Mountain villas · Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia
Two villas with ocean views on a jungle mountainside near Tayrona National Park.
It all begins with a piece of land. Maybe you want somewhere to disconnect completely. Maybe you're looking for a state of mind you can't find at home. Or maybe you just want a week unlike anywhere else you've stayed.
It all begins the moment you arrive. The gate opens, the jungle closes in, and the world you left behind starts to feel very far away. Two villas. One extraordinary location in the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, Colombia, a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve. Built with intention. Welcome to Bodhi Mente.
The name
Paired together, they became something else: awakening of the body and mind, folded into two words.
The villas
Render Double Queen room
Each villa rises to 3.5-metre ceilings, walls of glass framing the views outside your window. Space. Ocean air, mountain ranges, the jungle pressing in close at the edges. Sunrises, sunsets, snow-capped peaks in the distance, monkeys moving through the canopy. A panoramic view of over 180 degrees.
Render Double Queen room
Step inside and the story continues. Every villa has its own colour, its own character. Textures pulled from the painted stucco of Santa Marta architecture. A space brought to life after dark by light moving through the room like nothing you've felt before. Breathe in the solitude. Let the jungle do the talking.
The design
What should a room do to a person's mind?
The answer is pulled from two places. From the architecture of Santa Marta: the painted stucco, the colour laid straight onto old walls, personality worn on the outside.
And from something smaller: the mycelium and mushrooms native to this land, whose blues, oranges and greens now run through the lighting, furniture and textures of every space.
An atmosphere, built deliberately to provoke an expansion of reality.
The huge windows were in the plan from the very start, because the view is the main feature of our villas. The front is glass from floor to ceiling, 3.4 metres tall, in six panels of laminated safety glass.
We designed some of the lamps ourselves so they match the villas.
We built with local materials wherever we could.
The teak deck is cantilevered, with no columns underneath. Its railings are thin steel cables between wooden posts, so even the railing barely interrupts the view.
Its eight footings, each 1.3 by 1.3 metres, sit directly on the solid rock beneath the land.
We chose solid concrete slabs over metal decking because they stand up better to the salty sea air.
The roof is made of thermo-acoustic panels that keep the heat out and soften the sound of tropical rain.
The land
We count everything that grows, flies and walks through it. These numbers come straight from our field notes.
Caught on camera
Short clips from the land. We're filming every bird and animal we can find.
The guide
Where
The Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta is one of the only places on earth where snow-capped peaks and Caribbean coastline exist in the same breath. Jungle falling straight down to the sea. Mountains rising straight up from it.
Nearest airport: Simón Bolívar International Airport, Santa Marta (SMR).
About 50 minutes from Santa Marta by bus, private taxi or motorbike.
Bodhi Mente Insider
COP 75,000
Bodhi Mente Street Dog Fundación
Julieta was handed over as a newborn by a neighbour. Susi walked up to a table at a local restaurant. Gloria, Donna and Carmela, the triplets, were born right here on the land.
Every donation helps feed and treat local street dogs, and moves us closer to a large, permanent enclosure where guests can help feed, walk and care for them.
One email when the calendar opens, and the occasional story from the land. Nothing else.
