Jetwing’s ‘hand-made’ Pottuvil resort aims at high-roller surfers
View(s):Everyone is cashing on leisure in post-war Sri Lanka. Hotels are springing up, small guest-houses are being designated boutique hotels even if they don’t fit the profile and home-stay tourism with the entry of sites like Airbnb and booking.com drawing adventurous backpackers or cheap-stay travellers, is flourishing.
So in a market that is increasingly getting over-crowded, how do you stay out of the box? Be different; be unconventional?
One way is telling stories and that’s how the latest kid on the block – Jetwing Surf Pottuvil with 20 environmentally-designed cabanas – hopes to stand out of the crowd.
With the scheduled opening (held on Friday, December 1), the latest jewel in the crown of the Jetwing Group’s 35 + properties is pitching an environmentally-friendly design, simply put together by architect John Balmond, son of internationally famous Sri Lankan architect Cecil Balmond, using not only local, raw material but also local (from the neighourhood) artisans.
Mr. Balmond’s frames of the drawings of the cabanas and other facilities on the property, located just two km from the world famous Arugam Bay surfers’ paradise, were like doodles, child-like but which sprang to life when construction began.
And as Jetwing Hotels Chairman Hiran Cooray, explained to journalists last week in Colombo on how it all started, that was another story.
“On a visit to the UK some years, we had dinner at the home of Len Porter (who is also a director at Jetwing Symphony) in Surrey who spoke about his house at Pottuvil and the fascination of the waves breaking. I said you must be crazy to have a house (in the middle of nowhere).”
Continuing, Mr. Cooray, who has helped the hotel group created by his late father, veteran hotelier Herbert Cooray grow by leaps and bounds in the past five years, said: “Thereafter during a visit to Sri Lanka by Len and his wife, we went to Pottuvil and I was amazed by the location. There was a seven acre land up for grabs next to Len’s property and before long we were owning it.”
The luxury resort which offers rooms at US$300 bed/breakfast, is close to Whisky Point, another surfers paradise while Coconut Point is right in front is a great place for surfing.
The Jetwing property is the only luxury resort in an area with a largely Muslim population. “We have always been welcome in the area, working close with the community and, for the first time we are getting youth from the village to work here,” said Mr. Cooray.
The entire resort has been designed with the waves and breaking waves in mind, with Mr. Balmond showing drawings of circles and semi circles. The waves were drawn like curves, in the early sketches that he displaced on a video.
The video also shows the construction process with the structures made out of wood, woven coconut palm leaves and illuk (reeds). The finished product is like a work of art, no brick or mortar – a resort Jeremy Auvity, Operations Director at Jetwing Hotels described (at the media briefing) as a “‘hand-made hotel”.
(Feizal)