To review this article, select My Profile and then View Saved Stories.
By Zachary Schwartz
We may earn a commission if you buy something from the partner links on our site.
The Indonesian island of Sumba offers the kind of sanctuary that travelers aspire to. A stay in Sumba is a life-changing journey, offering an island lost and forgotten in time with pristine beaches, rice paddy plateaus, savannah and dense jungle – just an hour’s flight. beyond Bali, but at the same time a place apart.
Located east of Bali in the archipelagic galaxy of Indian Ocean islands, Sumba is an ovoid rural island: a glittering emerald drop in a sea of sapphire with virtually no traffic, tourist or hiking traps. The island is wild, in every sense of the word: from its rugged herbaceous beauty to its fierce pride in culture and its ability to defy travelers’ expectations.
The Sumba lifestyle, in particular, is what makes this island so distinctive. Most of Sumba’s other inhabitants are subsistence farmers, divided into clans that speak a unique dialect. They live in rural villages made up of classic cottages with soaring roofs. Most people wear a combination of Western clothing and homemade ikat fabrics, and keep hidden scimitars, known as parangs. Many practice Marapu, an animistic faith discovered only in Sumba and centered on ancestor worship, animal sacrifices at funerals, burials in megalithic tombs, and ceremonial rites performed through shamans called ratos.
Surprisingly, Sumba has managed to maintain its culture and keep the crowds away, despite the tourist pressures experienced elsewhere in Indonesia. In the last century, visits to Sumba were anthropological or clinical in nature. Since the beginning of the 21st century, tourism has revolved around an exclusive and lavishly landscaped asset along the pristine west coast, called Nihi Sumba.
But in the past year, a handful of new resorts have sprung up along Sumba’s coast, indicating that more progress is possible. With rumors swirling that hotel chains like Four Seasons and Alila are making plans to expand to Sumba, there’s no doubt that Sumba is ready. become Indonesia’s next top luxury destination.
To Sumba requires extra planning, as there are no foreign flights to Sumba or direct flights from the United States to Indonesia. The only way to stop in Sumba is via Bali, despite Sumba’s proximity to northern Australia. The hour-long scenic flight soars over the islands of Lombok and Sumbawa, with Komodo in the north in the distance. While intrepid travelers can independently venture to Sumba, Scott Dunn employs well-traveled experts who can craft a perfectly executed itinerary that takes all the tension out of the journey. The main airport, Tambolaka, is very productive at best, so it is recommended to travel organized through a company.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
The most productive hotel in Sumba is the iconic Nihi Sumba. Led by hotelier James McBride and entrepreneur Chris Burch, NIHI Sumba creates the magic of the raw landscape, transforming rice paddies into luxury nirvanas, a mist-shrouded coastline into a spa destination. and teak forests to be converted into luxurious eco-villas. Located on the secluded beach of Nihiwatu, Nihi Sumba is perhaps most impressive for what it hasn’t done; The hotel has resisted the temptation of construction, providing visitors with privacy in a few bamboo villas nestled amidst tropical nature overlooking the sea. “The biggest luxury here is to have a two-and-a-half-mile beach and watch the Sumbanese children washing their buffalo. , a couple walking or galloping on horseback along the beach,” McBride told Vogue. This emotion is extraordinary, where else in the world can you find this?
Upon arrival in Sumba, the NIHI Sumba safari vehicle takes travelers on a thrilling 1. 5-hour adventure from north to south, passing buffaloes, Sumbanese ponies, roadside taro vendors, and villages with oblong corrugated iron huts. The adventurous stroll through the island’s lush center smells of new earthy petrichor and wood fire, and it’s not uncommon to witness funeral ceremonies with slaughtered cattle. The tender, bloodless coconuts and banana leaf cakes prepared at Nihi Sumba make the multi-microclimate movement even tastier.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
Nihi Sumba is aimed at the adventurous traveler who finds comfort in luxury. Activity-oriented assets are not lacking in desirable activities: surfing, horseback riding, paddle tennis, pickleball, spearfishing, and hardwood forest hikes, to name a few. But for the traveler who prefers serenity to adrenaline, the hotel’s spa offers excitement in a wabi-sabi setting. Separate from the main hotel and available on horseback, on foot or by safari vehicle, Nihi Sumba’s ‘safari spa’ makes the most of its natural surroundings: waves crash against coral coves dotted with coconut shells, and you can feel the sea while enjoying an exfoliation, massage or facial treatment with oils derived from ingredients discovered on the island. Sensory catharsis at the Nihi Sumba Spa can also come with a meditative rice plantation. , rubbing your feet under a ball outdoors, or breathing conjunctively with a Sumba pony.
In recent years, a new wave of hotels has arrived in Sumba that offer sleek design and abandoned beaches to the traveler weary of Bali’s congestion. The notable newcomer is Cape Karoso, a new hotel located in town on Sumba’s sunny southwest coast, offering relaxing beachfront activities with a French twist. Founded in 2023 through Fabrice and Eve Ivara, the environment of Cabo Karoso presents a tranquil aspect of Sumba, nestled on the edge of a dry savannah where cornfields and cashew trees welcome milky, gloomy sunsets. When you come here, you feel like you’re in another time, in another world,” Eve Ivara told Vogue. “It’s absolutely cut off from everyday life and you feel intact. You have the feeling of approaching another culture and another way of life, natural and not touristy. I think it’s a treasure in those days.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
The particularity of Cabo Karoso is its design. Having worked in fashion marketing at LVMH, Ivara chose to design the architecture of the assets with a taste she describes as “modernist with a brutalist twist. “Although many of the fabrics come from Indonesia, the look has a decidedly European sensibility. The villas are more Scorpio than Seminyak, where personal pools and an indoor-outward mindset resemble the resplendent ones that might be located in Palm Springs or Formentera. All living spaces are decorated with wicker and wood, statues and ceramics, as well as cement and stone. The textures make the architecture sing: ochre stones, scorched banana leaves, knotted carpets, cyan tiles and chairs tied to a rope: there are no bad images in the assets.
