Villa Coco Bay

Villa Coco Bay is a rare thing in Berawa: a house that was designed rather than assembled, and it shows the moment the garden opens up. The main pool is a lagoon, a soft irregular curve with a shallow shelf at one end, cut into planting dense enough that the boundary disappears — palms, banana, bamboo, greenery trailing down over the timber. A raised boardwalk runs along one side; an open pavilion stands on the lawn with sofas deep enough to lose an afternoon in. From above, the rest of the arrangement becomes clear: one long thatched roof over the main house, and three separate plunge pools in a row down the flank, one for each loft. ArchDaily published the building in 2024.

The living room has no proper walls on two sides. A long sectional is set into a stepped platform, planting grows right up to the edge of the cushions, and the timber-slat ceiling carries on out over the terrace, so indoors and outdoors become a single decision about shade. Behind it the kitchen is a working one — a long island of dark veined marble with a stone extractor hood above it, fluted white tile behind the hob, bar stools along the front. The dining table sits under a cluster of glass globes with glazing on three sides. Beyond that are a cinema room and a gym, treadmills facing a mirrored wall.

Eight bedrooms, eight bathrooms, and enough variation between them that choosing takes a while. Seven are king and one is queen; the master has its own balcony and a deep navy velvet headboard under a slatted timber ceiling. Three are lofts, raised and separate, each opening straight onto a plunge pool of its own, which is why sixteen people can share this house without ever queuing for anything. The bathrooms swing between deep blue vertical tile with twin basins on marble, a green-tiled vanity wall standing behind one bed, and fluted white tile around a terrazzo basin. Every room has air conditioning, a safe and a bathroom of its own.

The case for booking here rather than somewhere larger is that marble island, because a personal chef stands behind it. Breakfast is included every morning; lunch and dinner come off the villa’s own menu, ordered the day before; and a floating breakfast in the lagoon can be laid on if the group is that sort of group. A villa manager and butlers are on site, and the house buggy with a driver takes the walk out of the run to the beach or the cafes. This is not a party house — outside speakers and DJ equipment are not allowed and there is a cap on visitors — but for sixteen people who want to eat well and swim a great deal, it is hard to beat.

Villa Coco Bay is the rare eight-bedroom house that still reads as one building rather than a compound: one lagoon, one long marble island, one open room where everybody ends up anyway. Sixteen guests, a chef, a gym, a cinema, and the sand at the end of the lane.