Villa Rindu Kamu

The front of Villa Rindu Kamu is a wall of coral stone with an arched timber door set into it, and a fringe of alang-alang thatch pulled down over the top like a hat. Inside, the plot runs long and narrow: a slim pool of pale tile down one side, edged with heliconia and banana whose leaves lean right over the water, and a run of stone paving on the other where two black mesh loungers sit beside a sawn log doing duty as a table. Timber posts the colour of honey carry the roof out over the paving, and the whole side of the house folds open onto it. Seseh Beach is four hundred metres away, five minutes on foot.

The ground floor is one long room stepped in two levels. Down three broad steps is the lounge, a deep white modular sofa under a ceiling fan facing a low black cabinet and a framed abstract; up again is the dining table in pale timber with six chairs, and beyond it the kitchen, an island with the hob set flush into its top, timber cabinets, an oven and a full-size fridge. Two rattan pendants the shape of upturned baskets hang above. Where the glass folds away, the timber posts frame the pool like a colonnade, and the difference between sitting inside and sitting outside comes down to whether you want the fan on.

Both bedrooms have a queen bed on a low timber base and a bathroom of their own. The downstairs room opens through a timber door onto a small screened terrace; the one above has a pair of arched windows looking out over the rooftops and a private balcony beyond, a pergola of timber slats against a wall of coral stone with two deck chairs under it — the best seat in the villa at six in the evening. The bathrooms keep to one language throughout: a rendered basin floating on a timber shelf, a round timber-framed mirror, black tapware, and a walk-in shower in pale stone with a niche cut for bottles.

Four guests, no washing machine and a beach five minutes away: the shape of a stay here is fairly clear. The laundry service is the one thing worth booking early, and a private cook is the other, because breakfast is not on this villa’s concierge list while a cook is, and the kitchen island was built for someone who knows what to do with it. Scooters make more sense than a car once you are here, since Seseh’s lanes are narrow and the beach is walkable. Daily housekeeping is included, and the massage table sets up on the stone paving beside the pool.

Villa Rindu Kamu is a young house on a quiet lane, built with more care than its size suggests: stone, timber and arches, a pool you can swim before breakfast, and a balcony that catches the last of the light. Four hundred metres later you are standing on the sand at Seseh, which is rather the point.