Villa Honegg

Nine hundred and fourteen metres above sea level, on the wooded ridge of the Bürgenstock, Villa Honegg looks down on Lake Lucerne from a terrace that has served the same purpose since 1905. The house belongs to the commune of Ennetbürgen in the canton of Nidwalden, a village on the lake shore far below, and the road up from Stans climbs through pasture before it reaches the gates. Most guests know the view before they arrive: the heated outdoor pool at the edge of the terrace has become one of the most photographed hotel pools in Europe.

History

The villa opened as a hotel in 1905, in the years when the Bürgenstock was being developed as a mountain retreat for the Lucerne tourist trade. For a century it ran as a modest family hotel of the kind the Swiss Alps once had in hundreds. In 2009 it closed for a complete rebuild. Only the shell of the Belle Epoque house was kept; the interiors, the technical plant and the spa were new when the hotel reopened in 2011 with 23 rooms. The relaunch coincided with the rise of photo-sharing on phones, and the pool with the lake behind it did the rest.

Architecture and design

From outside the building reads as a turn-of-the-century Swiss villa: a hipped roof, deep eaves, balconies on the lake side and a tower at one corner. Inside, the rebuild chose oak, wool and stone over period pastiche. Rooms are lined in pale wood and face either the lake or the meadows behind the house. The public rooms are small by grand-hotel standards, which suits a house of this size; the bar, the restaurant and the lounge all open onto the terrace.

Rooms and suites

There are 23 rooms and suites. The lake-facing rooms have balconies looking north over the water towards Lucerne and the Rigi; the larger suites sit on the upper floors under the roof. Beds, bathrooms and lighting were specified for the 2011 reopening and have been refreshed since. The hotel also has a private cinema with a handful of seats, used by guests in the evening and by small groups for presentations.

Dining

The restaurant serves a seasonal menu built on Swiss and Alpine produce, with lake fish and meat from the Nidwalden valleys, and a wine list drawn largely from Swiss growers. In summer, lunch and dinner move onto the terrace. Breakfast is served in the same room with the same view, which is reason enough for many guests to stay up the mountain rather than drive down to Lucerne.

Wellness

The spa occupies the lower floor and the terrace. Its centrepiece is the outdoor pool, heated to around 34 degrees and open through the winter, when steam rises off the water and the lake below is often under fog. Indoors are a sauna, a steam room and treatment rooms. Walking is the other wellness programme: the ridge paths of the Bürgenstock begin at the door, and the Hammetschwand lift, the highest outdoor lift in Europe, stands further along the same mountain.

Weddings and events

With 23 rooms, Villa Honegg is a house that a wedding party or a company can take over in full, and this is how most of its events run. Ceremonies and receptions use the terrace and the restaurant; the cinema and the lounge serve for board meetings and small seminars. The hotel does not publish large-event capacities and is not built for gatherings of several hundred guests.

Location

Ennetbürgen lies on the southern shore of Lake Lucerne, and this luxury hotel near Lucerne sits on the Bürgenstock plateau above it, about 20 minutes by car from Stans and 40 minutes from the city. Guests arriving by train change at Stans, or take the lake boat from Lucerne to Kehrsiten-Bürgenstock and the funicular up to the Bürgenstock resort, from which the hotel arranges transfers. Zurich Airport is roughly 90 minutes away by road.