At Heritance Kandalama Bawa created an austere building that derives its beauty from the surrounding landscape. The simple geometry and lack of decoration help to highlight the natural environment. When he first built the hotel, he told the staff that one day it would peer out from under a canopy of lush vegetation. The staff didn’t fully grasp what he was describing. Ten years later, after Bawa was long gone, the staff says he had described the hotel exactly as it is today.

The garden is open to visitors from 9am to 5pm daily. A guided tour of the garden is available on request.
The entrance court at Lunuganga was created as the main entry to the house after the 1947 remodeling by Geoffrey Bawa when he changed the actual entrance of the house back to front. The small verandah with the stairs leading up to the eastern terrace is marked by a human faced jar designed by Donald Friend the Australian artist and Bevis Bawa. A large Cannon ball tree, an ancient ata-amba (Mangifera Indica) and a blue olive tree, much favored for its blue fruits by the imperial green pigeon, shade this court. The view down to the water garden was one of Geoffrey Bawa’s favorites. The Black Pavilion at the end of the central path across the waterways marks the eastern edge of the Garden.

This is one more hotel amongst which in Southern Region is blessed with Bawa’s unique designs. Minimalistic, stately and elegant this inspired creation will captivate you with its unparalleled wonder: a member of Small Luxury Hotels of the world, it is the ultimate tropical retreat of lavish beauty in Sri Lanka.

Step in to the hallway and step back five centuries. A dramatic enactment – a historic narrative depicting the ‘Battle of Randeniya’ spirals upwards. Sweeping alongside the stairway, Portuguese horsemen charge the brave local inhabitants; their fervour immortalized in shimmering copper and bronze envisioned by renowned artist Laki Senanayake. Follow the flight and step out into the lobby, then stand amazed at the vista before you – the astounding beauty of a land the ancient warriors fought to save or gain is now yours to claim, for awhile at least. But yours will be a battle of a far more pleasant kind – how not to indulge too much in all the luxuries you will encounter during your stay.

Did you know that all the hot water and steam required for this hotel’s laundry is generated through the use of a biomass boiler?

It is beach and chic at this property. As Geoffrey Bawa’s final example of his infamous brand of architecture throughout Sri Lanka, this six-bedroomed seaside escape enjoys space, ventilation and barefoot luxury in a private location.

Décor throughout the property is largely a mix of fresh white walls and grey polished cement floors, serving as a backdrop to a mixture of antique and contemporary furniture, all adorned with bright colours. Bedrooms enjoy views of the sea or a lagoon, set in tropical gardens with a central swimming pool. Whether with family, friends or as a couple, The Last House is a truly serene tropical hideaway planted beside the Indian Ocean.

The house in 33rd Lane is an essay in architectural bricollage. In 1958 Bawa bought the third in a row of four small houses which lay along a short cul-de-sac at the end of a narrow suburban lane and converted it into a pied-à-terre with living room, bedroom, tiny kitchen and room for a servant. When the fourth bungalow became vacant this was colonised to serve as dining room and second living room. Ten years later the remaining bungalows were acquired and added into the composition and the first in the row was demolished to be replaced by a four-storey tower.

The final result is an introspective labyrinth of rooms and garden courts which together create the illusion of limitless space. Words like inside and outside lose all meaning: here are rooms without roofs and roofs without walls, all connected by a complex matrix of axes and internal vistas.

If the main part of the house is an evocation of a lost world of verandas and courtyards assembled from a rich collection of traditional devices and plundered artefacts, the new tower which rises above the car port is nothing less than a reworking of Corb’s Maison Citrohan and serves as a periscope which rises from a shady nether world to give views out across the treetops towards the sea.