Amangalla, Galle — resort overview

Within the boundaries of Galle Fort, a UNESCO World Heritage web site on Sri Lanka’s rugged southwest coast, is Amangalla. This elegant, white-washed retreat, as soon as house to Dutch governors and British troopers within the Seventeenth century, now presents a historic escape from the citadel’s bustling streets, combining colonial-era magnificence with service that goes properly past five-star.

The surrounding fort, initially established by the Portuguese in 1505, was later seized by the Dutch, who encircled town with ramparts and bastions to safeguard their pursuits. Today, it’s a historic haven, attracting vacationers with its slender lanes, flanked by colonial residences and authorities buildings that stay as picturesque reminders of the world’s turbulent previous.

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The property is a part of the Aman household, an ultra-luxury resort group recognized for its minimalist design ethos and unparalleled stage of service. The firm owns properties in a number of the world’s most fascinating places – from frescoed Venetian palazzos to secluded Balinese jungle hideaways – and Amangalla is not any exception.

The resort’s prime location close to the doorway to Galle Fort presents the right base for exploring this enchanting metropolis — and while you return by way of the shuttered veranda doorways, its serene ambiance offers the right counterpoint to the vigorous streets exterior.

Middle East Traveller checked in to a Chamber room at Amangalla to sleep amongst centuries of historical past and discover the Fort’s ramparts with out compromising on luxurious.

The Hotel

Originally constructed by the Dutch East India Company in 1684, Amangalla – with its strategic location overlooking the Fort on one facet and the Harbour on the opposite – as soon as served as native headquarters for the Dutch army and later as a centre of operations for the British military.

In 1863, the property was purchased over by a bunch of businessmen and transformed into The Oriental Hotel, shortly changing into a modern stop-off for European passengers travelling between Sri Lanka and Europe by ship.

Yet in the direction of the top of the Nineteenth century, The Oriental Hotel fell on exhausting occasions, with passengers more and more choosing a wider selection of lodging in Colombo relatively than staying within the citadel. In the next years, customer numbers continued to dwindle as giant ships diverted away from Galle in the direction of an expanded harbour within the Sri Lankan capital.

In 1899, the resort’s fortunes turned as soon as once more because it was bought to the Ephraums household, who renamed the property to the New Oriental Hotel and restored its grandeur. For a lot of the twentieth century, the property was managed by the legendary Dutch hotelier Nesta Brohier – herself born in one of many bedrooms – who would greet company on the entrance steps along with her two dalmatians as a pianist performed reside music within the background.

In 2004, Adrian Zecha, the visionary behind Aman and an everyday visitor on the New Oriental Hotel, purchased the property and became Amangalla, bringing a contact of ultra-luxury to Sri Lanka’s historic coast with a renovation that preserved the property’s authentic flooring, furnishings and character whereas including a spa, a brand new swimming pool and different important trendy facilities.

Today, it’s a mix of wealthy historical past, colonial-era magnificence, and timeless allure, inviting company to expertise a slice of Galle’s storied previous whereas nonetheless having fun with all of the comforts of an ultra-luxury resort.

The Arrival

Sweep previous the veranda colonnades and into the Great Hall – or ‘zaal’ because it was termed throughout the Dutch period – and also you’ll end up transported again in time. Here, beneath expansive ceilings, the air strikes lazily, stirred by slow-spinning overhead followers as classic metal chandeliers forged a delicate glow over rattan plantation chairs, numerous antiques and darkish, heavyset furnishings.

Check-in occurs behind the property, the place an open staircase leads all the way down to the library and swimming pool, in a room lined with historic drawings and its personal Nineteenth-century secure. Beyond a fast signature, there aren’t any varieties to fill out — that’s already been taken care of. Slink into an vintage chaise longue and wash away Sri Lanka’s humidity with a cool towel earlier than assembly your historically dressed butler, who acts as your fixer all through the keep.

After that, it’s off to your suite. Depending on whether or not you’re staying down one of many resort’s lengthy jute-carpeted floor flooring corridors or elevated above the rooftops of Galle, there may be just a few flights of stairs to briskly climb. Elevators, in any case, didn’t exist in 1684. The actual pleasure of the higher flooring is simple entry to the indoor sundown terrace, the place relaxed armchairs absorb views over town in an area flooded with mild from tall arched home windows.

The Room

Amangalla presents 31 rooms, all with views of the Fort, Harbour, or the property’s grounds. For a extra secluded keep, a non-public two-story home, ensconced in frangipani blooms and mango bushes, awaits within the resort’s 200-year-old gardens hidden behind a hedge on the finish of the swimming pool.

The elegant Chamber rooms – looking over Church Street’s treetops and the Fort’s ramparts – exude magnificence with white partitions and authentic polished teak floorboards that date again greater than 300 years. Each is furnished with interval items — a lot of that are authentic antiques from the New Oriental Hotel — together with plantation chairs, club-footed picket wardrobes and intricately detailed pettagama chests.

