Theater Meets Nature In The Sublime Architecture Of St. Regis Maldives

Sunset at the open-air Whale Bar of St. Regis Maldives Vommuli is quite the show. The natural backdrop of a fiery sun casting its orange glow over an expanse of unapologetically turquoise Indian Ocean is enough to stir the souls of most. But add to it the heaving rapture of ‘O Fortuna’ booming from the all-encompassing sound system coupled with the procession of white-clad St. Regis staff marching to the water’s edge bearing champagne bottle and ceremonial saber and it all gets a little surreal. This is the ritual of Sabrage, and it’s just the kind of show the St. Regis was built for.

There are many island resort paradises in the Maldives. No one seems entirely sure how many exactly but with several currently under construction and in planning, it is fast approaching 200. How then to choose? In terms of service and luxury, the difference between many is incremental, because once something gets so good you are left wanting for nothing, how does the next place improve on that? The answer at the St. Regis Maldives Vommuli is architecture – or more accurately, the experience that architecture creates.

A 30-ish minute plane ride south from Male to Dhaalu Atoll means the first view guests get of the island and resort is from above, in one of the fantastic Maldivian seaplane taxis that service so many islands. No opportunity to impress is wasted, with the first structure reaching out from the island to greet them looking unmistakably lobster-like in its arrangement – the Iridium spa, part of the Lagoon Zone, one of four distinct areas that make up the island and have inspired its design.

But it’s not just from the outside that the design speaks of its surroundings. Walk over the bridge and into the Iridium spa and you’ll cross a series of glass floor panels that open up unique windows into the lagoon and its multitudinous inhabitants below. Look up and outwards in any direction and views are framed by swooping elliptical curves that change the perspective whichever direction you glance – treatment room roofs pulled down wide and low to shade walkways from the sun. Form meets function meets massage.

Walk, or more likely cycle, off the over-water lobster and you enter the Jungle Zone, a tangle of tunnelway roads, sand lined and jungle encased, that lead to various other properties dotted around the island. Head inland and you’ll find Vommuli House, a nature discovery center whose wings branch into the bush like the roots of a banyan tree. The largest recreation center in the Maldives, each branch offers a different activity, from meditation to anti-gravity yoga. Not far from here you’ll happen upon Cargo, your nose likely drawing you into its low-lit scattering of tables piled high with Middle Eastern treats. Sandy toes and jungle soundtracks paired with charcoal grilled meats, spiced vegetables and dips of every persuasion.

Sated with Middle Eastern delights, head north from Cargo and you’ll soon reach the best part of any island – the Beach Zone. The Maldives is famed for its soft white sand and Vommuli’s beaches are a case in point, the fine coral sand particularly suited to this part of the world as it stays cool under foot despite the blazing equatorial sun. Set back on the edge of the beach that rings Vommuli, lightly camouflaged amid soaring palm trees angled in every direction like a giant sized game of fiddlesticks, are the beach villas.

Simple, triangular and glass-fronted, their design stands apart from the rest of the island’s quirkier shaped buildings but has authenticity at its heart. Inspired simply enough by an existing fisherman’s hut that had been built on the beach long before the St. Regis builders arrived in 2016, they’re designed to align with and maximize their natural surroundings rather than steal the show from them. Each is dominated inside by a centrally set bed facing oceanward, where a tap of an iPad button draws open floor-to-ceiling curtains to reveal your private pool, the beach and ocean beyond. Another grand piece of theater designed to elevate the already magical into something exceptional.

The Beach Zone is home to other treasures too. A vast infinity pool that frames the beach and from the right angle appears to dissolve seamlessly into the ocean. Behind it, Alba – the beating heart of the island. A gathering place from morning till night, it is the resort’s signature restaurant fusing Maldivian and Italian dishes with bistro classics in a light-filled, Mies van der Rohe-inspired pavilion-style structure. Floor to ceiling glass doors flung open tempt in cool breezes that blend indoor with out for alfresco dining – vital when it’s the setting for that most important and decadent hotel offering: breakfast. For many guests, it’s the only time they leave the revelry of their villas.

Bookending Alba on either side are two curious structures, wood-slatted and multistoried. The first, an ovular post-renaissance-helmet-shaped oddity, is the ubiquitous resort boutique – but head up the spiral staircase and find yourself in an extraordinary observatory tower with sweeping views over the island from above the palm frond canopy. The second is a spiraled conical that twists up into the sky and houses the library and work area. Both are outrageous additions that sing to their surroundings and the ethos of the St. Regis architects.

Curving back out into the Lagoon Zone are the overwater villas, a half moon runway of 44 private residences that kiss the island reef and promise daily views of the extraordinary marine life that lives there. So inspired, their shapes are taken from the manta rays that glide below and in particular the cephalic lobes they use to feed, creating that distinct open-mouth shape.

Lastly we come to the Coastal Zone on Vommuli’s south side where the island and reef almost meet. Home to twelve more villas, six jut from the jungle’s edge, half perched over the coast, and six balance over rocky shoals where land and water collide. Their designs are inspired by the Maldivian Dhoni, the ubiquitous boats that ply the waters of the Laccadive Sea, with the two-story villas wrapped in sail-like roofs that open on two sides to bring the coast onto the decks and blur the lines between architecture and nature. On their eastern flank Orientale restaurant brings the culinary delights of Asia to the St. Regis, but its newly-opened sister restaurant is the real showstopper.

Launching at the end of 2022, Teppanyaki restaurant T•Pan is an ode to modern Japanese Kaiseki-style cuisine, a multi-course extravaganza of decadent ingredients theatrically prepared at a teppan by your chef, paired with sakes from the renowned house Dassai. As with everything at St. Regis, food and service is of the finest quality but all is submissive to the theater of the setting and ceremony, which only makes it more memorable.

T•Pan is small, intimate – a dark, angular, rough-wood shell informed by the ghost crabs that patrol the island’s coast. It adheres to the wabi-sabi aesthetic, a view centered on the notion of accepting and celebrating imperfection. Chairs diners sit on are shaped for Manta Rays and the lights trail from the ceiling reminiscent of bioluminescent dinoflagellates that are the basis of the marine food chain. Imposing artworks are hewn like coral and knotted like seaweed and the backdrop to everything a glass wall framing once again, the impossible perfection of the Indian Ocean beyond.

It is the epitome of the St. Regis Maldives’ approach. Celebrate the natural beauty of the surroundings yet don’t be afraid to try and elevate it in a unique and surprising way. Quite the show indeed.