Looking to take a low-carbon holiday this year? Or how about a stay in a resort that combines gorgeous scenery with eco-friendly credentials? Well, we’ve raided our little green book to present our pick of those establishments that strive to limit their impact on the environment whilst still offering guests the ultimate in luxury.
Resort Valle dell’Erica Thalasso & SPA, Sardinia
June 2019 saw the World Travel Awards give their top prize for Europe’s Leading Green Resort to this Sardinian gem, which beat 600 European finalists in the process. Here protection of the local environment was a priority right from the planning stage, with the resort designed to integrate harmoniously into the environment. It also prides itself on serving local food, avoiding plastic, using energy from renewable sources, driving electric vehicles and stocking its spa with eco-bio and paraben free products made with locally sourced ingredients. Meanwhile regular excursions, led by locals, allow guests to appreciate and understand the nature and traditions of the island’s communities.
1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge, New York
Hailed as the Big Apple’s greenest hotel, this stylish boutique establishment combines eco-friendly credentials with killer views of Brooklyn Bridge and Manhattan. The hotel is run on wind power, offers guests a fleet of free electric Tesla cars to borrow, boasts a living plant wall and furnishes the rooms with hemp-blend mattresses. More than half of the building materials were reclaimed, including pine floors from an old Kentucky distillery and beams from a former Brooklyn sugar factory. Even Harriet’s Rooftop & Lounge at 1 Hotel Brooklyn Bridge uses reclaimed 100-year-old barn wood throughout the space.
Soneva Kiri, Ko Kood, Thailand
It’s comforting to know that whilst you are lounging in the lap of luxury on Thailand’s fourth largest – but least populated – island, you are doing so in a resort that places maximum importance on sustainability, whether it’s environmentally-friendly designed villas, protecting the local coral reefs, recycling cooking oil as biofuel, reusing water or buying from local fishermen.
Offering a collection of luxurious hotel suites and over-sea villas just a short boat ride south west of the capital Male, the Jumeirah Vittaveli resort has been Green Globe certified since 2015. Initiatives include the ‘Eco Pure’ system, which treats seawater to create fresh drinking water, and pools heated by generators that run on heat recovery systems. It also bottles its own water in recycled glass bottles, saving around 50,000 plastic bottles a year.
The only venue to make Expedia’s list of the world’s ten most eco-friendly hotels, the aptly named The Green House uses solar-powered water heating, energy-efficient lighting and a company car that runs on cooking oil recycled from the kitchen. The 32 gorgeous guest rooms meanwhile all sport locally-produced woollen carpets, wallpaper coloured with vegetable inks and wooden furniture made solely from fallen trees. It even vets all suppliers to ensure they share its eco credentials.
