Mandarin Oriental, Sanya

Thirty acres of beachfront palms on Hainan Island, closer to Vietnam than to Shanghai, where the Mandarin Oriental traded its usual city-tower format for a sprawling low-rise resort along Coral Bay. Rooms come with balconies, villas sit right on the beach, and the spa village is large enough to get genuinely lost in, which seems to be the point. Bill Bensley designed it, and the warm wood and open-air architecture feel right for a place that holds a Forbes Four Star.