“I wanted to create an experience for people that was unlike any other,” says John Hardy, referring to Bambu Indah, the hotel he created with his wife, Cynthia, in Bali’s spiritual center of Ubud. “Local is so important,” Hardy continues. “Why travel if you end up in the same-old, same-old?”

The hotel is certainly one of a kind, evolving, in its early years, as more of an experiment than an entrepreneurial venture. During the years when the couple were building Hardy’s namesake jewelry company—which they sold in 2007—they purchased a block of land adjacent to their house, fearful it would be turned into another of the area’s luxury hotels. From that point forward, Bambu Indah has evolved from a place that could accommodate the couple’s visiting friends to one of the world’s most unique examples of sustainable hospitality.

John Hardy in one of Bambu Indah's guest pavilions.

Pragmatism, rather than any particular design vision, governed Bambu Indah’s early development. The couple began snapping up inexpensive Javanese teak wedding houses, built more than a century ago, and transporting them to the island. “In a very short period of time we had three or four gladaks and placed them randomly on the new land,” says Cynthia. “There was no name for it and there was no organization, they were just cute little huts where we put a few guests who we asked to leave $20 a night in tips for the staff who would take care of them.”