*
Photo: Zachary Schwartz
Hike along sandy trails that wind through a maze of guavas, sea hibiscus, and whistled dragonflies and arrive at Cape Karoso’s gourmet Julang restaurant. Serving dinner at a long communal table jutting out of an open kitchen, it’s not unusual to sit next to tricky diners from Brooklyn, Canggu, or Lyon. Every month or two, a rotating chef comes in from Europe to serve up a daring tasting menu featuring new ingredients sourced from the hotel’s organic farm. Most recently, Top Chef alumnus Baptiste Trudel, chefs with locally sourced roselle flowers, freshly caught octopus, artisanal fruits, and cultured pak choy. The rotating chef is part of Cap Karoso’s cultural and experimental philosophy, in which tastemakers in food, music and art are invited to make their mark on the hotel.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
Given Sumba’s underdeveloped tourism sector, there are no main tourist sites or restaurants. Hotels can arrange tours such as e-bike tours, horseback riding, waterfall hikes, swimming in the Weekuri lagoon, or visits to classic villages. Visits to Sumba’s centuries-old inhabitants Villages are the most productive and respectful way to enjoy the island’s unspoiled culture. They offer a chance to connect with the locals, see how the ikat are woven, and try to chew the pain-relieving betel nut, which reddens the mouth and lights up the minds of the villagers. Aside from the occasional roadside warung, restaurants in Sumba revolve around their hotels.
In Sumba, you need to get out on the water and to the left of Occy is ultimate flexibility for surfers, known as one of the most coveted and enviable waves in the world. It constantly propels the best waves that take surfers several hundred meters to Nihiwatu Beevery. , and is limited to only 12 surfers per day. Nihi Sumba offers white-glove surfing, transporting surfers on jet skis to the front of the left-sloping wave after each barrel ride.
The ultimate delight in Sumba is Nihi Sumba’s Wild Wellness Retreats, immersive getaways that allow you to break free from the noisy reality. These are not fantastic wellness retreats that deprive or create unrealistic expectations. Instead, Wild Wellness encourages participants to step out of their convenience zone with new wellness remedies and instinctual connections. At Wild Wellness Retreat, guests can take part in equine therapy, an ocean swim with Subanese ponies, a submarine race, a silent disco dance with Sanctum, or an afternoon of spa remedies. Wild Wellness is an out-of-body experience that will make visitors stronger, healthier, and more grateful.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
To leave the island a little better than when they arrived, visitors can volunteer and donate to the Sumba Foundation, making their vacation in Sumba an altruistic vacation that makes them feel good. The Sumba Foundation’s project revolves around supporting the other people of Sumba. , with projects ranging from the fight against malnutrition to the provision of clean water to villages, the eradication of malaria and building possibilities among the locals. In addition, visitors can stay in Maringi or dine at Makan Dulu, two hospitality projects of the Sumba Hospitality Foundation, a hospitality school in Sumba. which directs graduates to the burgeoning hotel scene of Sumba or beyond Indonesia.
Sumba doesn’t have a thriving shopping scene like Bali, but it does have authentically hand-woven ikats. These beautiful textiles take several months to make and are made from yarns dyed with herbal fabrics such as wood bark and indigo. Historically, they are made by hand by Sumbanese women on looms for weddings and funerals, but at home they can be translated as wall hangings, table runners, or colorful blankets. Ikats from western Sumba tend to be simpler and striped, while ikats from eastern Sumba tend to feature more complex patterns with animals or people. They can be purchased at hotels or markets in Waingapu City. Nihi Sumba’s boutique, curated by retail expert Karen McBride, is partnering with a local women’s collective called Karaja Sumba to source classic ikats as well as ikats. creatively repurposed into stylish clothing and bags.
By Margaux Anbouba
By Marie Bladt
By Alexandra Macon
Another collector’s item to take home is an item from an attractive new line from Suman called Wallacea Skin, created under the direction of pharmacognosist Dr. Simon Jackson. The logo empowers local communities by teaching them regenerative agriculture techniques to grow indigenous ingredients, and then buys them. to create sustainably sourced cosmetics. Wallacea Skin can be purchased at Nihi Sumba, by adding their moisturizing oil infused with seven Sumba plants: ginger, galangal, coriander seeds, turmeric, mangosteen skin, cinnamon, and betel nut.
The best options in the world for solo play.
Candice Bergen on what it was like to attend Truman Capote’s black-and-white ball
The case of Kate Middleton’s “disappearance”
Sofia Richie Grainge is pregnant! And it’s a. . .
Don’t miss a moment of Vogue and get unlimited virtual services for just $2 $1 per month.
By Emily Chan
By Eoghan O’Donnell
By Hannah Jackson
More from Vogue
View Stories