Bensley is known for the Four Seasons Golden Triangle Tented Camp and other lavish Pacific Rim hotels, and he outdid himself with this antique-filled boutique. Set on the Chao Phraya River, it’s a polished vision in black, white, cream and gray that effortlessly mixes the European colonial period, art deco—and the movies.
“I want guests to be drawn back to another era and to be put in a place where imagination can run wild,” Bensley told me. When I asked him what kind of characters he would imagine slipping into a guest room off the riotous water garden that soars up to the glass ceiling, the famed designer reached for nostalgia and romance. “Flirtation,” he said, “is always an underlying design muse for me. Have you ever seen L’Amant?” He was referring to the steamy 1992 film based on Marguerite Duras’s novel The Lover, a tale of an illicit coupling set in 1920s Indochina. “That will explain everything!”
I never left the hotel. I’d been to Bangkok before, and it would always be there. I couldn’t seem to pull myself away from the black-and-aqua tiled pool by the river. Like everything else on this trip, it was ready for its close-up.