MALDIVES ISLAND RESORT
CLIENT
Crown and Champa Resorts
LOCATION
North Malé Atoll, The Maldives
CATEGORY
Hospitality
RENDERS
Parkade
In 2019 we were approached to overhaul a resort island, part of an isolated atoll in the Maldives. The resort itself is traditionally Maldivian, with thatched buildings of natural materials. Simple structures that speak to an island holiday in the vastness of the Indian Ocean.
The brief was to completely update and brighten the island, which covers some 30 hectares, featuring multiple restaurants, two bars, two spas, a kids club and multiple room types, from garden rooms to villas on stilts over the tropical waters. The brief dictated that all existing infrastructure be reused and that there would not be any new buildings, which meant that this was largely an interiors project.
This was an exciting and challenging prospect – how does one brighten or adorn what, in many respects, is already a paradise? Our approach was not to compete with the natural beauty, but to ensure that we designed something beautiful alongside it.
On an island resort, time itself becomes an abstract concept. The hours bleed into each other. The shadows shorten and lengthen, but the days themselves seem endless. At night, the stars wheel overhead in their predetermined arc, always moving but apparently still. Gentle waves lap ceaselessly at the shore, their stalemate with the beach constant.
There is a simplicity about time when viewed in this way. With this in mind, we wanted to hearken back to the island’s long history, but without evoking nostalgia – we sought to plant the person experiencing the environment in a permanent present informed by the past. On the island is a museum, in which we came across an old woven mat. We took some photos of it, and using different magnifications created patterns out of it to apply in our interiors. We took something from time past, abstracted it, and created something new – this was the thinking we took into everything we designed for the island.
The island itself – the sand and the sea, the vegetation and the sky – is almost overwhelmingly beautiful, and so we wanted the interiors to act as a counterpoint. We created uncluttered, unadorned, simple spaces for restless eyes to find peace.
This minimalist approach allowed the windows and the sliding doors to frame the artwork of the outside world, with the interiors eschewing anything ornate. Modern wooden furniture, bare stone-coloured walls, the honesty of thatch, plain linens. Simple courtyard bathrooms. Sheer curtains, light as a whisper.
A refuge, if you will, from the wild beauty outside.
