Next-Generation Luxury In The Indian Ocean: Patina Maldives, Fari Islands

There are many resorts in the Maldives. There is only one that has a James Turrell artwork. More specifically, the new Patina Maldives, Fari Islands has a pavilion envisioned by the American Turrell, who is known for his involvement in the late-20th-century Light and Space art movement.

His most famous series is his Skyspace project, a collection of works that frame the night sky. Patina Maldives’ assistant director of marketing and communications, Zainab Hussain Shihab, says that many resort guests—who have traveled all over the world to see other Skyspaces, only to find them full of people—are overcome with emotion when they step all alone into the one-of-a-kind wooden artwork here.

Privacy and exclusivity—being alone—are two of the Maldives’ tourism hallmarks. The majority of the islands’ 150 or so luxury resorts are each on a private island. (And when the natural ones all got taken, the developers started making artificial islands from scratch, as in Dubai.) Those hotels trade on those promises, along with some of the most unbelievably turquoise water, an outrageous quantity and variety of marine life, and abundance. In some cases (as I saw a few years ago and Eugene Levy recently found for his adorable series, The Reluctant Traveler), an “anything, anywhere, anytime” proposition.

Patina offers many things to its guests throughout the day and night, but it doesn’t follow the usual Maldives model of cocooning guests in their over-water villas and delivering all sorts of luxuries. Rather, it encourages them to get out of their villas and explore the 100-ish-acre island (generally with the assistance of the private butlers—called Essentialists—who seem to spend a good part of their day driving guests around in solar-powered golf carts and WhatsApping to check if they need a ride or anything else) and into lively social spaces.

Opened in 2021, Patina Maldives will be one of three resort properties in the newly constructed Fari Islands. Call it the kid sister of the newly opened Ritz-Carlton and the upcoming (2025) Capella Maldives. The managers are clear that they’re going for a new generation of guests with what they expect to be the first hotel in a new “lifestyle brand” from the Capella Hotel Group.

Their demographic is one that’s more informal, that brings their young children (the hotel has an outstanding kids’ program), and that appreciates design choices and details, like the unorthodox gray linens. These blend into the biophilic (nature-inspired) rooms designed by noted Brazilian architect Marcio Kogan, rather than the standard-issue blinding white hotel bed.

As the youngest-skewing and certainly the biggest resort in the Fari Islands. it was chosen as the island that would be home to the Fari Marina. As a result, it has services not only for the guests of its own 90 beach and water villas and 20 studios but also for guests who “island-hop” from the Ritz-Carlton and for yachties on longer adventures. That marina allows for fun activations (as the marketers like to say), such as a daily happy hour with sushi and craft cocktails, the light show in Turrell’s Skyspace and a little corral of food trucks serving Thai street food, various burgers and homemade gelato (vegan options available, of course).

Officially, Patina has 12 restaurants, which is quite a lot for a 110-room resort, even one in the Maldives. When they add in-villa dining and the possibility of hopping over to the Ritz-Carlton, there are 18 dining options. Many of the chefs in those restaurants have traveled a long way to be serving their native cuisine on a speck in the Indian Ocean.

At the glamorous yet authentic Wok Society, chef Zhang Sichuan turns out dishes that highlight different cultures and regions of China. Newly appointed Peruvian chef Nick Magdeleno helms the fire kitchen at the pan-South American Brasa, which specializes in the grilled meats of the southernmost countries, as well as Lima-style ceviche and tiradito. And at the laid-back Aegean-inspired Helios, some of the kitchen brigade hails from Turkey.

Notably, the “signature dining” restaurant is called Roots and bills itself as a “purveyor of conscious cuisine.” This means it’s a plant-based restaurant that serves tasting menus in the middle of the resort’s organic Perpetual Garden. There, they’ve managed to create remarkably fertile soil on an island that didn’t exist at all just a few years ago, and are harvesting large amounts of produce—about 440 pounds of eggplant alone, according to a press release.

It’s fair to question whether such press releases are mere greenwashing, as the Maldives’ model of abundance on private islands inevitably creates a footprint. Still, Patina Maldives is doing far more than the minimum. General manager Antonio Saponara admits that along with a genuine affinity for the islands, he applied for the job in part because he knows that the Maldives—famously the front line of climate change—may not be around all that much longer. (He also notes that the Fari Islands are higher above sea level than some other places.)

And so, along with 2023’s bare minimum practices like banning guest-facing single-use plastic and trying to grow at least some food organically on site, the resort has undertaken some meaningful initiatives. They carefully vet their off-island food suppliers, look for more efficient ways to transport guests and supplies, organize guest programs focused on coral propagation, and focus on kids club activities meant to teach the “next generation of champions for the ocean,” along with the 3D printer and nifty little STEM lab.

Together, it was enough to win the place an EDGE (Excellence in Design for Greater Efficiencies) Advanced Certification, an international standard developed by a member of the World Bank Group. This was enough to get the developers the first “green loan” in the Maldives, which they plan to use for continued upgrades to make the Fari Islands “zero-carbon ready.”

A similarly important piece of the sustainability puzzle is working conditions, community involvement and other social commitments. Let’s not greenwash: Building a network of trusted food suppliers in hopes that they’ll never leave you fish-less, and making sure your employees are satisfied with their working conditions so that they don’t quit and force you to train new people, are good business practices.

But in fact, they’ve created living conditions that are above and beyond any other staff housing in the Maldives. The Fari Campus occupies its own island and houses more than 1,000 employees from all over the world, mostly native Maldivians. It has the accommodation level and recreational facilities—not to mention the beaches that staff can enjoy freely—of a hotel in itself (albeit not with the luxury level of a place like Patina, I assume—I didn’t get to see it for obvious reasons). Continuing education on the campus is in partnership with Ecole Hôtelièrie de Lausanne and is meant to provide employees with a realistic, credible alternative to Swiss hotel schools.

It’s hard to say that the campus is solely to credit for the quality of the service and the friendliness of the staff. (The relaxed approach that lets even senior managers roll up their shelves and show their tattoos seems like it might help, not to mention the innate skill and affability of hospitality professionals in this part of the world.)

But it makes some of the over-the-topness of the guest experience go down more easily. And like the Turrell, it’s something that makes Patina Maldives Fari unlike anyplace else in the world.