Four Seasons's new showcase project in Palau

The combination of outstanding service, luxurious facilities, innovative health and wellness offers and a commitment to sustainability makes Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts a leading brand in the luxury segment. The global portfolio of Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts features captivating destinations. In Switzerland, the luxury hotel chain currently operates in Geneva and will soon expand to Gstaad.

The resorts on the Maldives, Kuda Huraa and Landaa Giraavaru, as well as Jimbaran and Sayan on Bali, are particularly popular with Swiss travellers. Swiss hotelier Armando Kraenzlin, a renowned figure in the industry, has been working in Southeast Asia since 1988 and has been a key part of Four Seasons Hotels for many years.  As Regional Vice President, he is responsible for several hotels in Asia (see box) and has also been General Manager of the Four Seasons Landaa Giraavaru in the Maldives for 15 years.

Armando Kraenzlin spent a few days in Switzerland this week. Travelnews spoke at length with Kraenzlin, mainly about an exciting new project he is undertaking.

View of the Rock Islands

Armando Kraenzlin is currently pushing ahead with a new Four Seasons project. A new Four Seasons Resort is to be built in the island nation of Palau by 2027.

‘I visited Palau for the first time in 2017 and was immediately fascinated,’ says the Swiss hotelier, who is a passionate diver and diving instructor. The coral reefs are completely intact, making diving an extremely impressive experience.

At the same time, the government is doing a good job of protecting the sea: to date, 80 per cent of the waters around the islands are reserved for local fishermen.

He is very fond of the entire microstate, which encompasses 356 islands, and Kraenzlin enthuses about the breathtaking landscape, the rainforests and the Polynesian culture. In 2017, Palau still had a population of over 25,000; today, it is only 18,000. Because the population can apply for a US green card, the country has experienced a wave of emigration among younger people – and is reacting.

New, sustainable tourism projects are to be developed in line with careful, sustainable guidelines to create new jobs. Four Seasons has recognised the opportunity and will now build a 50-room resort over the next three years, with a view of the iconic Rock Islands, a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The new Four Seasons project is being carefully planned. The hotel chain has been present in Palau for a year now with the luxury yacht Four Seasons Explorer, giving guests a first taste of the Pacific island world. ‘The country can best be explored by boat,’ explains Armando Kraenzlin, adding that the Explorer will be just as important when the resort is completed and guests can visit various islands and go diving before continuing their stay at the resort.

These are impressions of Palau and the Four Seasons Explorer:

Palau is not exactly nearby—it’s a four-hour flight east of Taipei, a three-hour flight east of Manila, or a ten-hour flight west of Honolulu. However, the Pacific paradise is likely to attract more interest in the future, as the small state has decided to take on an environmentally conscious, sustainable role in tourism and appeal to responsible travellers. Meanwhile, the infrastructure is being further enhanced, with promising developments like the Four Seasons Hotels project.

As early as 2022, Palau caused a stir in the tourism world with the launch of the environmental initiative ‘Ol'au Palau’. This is a model that aims to specifically reward environmentally conscious behaviour by tourists by giving them access to untouched places that are off limits to ‘conventional’ tourists. Visitors can collect points by engaging in responsible and regenerative behaviour during their stay. In turn, they can use these points to access unique experiences that Palau has to offer. Visitors who do not participate or do not collect enough points during their stay will not have access to these experiences.

Good years for the Maldives

When asked about the recent development of the resorts he is in charge of, Armando Kraenzlin says: ‘The years 2021 and 2022 during Covid were very good for us in the Maldives because the Maldives and Dubai were among the few destinations that could be visited. During these years, we were also able to tap into new markets, such as the US and India, which have now remained loyal to us.’

The resorts in Bali, on the other hand, suffered badly in the Covid years. But currently things are going very well again throughout Asia, with Japan being particularly ‘on fire’.