St.-Tropez: Where to Stay: Newcomers: Benkiraï Saint-Tropez

Benkiraï Saint-Tropez

Set back on a quiet, leafy road, Hotel Benkiraï is the first of its kind in St.-Tropez—an ultracontemporary property designed by cool Parisian Patrick Jouin (who also did Alain Ducasse’s Mix, in Las Vegas and New York, and his three-Michelin-starred restaurant at the Plaza Athénée in Paris). The rooms are small and rather spare but also deeply cosseting. Each is divided into a monochromatic Zen-white bedroom and periwinkle-blue bathrooms with cabinets that slide away and transform into sinks. Predictably, high-style rules: everything from the multilevel bar and restaurant decks to terraces that overlook the mosaic-tiled pool and gardens is built with red-hued Benkiraï teak from Indonesia. Jouin’s design is infused with fun: the white-lacquered consoles cleverly integrate a plasma flat-screen TV and DVD player in the rooms, while the crisscross patterns of metal wall lamps create their own unique mood lighting.

Even if you’re not staying here—the small rooms are not for everyone—come for dinner and mingle with the artsy crowd that seems to include all ages and nationalities. The Benkiraï’s restaurant is headed by acclaimed Thai chef Oth Sombath, formerly of Paris’s Blue Elephant, who whips up such dishes as five-flavor steamed salmon wrapped in a banana leaf, duck fillet with red curry and chocolate spring rolls for dessert. Rooms from $605.