Six Senses Samui

Here’s part two of my Koh Samui eco resort series – featuring Six Senses Samui (catch up with the first, Garrya Tongsai Bay). While their ‘green-ness’ might clock a similar score, a quick look at their distinct features and amenities will help you to easily choose between the two. Is Six Senses for you?

‍Six Senses Samui turns twenty-two years old this year, making it a much newer construction than Garrya Tongsai Bay (built in 1987). It’s not for everyone and, if you prefer a sterile experience (with nature hermetically sealed outside), you’ll be happier elsewhere. Perhaps, though, you like your ocean breezes, wherever they find you? Then settle in...

The Six Senses Samui property

Built into a very steep hillside, in the former GM’s own words:‍

"it took nothing less than an engineering miracle to build this resort”.

‍All wooden materials at Six Senses Samui are renewable (there’s a lot of bamboo and coconut palm thatch) or reclaimed – see the charming, weathered teak boards used for stairs, signs and flooring. Together, this minimalist look and its muted colours make banana trees look brighter and the ocean more vivid. It rather offsets the sunset, too...

Thorough recycling takes place in-house. Recycling is by no means institutionalised on Koh Samui – if you want it to happen, you have to invent your own system. As such, one that involves aluminium, plastic, glass and paper is particularly comprehensive. Grey water is recycled and one last thing? They make their own bio-diesel. Not quite as cuddly as Tongsai’s devotion to all-creatures-great-and-small, but an equally dedicated green effort.

Animals and Koh Samui wildlife

The twenty-acre Six Senses property is home to a host of wildlife, amongst it a monitor lizard that a reader spotted at resort restaurant Dining on the Rocks. However, if Tongsai Bay is the Doris Day of Samui animal welfare, Six Senses is equally focused on local education and children’s causes. Involvement with a nearby school includes helping with grounds upkeep and supplying school stationery.

Organic/local ingredients

Food nerds, sit down for a minute: there’s a mushroom hut. Organic greens are also grown on site in a massive herb garden, for use in the resort’s restaurants (and cocktails). Your spa treatment might even include a bit of home-grown aloe.

Six Senses' green principles

With a LEED-accredited VP of sustainability, the Six Senses brand takes green industry best practices more seriously than most. Much of the resulting greenery is behind-the-scenes stuff that guests will never notice (like the recycling of grey water), but it’s a company-wide commitment nonetheless. For more details, see Six Senses Samui's sustainability ethos (that's a lot of S's).

More hotel questions?

Chemicals/pesticides: Only ‘eco-friendly’ chemicals are used.

‍Good for a family vacation? Yes.

‍Shark-fin free? Yes.

For even more insight into Koh Samui hotels, your very best resource is The Koh Samui Guide. As well, take a look at:

• Where to stay on Koh Samui?
• Bophut Beach, Koh Samui: Your Top 22 FAQs
• 12 Reasons to Choose Koh Samui’s Choeng Mon Beach
• Where to Stay on Koh Samui with Kids?
• 13 Cool, Quirky and Unusual Places to Stay on Koh Samui