Koʻa Kea Resort on Poipu Beach

Ko’a Kea Resort on Po’ipu Beach

"You might assume that the first luxury small property to open on Kauai in 30 years would have made a splashy debut, but the beachfront Ko‘a Kea Hotel & Resort (built on the site of the old Poipu Beach Hotel) slipped onto the scene with barely a ripple. Maybe it’s the size: With just 121 rooms—all with balconies or lanais and within earshot of the waves—the resort is considerably smaller than its brand-name neighbors on the sunny south coast. Eschewing waterslides and swim-up bars, Ko‘a Kea has more sedate pleasures: an unadorned swimming pool tiled in deep blue, a sophisticated restaurant/lounge with a sashimi tasting menu, and an expansive lawn overlooking a cove where guests (mostly honeymooners) sit at sunset. Rooms might be dismissed as humdrum nouveau-Hawaiian (there’s lots of coral) if they weren’t so comfortable and thoughtful—each has a cushy chaise longue, a ceiling fan and AC, and an in-room espresso machine that provides a pre–surf lesson pick-me-up (one of the island’s best breaks fronts the hotel). When it comes to service, Ko‘a Kea demonstrates that smaller may indeed be better: When a recent rainy day kept guests indoors, a desk clerk sent the latest issue of Vanity Fair magazine up to their rooms to help while away the hours."