A GARDEN PARADISE

Bernard Haymoz is well ensconced in the Bali Life. he’d prefer more to close books than open new chapters now, but his house and garden in sanur is still one of the best in bali. david trauts has a walk around the beautiful gardens of taman sorga.

Villa Taman Sorga was completed in 1997 on the eastern shores of southern Bali in Sanur by Swiss born, Bernard Haymoz and his wife Cecilia. The sometime rental, but mostly, villa residence of the Haymoz’s was one of the most stunning homes in all of Bali at the time of its building. “Now, there’s plenty of spectacular homes and rental villas, but back then, there was hardly anything around,” says the Bali wine connoisseur and owner of local wine merchants Indowines, Bernard Haymoz. The architect he chose to design the house was Ketut Siandana of Waka fame, and with his help Haymoz oversaw the construction from start to finish.

Taman Sorga is sited on a 30 are piece of land in a tranquil part of Sanur, just off Pengembak Road. “Now, Sanur is known as a sleepy village, but back then, there wasn’t any other choice; Seminyak wasn’t the same as today and nowhere had as good infrastructure as this part of Bali,” says Haymoz. At the time of purchasing the land, he says that he could have chosen a beach site lot down the picturesque Pengembak road, but he decided against it. “I can walk or drive to the beach. I don’t need to be right on top of it,” says the Honorary Consul of Chile, a position Haymoz took in 2005. “Everyone wants to be on the beach, but the reality is that if you want to enjoy it and keep it open to the water, etc, you will have a security problem. Here, it is walled in and totally private.” Nowadays, everyone wants to be in Seminyak, Canggu or the Bukit when they think of living in southern Bali, but it wasn’t always like that. “The first time we came here on holidays some 18 years ago, after a short business trip to Jakarta, we stayed in the Bali Hyatt in Sanur and we’ve stayed in this area ever since,” continues Haymoz. “After a couple of years, we rented a house in the Batu Jimbar area and we fell in love with the island, the architecture, the lifestyle and all these things at the time. For me, Sanur’s the ideal place to live in Bali.”

The clay brick and tile residence is composed of 6 separate buildings in a typical, Balinese compound style lay-out with 7 bedrooms. “It’s based on the Balinese principals of separated sleeping, eating and washing areas,” says Haymoz as he walks us around the property. The main building houses the main bedroom upstairs and kitchen, living areas and second bedroom downstairs. The Wantilan building, which is a very typical Balinese Banjar (Local Council) meeting space on one side of the garden, is used for performances and large dinners. “The artisans were brought in from Gianyar especially to build the Wantilan,” comments Haymoz. The main kitchen, dining area and guest rooms at the back of the block are almost a world away from the main building “Sometimes I even forget they are there,” he offers with a smile. They are on the far side of the expansive swimming pool, fountains and walk bridges, which are the central focus of the garden. The 30 are space leaves sufficient area for the glorious, Taman Sorga garden, which is the high point of this villa. Designed by Haymoz and nurtured by his team of staff, the garden is a kaleidoscope of color and a beautiful example of the tropical, Bali garden. Taman Sorga means Garden Paradise in Indonesian and it is all of that and more. “This is my favorite part of the house. The garden is the place I most enjoy,” says the obviously green thumbed Haymoz.

The house was rented out to tourists as a villa regularly in the first few years, but now the Haymoz’s are spending more time at home and less renting. “I haven’t rented the house in 5 or 6 years. Before, we would spend a lot of time outside the country on business, but now we are spending more and more time here and it’s become impractical to rent it. I was talking with Elite Havens recently and they recommended if we wanted to seriously rent it again we would have to remodel the bathrooms, etc, to keep them uniform. Now there is a lot of competition in the villa market and we have to keep up with it. I’m in two minds about it because for one thing I’m not getting any younger and I wonder if I really want to go through the building cycle again at this stage of my life. You know, I just want to close books and get on with living life. But on the other hand, if we did renovate and rent again, it would give us the opportunity and reason to get out around the islands again and experience more of this wonderful country.”

Villa Taman Sorga, like many villas and dwellings in Sanur is hidden away behind high walls and solid gates. The entrance is ornate and welcoming, the antiquities found inside are breathtaking samples collected from all over the archipelago and the gardens behind the large walls open to a relaxing and tranquil world.