The Most Natural Moments in Four Seasons — Four Seasons Maldives and Four Seasons Singapore

The Most Natural Moments in Four Seasons — Four Seasons Maldives & Four Seasons Singapore

I traveled through Singapore to the Maldives * and experienced three Four Seasons properties. Amid unexpected landscapes and warm hospitality, time at Four Seasons flowed more naturally than ever.

Words Parc Jinmyoung
Photos courtesy of ∙ In collaboration with Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts
* There are currently no direct flights from Korea to the Maldives, so this journey went via Singapore. After a night at Four Seasons Hotel Singapore, I entered the Maldives through Malé and traveled in turn to the two islands that are home to Four Seasons resorts, Kuda Huraa and Landaa Giraavaru.

Tradition Meets Modernity, Nature Meets Civilization

On the way from Singapore Changi Airport to Four Seasons Hotel Singapore, lush greenery lines both sides of the wide road, as you would expect from a country nicknamed “the world’s largest park.” Entering Orchard Road, the heart of Singapore shopping, I found trendy, glamorous malls such as ION Orchard and Paragon Shopping Centre clustered together. Several luxury hotels stand here as well, and Four Seasons Hotel Singapore is one of them.
Step into the lobby and your eyes move in turn across antique furniture, traditional objects, and art pieces that carry the marks of time. Established 29 years ago, the hotel lets tradition and modernity coexist. In its 2019 renovation, the team worked to improve guest comfort without losing the identity of a hotel with a long history. Worn and frayed furniture and wallpaper were replaced with new pieces, for example, but floor tiles that were still serviceable were kept, and the owner’s historically significant personal collection was rearranged to preserve the classic atmosphere.

Four Seasons Hotel Singapore has worked hard to preserve its distinctive character, but as eco-friendliness has become a core value of travel, change was clearly necessary. If a hotel wasn’t designed with sustainability in mind from the start, how can it contribute to the environment? Installing automatic curtains and LED lighting, and changing bed sheets and towels only every three days unless guests request otherwise, to save energy, is the easy part. Detailed eco-friendly policies, such as eliminating single-use plastic containers in guest rooms and splitting bins into recycling and general waste to nudge guests toward sorting naturally, started small and took several years to complete.
The effort to balance nature and civilization becomes even more concrete in the hotel’s restaurants. Every restaurant runs a program that converts food waste into organic waste and uses the Lumitics system to track it. One-Ninety, an Asian fusion restaurant that also serves breakfast, uses up to 80 percent locally sourced seasonal ingredients, and the neighboring One-Ninety Bar offers a wellness-focused menu of plant-based, gluten-free dishes and cocktails.

Keeping the Maldives’ Distinctive Charm

A flight from Singapore reaches Malé airport in the Maldives in just 4 hours and 50 minutes. Late at night, the briny smell of the sea hits your nose and a muggy breeze brushes your skin, and it finally sinks in that you have arrived. Set in the middle of the Indian Ocean, the Maldives is made up of 26 atolls containing 1,192 coral islands, large and small. About 160 of them each host a single resort, and Four Seasons occupies three islands: Kuda Huraa, Landaa Giraavaru, and the private island of Voavah. Four Seasons Resort Maldives at Kuda Huraa, about 25 minutes from Malé by speedboat, was the first stop of the trip. Just as my hair stiffened from the salty sea wind, the boat’s noise faded. I stepped off the small boat and followed the long line of lights along the wooden jetty deck. Even in the dim light, the sea glowed a vivid jade, and a pleasant tension filled my whole body.
The sun rose through broken clouds, and when I opened my eyes in bed, the sea was right in front of me. With daylight, the true charm of Four Seasons Resort Maldives at Kuda Huraa is revealed. Its 96 rooms, all individual bungalows, are built as Maldivian-style thatched houses, with palm-leaf roofs and walls of stacked coral brick. The interiors follow Maldivian tradition too, with wallpaper and fabrics inspired by the island’s nature, such as tropical flowers, shells, coral, and lush greenery, and furniture woven from bamboo that carries its own charm and value. “Since last year we’ve been renovating the entire resort in a modern style, while keeping the light, relaxed atmosphere that is unique to the Maldives,” says Shaima, the public relations representative. Rooms are divided into sunrise-view and sunset-view bungalows, and each terrace, with its private outdoor pool, hammock, and sunbeds, opens onto the sea. The sunrise bungalows lead to a coral beach, while from the sunset-view bungalows you can dive straight into the lagoon, home to fish and coral.

Wherever you set foot, Four Seasons Resort Maldives at Kuda Huraa is covered in coral, so it naturally puts great effort into protecting its reefs. Coral reefs are home to 25 percent of all marine life, yet according to Four Seasons, two-thirds of the world’s reefs have been destroyed. The coral protection program at Kuda Huraa aims to safeguard existing reefs and grow new ones by placing about 3,500 coral frames in the surrounding waters. Over the past seven years, more than 2,000 frames have been built through the program. Travelers can join the program through a donation, or visit the coral nursery in person on a complimentary guided snorkeling tour. Divers with at least 10 dives can try coral gardening, and planting a piece of coral and attaching a name tag of your own would be a meaningful experience. Just don’t forget to wear reef-safe sunscreen.