Dominating the ethereal, uncluttered area is the king-sized four-poster mattress, set so excessive off the bottom {that a} small step is offered. The room is refreshed day by day with a number of native fruits, whereas trendy facilities – together with a Bluetooth speaker, air con, and a fridge with complimentary gentle drinks – are seamlessly built-in. For a contact of nostalgia, flick a change and go to sleep to the mild whir of a rattan fan suspended from the ceiling above.

The Service

Aman is known for its discreet, intuitive service, and in Galle the model continues to exceed expectations. Staff are proper there while you want them but invisible while you don’t. There’s no must ever signal a invoice or point out your room quantity, for instance — they only know.

And then there’s the butler service. Whether you’re absorbing the solar by the pool or discovering a second of peace within the library, they seem as if by magic and able to help at any hour.

Many of Amangalla’s employees have labored on the resort for nearly 20 years, and virtually all of them have been born within the surrounding space, which brings a contact of authenticity and native experience to visitor interactions.

The Restaurants and Bars

In Amangalla’s grand Great Hall, an intensive menu providing each Sri Lankan and European delicacies sees eggy hoppers served alongside acquainted favourites like tuna tartare and goat’s cheese salad. If your favorite dish isn’t listed, the kitchen will likely be more than pleased to accommodate with a little bit of discover.

For a really indulgent expertise, include an urge for food and order the rice and curry choice at lunch or dinner. This sprawling, vibrant unfold of 11 dishes contains delights comparable to sizzling coconut sambol, spinach daal, and rooster black curry, showcasing the resort’s dedication to sourcing spices from close by villages and produce immediately from native farmers.

Breakfast, included with all stays, is one other standout. While embracing Sri Lankan flavours is a should (attempt the omelette with inexperienced chilli for a spicy kick), the French toast steals the present, pairing a candy, sticky hunk of bread with a cooling dollop of orange and rhubarb yoghurt.

As night falls, the resort’s bar comes alive with basic cocktails and reside piano music. But for a really memorable sundowner, head to the indoor sundown terrace on the highest flooring, the place martinis and tropical cocktails are expertly crafted with views over Galle’s terra cotta rooftops extending out to the Indian Ocean horizon.

The Activities

Wander by way of Amangalla’s lush gardens to find the attractive green-tiled swimming pool tucked down just a few steps behind the property, the place you’re as prone to see a monitor lizard or monkey roaming the grounds as one other visitor.

Luxuriate on picket solar beds shaded beneath palm fronds, or chill out in one of many 5 conventional ambalama pavilions as attentive employees guarantee your iced water is all the time crammed, your sun shades gleam, and recent towels are all the time at hand.

Despite the occasional toot from a distant automotive horn, this sanctuary feels worlds away from the vigorous streets of Galle Fort. This being Aman, the pool is all the time open, and sundown is the right time for a swim because the Sri Lankan warmth retreats and bats swoop down from the bushes over the water’s softly lit floor.

A brief stroll away, Amangalla’s cascading spa presents 5 atmospheric therapy rooms with dramatic arches, lofty ceilings and shuttered home windows that open out onto the gardens. Personalised therapies draw on 5,000-year-old Ayurvedic therapeutic traditions that promise to stop sick well being by cleaning, detoxifying and balancing every particular person’s dominant dosha.

There’s additionally a barbershop providing conventional chopping, styling, and shaping of the hair, whereas the salon offers the standard vary of manicures and pedicures plus conventional Sri Lankan eyebrow shaping utilizing an area threading method.

Guests can even reserve certainly one of two candle-list personal hydrotherapy areas freed from cost, together with a chilly plunge pool, jacuzzi, steam room and sauna. Our butler arrives to see if we’d like something — then returns minutes later with a plate of cookies to stave off our night starvation pangs.

Head for the library to find an intensive vary of reference books, novels and video games, plus an eclectic assortment of memorabilia from the archives of the New Oriental Hotel providing insights into the historical past of the resort, the Fort and the city of Galle.

To discover extra deeply, take a non-public stroll with Amangalla’s fort map, a historic tour together with your butler, or a ramparts stroll at sundown.

All stays embrace complimentary conventional cream tea every day, which may be taken on the veranda overlooking Church Street, within the library or on the terrace. The scones are distinctive — the Ceylon tea, maybe unsurprisingly given Sri Lanka’s huge plantations, much more so.

Why Stay?

Amangalla isn’t just certainly one of Sri Lanka’s oldest boutique motels—it’s also essentially the most luxurious and historic. To step again in time, surrounded by rigorously preserved antiques and authentic options of this storied Seventeenth-century constructing, is a privilege. Yet it’s Aman’s legendary service that elevates a keep right here to a once-in-a-lifetime expertise.

The Essentials

• Rates: Rooms begin at USD900 per evening together with taxes with breakfast, cream tea, non-alcoholic minibar refreshments and urgent of three objects day by day included
• Phone quantity: +94 912 233 388
• Website: aman.com/resorts/amangalla
• Address: Amangalla, 10 Church St, Galle 80000, Sri Lanka