the macan Bingin

A thatched porch over a solid timber door is the whole of the street frontage, and behind it the villa turns its back on the lane entirely. The macan Bingin is a single-storey white house wrapped in an L around its own courtyard, with a pool set into a strip of bright lawn and a wall high enough that the only thing overhead is palm. Everything is arched — the steel windows, the doorways, the niches cut into the plaster, even the mirrors — which gives a small Bukit house the feel of somewhere Mediterranean that happens to have travellers palms in it. Bingin Beach and its ladder down the cliff are about seven minutes away by car.

Inside is one open volume under a vaulted ceiling of exposed rafters, hung with woven rattan pendants and a black fringed light over the kitchen. A live-edge timber table with cane chairs sits at the centre; along one wall a built-in banquette in blush cushions and black-tasselled bolsters gathers around a wavy slab of a coffee table, and an arched alcove holds pale ceramics and a row of candlesticks. A bougainvillea grows indoors in a tall stone pot beside the doors, which fold back so completely that the difference between the living room and the lawn stops mattering by the second morning. The kitchen is a pale concrete island with timber and cane joinery, properly equipped down to the oven and the dishwasher.

Two bedrooms sit at either end, each with its own bathroom and a queen bed under a curved cane headboard. One has a tall arched steel window directly above the pillows and cane-fronted wardrobes alongside; the other opens through louvred timber shutters straight onto the grass. The bathrooms are worth the trip on their own: a freestanding stone tub under an arched window with a shell-drop chandelier over it, twin basins in a solid timber vanity beneath a pair of arched black mirrors, a rain shower behind glass, and out in the garden a second shower set into an arched panel of rough coral stone. There are no stairs anywhere in the house.

Staff come in daily to clean, and the stay includes a welcome drink, towels, fast Wi-Fi, a safe and parking inside the gate; there is a washing machine and a dryer in the villa, which after a week of salt water matters more than it sounds. The concierge arranges everything else — airport transfers, a car with or without a driver, scooters, breakfast, massages at the villa, a nanny, a pool fence and days out among the cliff temples. Four guests in two equal bedrooms makes this a villa for two couples, or one couple who like the idea of a spare room.

This is a small villa that has been thought about properly: white plaster, arched light, cane and coral stone, and a pool you can see from the bed. Two couples can share it without negotiating, and the surf that made this corner of the Bukit famous is a short drive down the hill.