The Brando

Tetiaroa is a ring of twelve small islands around a lagoon, 50 kilometres north of Tahiti, with no pass through its reef that a boat can use. The Tahitian royal family kept it as a retreat; Marlon Brando found it in 1960 while scouting locations for Mutiny on the Bounty and took a 99-year lease on it in 1966. The Brando, the resort that opened on the motu of Onetahi in July 2014, is the house he spent his last decades planning and never saw.

History

Brando lived on Tetiaroa for stretches of the 1970s and tried, without much success, to run a small eco-village and hotel there. In 1999 he began working with Richard Bailey, the Tahiti-based founder of Pacific Beachcomber, on a resort that would pay for the atoll's protection. Brando died in 2004; Bailey carried on with the estate, built an airstrip on Onetahi and opened The Brando a decade later. The Tetiaroa Society, a non-profit founded alongside the resort, runs an ecostation on the motu where visiting scientists study the lagoon, the seabirds and the turtles. In 2017 Barack Obama spent a month on the atoll writing his memoir, the stay that brought the place to most people's attention.

Architecture and design

The villas are low, thatched houses in local timber set back from the beach under the coconut palms, each with a plunge pool, an outdoor bath and a garden, and none visible from its neighbour. The engineering is the real design statement. Air conditioning comes from seawater pumped from 900 metres down, cold enough to chill the buildings without compressors; electricity comes from solar panels along the airstrip and generators burning coconut oil; and the resort was the first in the world to be certified LEED Platinum. Wastewater is treated on site and nothing is drawn from the lagoon.

Rooms and suites

There are 35 villas, with one, two or three bedrooms, each on its own stretch of beach. The one-bedroom villas face the lagoon on the western shore; the larger ones sit at the ends of the motu for more privacy. A set of private residences with more bedrooms, including the house built for the Brando family, is available to groups. Every villa has a bicycle for the paths and a staff team of its own.

Dining

Les Mutinés is the fine-dining restaurant, with a menu overseen by the French chef Guy Martin of Le Grand Véfour in Paris and a cellar below ground. The Beachcomber Café serves breakfast and lunch on the sand, and Bob's Bar, named after the resort's first general manager, stands at the end of the beach for sunset. Much of the fruit and vegetables comes from the atoll's own garden and honey from its hives. Picnics on an empty motu across the lagoon are a daily option.

Wellness

The Varua Te Ora Polynesian Spa is set among the trees of the interior, with treatment rooms, a yoga pavilion and a tree-top suite reached by stairs, and uses Polynesian techniques and plant-based products. The lagoon, with its turtles and rays, is the real spa; guided snorkelling, diving outside the reef and visits to the bird island of Tahuna Iti are run by the resort's naturalists.

Weddings and events

The Brando hosts weddings, Polynesian blessing ceremonies and private celebrations on the beach or in a villa garden, with dinner at Les Mutinés or on the sand. Whole-atoll buyouts are taken for large families and companies, who use the residences as a base. There are no conference rooms; the Tetiaroa Society's ecostation and the main lounge serve for presentations and small meetings.

Location

Tetiaroa lies about 50 kilometres north of Tahiti. Guests fly from Faa'a International Airport at Papeete on the resort's own airline, Air Tetiaroa, a flight of about 20 minutes to the airstrip on Onetahi. There is no sea access for visitors, since the reef has no navigable pass. As a private resort on a Polynesian atoll it is the one with a working scientific station and a former president among its guests.