It is late afternoon, and after lunch and a surf lesson on the beach, everyone is pleasantly worn out. We decide to go see the dolphins that live in the nearby waters. Before boarding, marine biologist Shona gives a 30-minute briefing. “Today we’ll be looking for baleen whales, toothed whales and more. Dolphins are chatty animals. They communicate using a range of acoustic languages, including clicks, creaks and whistles.” The cruise, carrying about 10 dolphin watchers, glides steadily onward like a train following its tracks. As the swells grow stronger, the first gasps of delight begin. “Oh, there they are!” “Wow, look over here!” Following the pointing fingers of the crowd, I finally spot the dolphins. They circle the boat, leaping out of the water and swimming as if racing one another, and I watch them for a long while. Only as it’s time to leave do I come to understand the true appeal of this place, and somehow it feels unfair.

Modern Elegance Meets the Vitality of the Rainforest

The morning after the dolphin encounter, its afterglow still lingering, I board a seaplane bound for Landaa Giraavaru, another Four Seasons island. Having learned that “Maldives” means “garland” in Sanskrit, I find the coral islands below look like flowers blooming on the sea. About 30 minutes pass as I gaze, entranced, at waters glowing turquoise and sapphire, and then the seaplane, designed after a fish native to the Maldives, lands at Four Seasons Resort Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru.
The first things I notice upon arrival are the fruit bats flying freely overhead and the colorful tropical birds chirping without pause. “Before the resort was built, this island was a coconut plantation,” says Joe, the only Korean staff member on the island, adding that they tend the island, once a plantation and a playground for birds, just as it is. Four Seasons Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru is about four times the size of Kuda Huraa and has 103 rooms. The accommodations come in two types, villas and bungalows, and the private gardens are separated by tropical trees rather than fences. Built in the traditional Maldivian style, as at Kuda Huraa, the rooms were recently renovated and feel modern and refined. Among the decorative pieces, the ceramics in colors reminiscent of the Maldivian sea stand out; Joe explains that a local artisan lives on-site and makes them here by hand. The garden, which feels like a rainforest, comes with a five-meter pool and a sundeck. Past the greenery lies a quiet shore where the only sound is the lapping of waves.

Walking along a path thick with greenery, I stop at the scent of fragrant herbs. I have arrived at the Landaa Giraavaru Orchid Garden, which covers about two hectares. Here, more than 8,000 orchids of seven kinds grow alongside some 20 types of herbs. Herbs such as basil, mint, lemongrass and butterfly pea flowers are used throughout the resort’s bars and restaurants. Every restaurant grows its own herbs, vegetables and eggs for its dishes and sources 90 percent of its ingredients, including fish and seafood, locally. Food waste from the resort is left to ferment naturally for three months behind the garden before returning to the earth.

Castor plants, noni, fish poison trees, drumstick and other plants grown in the garden are used in spa treatments. AyurMa, the spa brand run by Four Seasons Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru, embodies the resort’s wellness philosophy. Built around four keywords, Ayurveda (the traditional medicine of ancient India), yoga therapy, wellness and planetary well-being, its core idea is to consider not only the individual’s body and mind but also harmony with nature and the planet (to that end, experts such as Ayurvedic doctors, yoga therapists and naturopaths are in residence). After analyzing a guest’s constitution through Ayurveda, it proposes a personalized wellness program that may include spa therapies, naturopathy, acupuncture, yoga and meditation. The same approach extends to the menus at every restaurant in the resort, helping guests order dishes suited to their constitution.

For my last day in the Maldives, I decide to try snorkeling. This island is part of Baa Atoll, a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, and is famous as a habitat for manta rays, so I can’t miss a chance to explore the sea. I throw myself into the quiet middle of the Indian Ocean and spend my time swimming among schools of tropical fish and passing over deep waters whose depth I can’t guess.
From May to November each year is a good season to see manta rays. Four Seasons Maldives at Landaa Giraavaru is home to the Marine Discovery Centre, which protects and conserves the marine life living in nearby waters. The center has identified some 7,000 manta rays in all. “If people have fingerprints, manta rays have the patterns on their bellies,” says assistant manager Akbar. The photos and names of every manta ray the center has found cover an entire wall of the building. Looking at the mysterious grace of these animals, I wonder whether there is anything a traveler can do for them. Akbar explains that you can make a donation or take part in Manta On Call (if you carry a Nokia phone provided by the resort, the researchers at the center will contact you as soon as a manta ray is sighted). “Just swimming with manta rays helps them. It makes you want to protect them even more.” The center also runs a turtle rehabilitation project that treats injured turtles and returns them to the wild. Over 10 years, it has rescued some 300 turtles and returned many of them to their original habitat.
During my stay in the Maldives, I woke to birdsong instead of a nagging alarm. I guessed the names of the tropical flowers and plants blooming along every path, and meeting wild animals such as dolphins, turtles and manta rays reminded me of something I had forgotten while living in the city: that this planet is shared by countless forms of life besides humans. On the vast waters of the Indian Ocean, time at Four Seasons flows more naturally than anywhere else.