Great bones, beautiful beach make Cap Juluca the ideal renovation.
Famous for its distinctive Moroccan style and crush of celebrity clientele, Anguilla’s Cap Juluca resort unveil the results of a $22 million makeover—from new landscaping to completely redesigned guest room interiors—in December of 2008. And while such aesthetic improvements were part and parcel of maintaining one of the world’s moved loved resorts, finding the right person for the job could easily be likened to finding a needle in a haystack. Not so in the case of Cap Juluca, whose asset manager, Hans Maissen, immediately turned
to Texas-based designer Paul Duesing. MaissenÂ’s instinct was spot on, and Duesing accepted the challenge without a second thought.
According to Duesing, whose other projects include Tuckers Point Club Hotel in Bermuda, the new Capella Pedregal Hotel in Los Cabos, Mexico, and Royal Livingstone Hotel at Victoria Falls in Zambia, the two first met when the designer oversaw a major refurbishment of Bel- Air Hotel du Cap-Ferrat in the south of France, where Maissen was then general manger. “We hit it off and created a fantastic result together,” Duesing says. “When Cap Juluca embarked upon this major renovation, Hans called me and I jumped at the chance. I’ve always thought that [Cap Juluca] has great ‘bones’ and the most beautiful beach I’ve ever seen.”
Duesing went to work procuring materials and accessories that pulled together the property’s new look, which, he says, includes flowing cotton and linen and an “easy, cool, and refreshing color palette, all the colors found on the beach and in the sand.” In fact, his appetite for authenticity even led Duesing and his team to the souks of Marrakech, where they discovered an unlikely treasure trove in the form of a backstreet warehouse. “The custom chandelier that we created for the entry living room was inspired on the spot when we found a warehouse full of intricate metal spheres of varying shapes and sizes,” Duesing says. “We also found some amazing furnishings, rugs, and amenities that came together to form a really fantastic result.”
“Our mission has been to bring the property up to date aesthetically without destroying the underlying appeal that has made this property so popular. That has attracted the tremendous repeat guest loyalty that the resort has enjoyed,” he says. So far, it seems, mission accomplished. For more about Cap Juluca, call 264-497-6666 or visit http://www.capjuluca.com. —Lindsay Lambert
Designer Details
Paul Duesing Partners
Contact: Jack Seifrick
[email protected]
214-720-0212; Bernward
House, 2600 Fairmount,
Dallas, TX 75201