Sri Lankan diversified conglomerate Aitken Spence recently announced that its hotels’ arm had signed a "50:50 joint venture" agreement with international luxury brand Six Senses Resorts & Spas, and local representatives, the Favourite Group, to set up Six Senses Ahungalla which has an estimated opening date of 2012.
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A Six Senses living room |
Located close to Aitken Spence's existing Heritance Ahungalla property, this US$ 40 million hotel and spa project will encompass 10.5 acres of beachfront land and a 27-acre nearby island. Described as architecturally inspired by the late Geoffrey Bawa and comprising 20 one bedroom villa suites, 14 two bedroom beach front residential villas and 15 island villas, this resort expects to charge as much as US$ 450 per room.
Six Senses currently operates 13 high-end resorts branded as Soneva, Six Senses and Evason in the Maldives, Thailand, Vietnam, Oman and Jordan with new developments coming up in Morocco, Turks & Caicos and China. Also, it operates 27 spas with additional projects underway in India, Morocco and Oman.
The Aitken Spence portfolio comprises 27 properties under its Heritance, Adaaran and Aitken Spence Hotels & Resorts brands in Sri Lanka, the Maldives, India and Oman, with a total room capacity of 2300. |