Hotel Du Cap-Eden-Roc’s Spectacular New Villa

In Downton Abbey: A New Era, Lady Edith – the daringly intellectual Crawley daughter – informs her sceptical parents that going to the South of France in the summer doesn’t result in automatic social death.

She throws in the names of F. Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald as bait and in due course, the majority of the Grantham family decamp to the Cote d’Azur for an extended stay. They stay in a villa: in those days, the truly grand would only ever stay in hotels in cities when transiting between destinations.

One hotel changed all that. In 1923, two wealthy Americans – Gerald and Sara Murphy – hired Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc for the summer, bringing members of the Lost Generation with them, including the Fitzgeralds, Ernest Hemingway and Cole Porter. Over the course of that one stay, they repositioned the South of France from a winter to summer destination and made hotels desirable for the ultra-rich. Fitzgerald went on to base Hotel d’Etrangers in Tender Is The Night on the du Cap.

After the Murphys’ intervention, Europe’s grandest hotels started to become destinations in their own rights and the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc is still considered to be one of the world’s most celebrated hotels, keeping generations of the same families happy in the way only starched linen, stellar views and finessed service do.

The Murphys rented Hotel du Cap in its entirety. Now, for smaller groups of friends the du Cap has opened the Villa Sainte-Anne. This five bedroom villa offers exceptional privacy and formerly belonged to the Sella family, long-time owners of the du Cap before the hotel became part of the Oetker Collection in 1969.

With stucco and dark green shutters, terraced gardens and inky blue swimming pool surrounded by gardens, glorious sunsets and sun loungers, Villa Sainte-Anne is both last century perfect and completely au courant. Butlers from the mother hotel nurture guests, but the feel is a bit lighter, the decor more playful; including an outdoor dining table created by ceramicist Agnes Sandahl. There’s a fully equipped gym and kitchen and an annex for you to bring your own staff. Nightly rates start at 14,000 euros.

After the gates swing open for your car, and swiftly close again, no one need know you are there. Except, across the road is one of the world’s most celebrated playgrounds, with that breathtaking cliffside swimming pool, the cabanas that the Kennedys colonized in the 1930s and Chagall sketched. There’s access to the hotel’s yacht and the hotel’s Michelin-starred Louroc restaurant. The staff can and will stop the traffic when you want to cross the road, even when there’s a crew setting up a car chase for the latest Marvel film.

The Hotel du Cap Eden Roc has cast its spell – and its wedding cake shadow – over the whole peninsula for a hundred years; a bewitching combination of palms and pine trees, rose gardens and history. It’s the ultimate Cote d ‘Azur cocoon with history, tradition and – above all – a sense of space.

The Villa Sainte-Anne has got its own rather lovely view down to the bay of Juan-les-Pins. Renovated over two years, the roses and tiered gardens have matured in a delightful way. And by opening it, the hotel continues to play with the conviviality and notions of privacy as it has done over a hundred years.

After the Murphys reset the Cote d’Azur as a summer destination, the Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc – in the way only the very grandest hotels can do – started to close between November and April and still does. It’s likely that the Villa Sainte-Anne will stay open, either by graciously giving into demand, or – perhaps – giving this peninsula another pioneering shift. Downton Abbey: A New Era opens in the U.S on May 20.