Siem Reap's Green Scene

Angkor Wat may be Cambodia’s crown jewel, but there’s more to take in now at this tourist town, as artists, chefs, and eco-conscious hoteliers reshape its identity.

- Marine Strauss

Angkor Wat rightly claims a spot near the top of many travelers’ bucket lists, but for most of the area’s 2.5 million annual visitors, the standard visit is about three days—just enough time to wander through the archaeological park’s central ruins and get sufficient selfies. That strategy is a mistake. The city of Siem Reap, a genuine beauty, is home to about 140,000 Cambodians and riches worth lingering for.

“Things are looking up,” says architect and conservationist Bill Bensley, who in 2000 redesigned the city’s Hôtel de la Paix, now a Park Hyatt. As in much of the developing world, sustainability in Cambodia can be an afterthought to simply making a living. But now, Bensley says, as the nation has made strides in alleviating the problems of malnutrition and has moved toward cleaner water and better medical care, it can begin to confront First World problems of conservation.

Bensley has designed more than 100 properties around the globe for luxury brands Oberoi and Four Seasons, but his personal mission is to ease poverty through high-end, eco-conscious hospitality. Shinta Mani Siem Reap, one of three Bensley Collection properties in the city, is a fresh effort to accomplish that goal: Each of its 10 private bilevel villas (from $815 per night in low season) has a plunge pool, glassed-in bathrooms with garden views, and an outdoor sky bed, where you can sleep on a rooftop terrace surrounded by bougainvillea flowers. Visitors enter the property offa leafy street of the Old French Quarter, passing under a white marble arch like that at the ancient Khmer temples.