Villa Koya

Gang Villa Kamag is one of those Seminyak lanes wide enough for a scooter and not much else, which is exactly what you want at the end of a day out. Behind the wall, Villa Koya turns its back on the street and arranges itself around a rectangular pool set into a deck of dark hardwood, with raised planters of pandanus, banana and cycad crowding the water’s edge and a low grey-tiled roof pitching down on three sides. It is a single-storey house on one level, so the pool is never more than a few steps from anywhere, and at dusk the underwater lights turn the courtyard the colour of a swimming pool advertisement.

The living side of the courtyard opens completely. Sliding glass folds away to reveal a deep pale sectional facing a wall hung with Balinese woven discs, carved panels and feather fans, lit by a mix of black drum shades and copper globes. The dining table seats six under the same pendants, and the kitchen behind it is properly equipped rather than decorative: a marble-topped island with bar stools, an oven and stove, a microwave and toaster, a wine fridge, a blender and a water dispenser. Red and orange kilims lie across polished concrete, and ceiling fans turn slowly whether or not the air conditioning is on.

All three bedrooms are kings with their own bathrooms, and the easiest way to tell them apart is by the throw across the bed: burnt orange in one, mustard in the next, olive in the third. Each has sliding doors to the deck, so the last thing you see before sleep is the lit water. The bathrooms are the best-finished rooms in the house, lined in grey marble with carved stone vessel basins sitting on concrete shelves, round black-framed mirrors above them and planting pressed against the shower glass, one of them screened by a slatted timber panel that throws stripes of light across the floor in the morning.

Staff come daily and work to your rhythm rather than a schedule; the concierge does the rest. The house keeps an iron and a drying rack but no washing machine, so laundry is worth handing over on day one, and because the kitchen island is the natural centre of the villa a private cook is the request that earns its keep here. A pool fence can be fitted, which matters in a courtyard where the water starts at the door. Restaurants, coffee and the Seminyak markets sit within a few minutes’ walk, and the beaches at Petitenget and Seminyak are a short drive rather than a stroll.

Villa Koya is the sort of Seminyak house people rebook: three matching suites, a courtyard pool a few steps from every door and a kitchen that makes staying in feel like a choice. It suits three couples, or a family who would rather walk to dinner than drive.