ESCAPE TO NATURE

A piece of paradise is less than an hour's flight away, and with Carlo Calma's architectural ethics it will stay as pristine as it is today

- Chit L Lijauco

Pre-pandemic, when the architect Carlo Calma started his oculars of the property, he found himself in an untouched paradise. San Vicente, located on the northwestern side of Palawan Island, is categorised as a first-class municipality and home to the longest white-sand beach in the country, the second longest in Southeast Asia. At 14.7km long, said to be three times longer than Boracay’s White Beach, San Vicente’s prized possession is aptly called, Long Beach. This natural gem, plus the opening of the new San Vicente Palawan Airport today make this part of Palawan a growing tourist destination.

There were already a few resorts on the island, but the 3.12 hectares of Hotel Elizabeth Resorts and Villas given to Calma to develop were still practically virgin. And the architect known to work with nature wanted to keep it this way.

“I remember taking long morning walks on the beach, about two-hour walks,” Calma says. “I also went back several times a day to see how the place was at noon, in the afternoon and in the evening.” From sunrise to sunset, the place was constantly picture-perfect.

A dense mangrove also sits on the property, along a body of water that looks like a lagoon but is really a canal that leads out to the sea. “There was a discussion on whether this canal ought to be covered; this did not progress at all,” Calma recalls. Instead, he designed the master plan incorporating nature, working with the existing terrain and landscape. “It kind of made sense,” he says. For instance, he will equip the villas in the mangrove with jacuzzies. “Imagine the experience of soaking in a hot swirling tub amid a lush vegetation!” he enthuses.