Amanemu Opens, Aman’s Hot-Spring Resort in Ise-Shima

Amanemu opened in March 2016 on a wooded hillside above Ago Bay, in the Ise-Shima National Park of Mie prefecture. It was Aman’s second property in Japan, a little over a year after Aman Tokyo, and its first resort built around hot springs.

The architect was again Kerry Hill, and the reference this time was the minka, the traditional Japanese farmhouse. The buildings are low pavilions with tiled roofs and walls of dark-stained cedar, spread along the slope so that each looks over the bay and its pearl rafts. There are 24 suites and four two-bedroom villas, with interiors in pale timber, white oak furniture and sliding screens. Every one has its own onsen, a stone bath filled with water from the resort’s spring.

The spa is the centre of the resort and covers 2,000 square metres. Its heart is a large outdoor thermal pool with daybeds and sunken seating, in the manner of a communal onsen, flanked by two private pavilions with indoor and outdoor baths, rooms for Watsu water therapy and a glass-walled yoga studio. A 33-metre swimming pool lies in front of the restaurant, which serves the produce of a region famous for its spiny lobster, abalone and Matsusaka beef.

The decoration is restrained and specific to Japan: kumiko, the latticework assembled from small pieces of wood without nails or glue, and textiles by Genbei Yamaguchi, a Kyoto maker of obi.

The location matters as much as the design. Ise-Shima is the home of Ise Jingu, the most sacred shrine of Shinto, rebuilt in identical form every twenty years, and of the ama, the women who dive for shellfish in the bay. Two months after the resort opened, the leaders of the G7 met on an island nearby. To the south, the trails of the Kumano region lead into the mountains.

Amanemu showed that the ryokan tradition of bathing, seasonal food and quiet could be translated into a contemporary resort without imitation, an idea the group took further with Aman Kyoto in 2019.