Lily Pool Cottage

The way into this estate, and it is not a compromise so much as a smaller version of the same idea. A high white gable on timber posts, a living room with a low sideboard the length of one wall, a bedroom with a large double under fine drapes, and folding glass doors that open the whole front of it onto a sit-out. The bathroom has a tub and a separate shower cubicle and an open-to-sky court leading through to the pool.

The pool is the reason this villa exists rather than a room without one. It is a narrow lap of turquoise set alongside a lily pond, lanterns standing in the water, reeds and banana at the far edge, and the plantation dropping away beyond that — at blue hour it is as good as anything above it here, and 18 of the 59 villas are this one, so it is also the one you can actually get. Two things to know: no heating is promised for its pool, and it takes 3 people rather than 4.