DEPARTURES TRAVEL ON
DEPARTURES TRAVEL ON THE RADAR 22 Clockwise from top left: the pool area at Pan Pacific Orchard; outside the COMO Metropolitan; the Shophouse Suite at the Mondrian Singapore Duxton (angama.com) 10 tented suites, set within a forest of fever trees where Super Tusker elephants roam alongside breathtaking views of Mount Kilimanjaro. And JW Marriott Masai Mara Lodge (marriott.com) has arrived in the expansive Kenyan game reserve, with 20 tents each with private deck and Jacuzzi overlooking the Talek River. The Americas Habitas (ourhabitas.com) is expanding its footprint with three new openings. Habitas Santa Teresa, on the southernmost tip of Costa Rica’s Nicoya Peninsula, will appeal to surfers and adventurers with 45 lowimpact rooms and ten luxury tents located between white sand beaches and lush forest. Habitas Atacama, in the Chilean desert, known for its What’s Happening in Singapore? The Lion City has seen a pride of new openings in 2023 as Singapore roars back to life following the pandemic. Having opened hotels and resorts from London to Perth to Bali and the Turks and Caicos, Singaporean hotelier and fashion maven Christina Ong has finally brought her COMO hotel brand home. Designed by Paola Navone, the COMO Metropolitan Singapore (comohotels.com) is located near the city’s main shopping district and features 156 rooms and suites alongside a Korean steakhouse, a French patisserie, a rooftop swimming pool and an expansive COMO Shambhala spa. In keeping with the brand, wellness is, naturally, threaded through the entire 19-storey property. Another notable newcomer, aimed squarely at dramatic landscapes of volcanoes, salt flats, geysers and hot springs, boasts 51 rooms that are ideal bases for explorations of the area. And in Oaxaca, Habitas Mazunte is located near the Mexican Pacific coast’s world-famous surf breaks, and will offer 28 rooms surrounded by jungle, a private beach club and holistic wellness facilities including Mayan cleansing ceremonies. SHA Mexico (shawellness.com), another Mexico newcomer, will offer a sanctuary for wellness spread over seven hectares of natural landscapes opposite Isla Mujeres, encompassing 500 metres of white-sand beaches, clear Caribbean waters, a protected coral reef and its own cenote. In the US, New York will see the arrival of The Fifth Avenue Hotel (thefifthavenuehotel.com), Asia’s tastemakers, is the Mondrian Singapore Duxton (ennismore. com), a boutique property that draws on Chinatown’s shophouse architecture and hyper-local history. Artworks that stop you in your tracks – Ian Davenport’s In Deep Magenta Mirrored puddle painting; Waterfall IV, a time-lapse film by Singaporean artist Dawn Ng – litter the hotel. Other attractions include a Californianfeeling rooftop pool and an Italian restaurant and three lounges. Another new entry is the Pan Pacific Orchard (panpacific.com), a sustainable skyscraper cut with Avatar-like sky gardens, water gardens and 120m-tall columns of tropical creepers. Still to come this year are the debut of The Standard (standardhotels.com), with 143 colour-pop rooms and a party-worthy swimming pool; an Edition outpost (editionhotels.com) designed by Philippe Starck; and the first Artyzen lifestyle hotel (artyzen. com) outside China, plus the unveiling of the Mandarin Oriental, Singapore ( mandarinoriental.com), as it emerges at the end of the year from a top-to-toe revamp. – Lee Cobaj a reimagining of a Gilded Age mansion in the heart of Manhattan filled with maximalist design details. Out west in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, the Rusty Parrot Lodge & Spa (rustyparrot.com) rises like a phoenix after a devastating fire in 2019, with a handsome stone edifice, a restaurant featuring locally sourced and wild ingredients, and a menu of treatments designed for mountain living at the Body Sage Spa. And in the 50th state, on Hawaii’s Big Island, the Kona Village has undergone a renaissance by Rosewood ( rosewoodhotels.com), inviting guests to connect with Hawaiian wellness traditions, dine on Pacific Rim-to-table cuisine, and head out on a sunrise paddles in an outrigger canoe. – Nicola Chilton CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: STUDIO PERIPHERY, © COMO METROPOLITAN SINGAPORE, © MONDRIAN SINGAPORE DUXTON
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