Bali: how 60 years of tourism was kickstarted in Sanur, and at a 5-star island landmark
Championed by Indonesian president Sukarno, Sanur was a high-flying destination for Rockefellers, Rothschilds – and even hosted Mick Jagger’s wedding
Things began looking up later in 1966 with the opening of the InterContinental Bali Beach Hotel, the first five-star internationally branded resort on the island. Commissioned by Indonesia’s founding president, Sukarno, on the tranquil shores of Sanur Beach, on Bali’s lower east coast, the 10-storey art-deco structure signalled to the world that Bali was once again open for business.
“Sukarno’s mother was Balinese, so he had a special affinity for the island,” says Ed Brea, the American general manager of the heritage building, now simply called the Bali Beach Hotel. “[Local people] tell a story of how he used to come here, walk onto the beach and say this is where he will build a big hotel. No one made much of it but then, one day, he actually started building it.”
Following a three-year restoration that cost 1 trillion Indonesian rupees (US$61 million), the property now features an entrance worthy of an Ancient Greek or Roman edifice. From the porte-cochère, a long marble tunnel with a dark mirrored ceiling leads to a grand concrete lobby inlaid with wooden structures, water features and sculptures, including a 30-metre-long bass relief of Sukarno surrounded the people of Indonesia, made by local artists in the 1960s.
“The architect’s brief was to bring back the original grandeur and compliment the original design by folding new structures into existing ones,” Brea says. “We’ve had some guests who came here with their parents when they were kids; they remember playing in the pool, swimming in the ocean. They say the hotel still has the same feeling as it did back then.”
