Improving on Paradise: Kengo Kuma’s Wood-Wrapped Bali Villas Embody Easy Living

As if Bali, a world-renowned haven for all things paradise, couldn’t be more beautiful, a new series of villas slated for construction in the Bukit Peninsula organically blend architecture with the surrounding nature. Kengo Kuma and Associates recently revealed a new design for six villas, a yoga pavilion and a greenhouse that will make up a 20,000-square-meter [215,000-square-foot] site on a sandstone cliff overlooking the southernmost Indonesian coast.

The project, titled Tsubomi Villas, or “flower bud” in Japanese, includes three different types of villas that correspond to the surrounding typography and, on each, feature a hyperbolic paraboloid roof canopy created from light layers of overlapping wood. They appear to blossom from the tropical climate, evoking an organic relationship between the lush, local vegetation and the building materials themselves.

Kengo Kuma hasn’t taken such a sweeping approach to a new design since unveiling the concept for The Darling Exchange in Sydney early last year. The multi-use building, which includes a new library for the City of Sydney, resembles a giant beehive wrapped in a screen of wood. This circular civic space is meant to be a welcoming and accessible public building at the heart of the redeveloping Darling Harbour.

The Tsubomi Villas, though a private construction set on the edge of a cliff, convey the same sense of activity and excitement, inviting guests to explore what it feels like to be inside a woven piece of architecture.

The villa interiors give off an air of openness and tranquility thanks to the fluid combination of glass and timber. This will have a calming effect on guests practicing yoga, meditating or relaxing by the pool. The surrounding landscape of water features, high palm trees and layers of flowers will also contribute to guests’ awareness of the graceful connection between the villa designs and nature in Bali.