Sardinia's Costa Smeralda

The connoisseur's guide to the Emerald Coast — how to navigate the most concentrated stretch of Mediterranean luxury at its season's first peak.

The Costa Smeralda is, for a stretch of approximately fifty-five kilometres on the north-eastern coast of Sardinia, the most concentrated piece of luxury coastline in the Mediterranean. It was conceived in 1962 as a single private development by a consortium led by the Aga Khan, and the original architectural rules — limited heights, native materials, no advertising along the coast road, building set back from the shoreline — have been preserved with admirable rigour. The result, more than sixty years on, is a coast that has aged considerably better than its peers in southern France or the Italian mainland. It is also, by any reasonable measure, the most expensive stretch of Italian coastline to visit, and the planning of a week here repays an unusual degree of care.

The Geography of the Coast

The Costa Smeralda runs from Olbia in the south to Liscia di Vacca in the north, with most of the centres of activity concentrated around Porto Cervo and Porto Rotondo. The coastline is granite, deeply indented, with a sequence of small bays and inlets that produce the famous turquoise water — the result of the white granite sand reflecting the light through the shallows. The interior is a low maquis of myrtle, mastic, and juniper, and the country roads are punctuated by the occasional Aga Khan-era villa hidden behind walls of bougainvillea.

We organise stays here around three centres. Porto Cervo for clients who want the headline social pageant — the Yacht Club Costa Smeralda, the Pevero golf course, the boutiques of the Promenade du Port. Porto Rotondo, slightly to the south, for clients who want a quieter alternative on the same coast. And the smaller bays — Cala di Volpe, Romazzino, Liscia di Vacca — for clients who prefer the seclusion of a single property. The choice has consequences.

The Hotels and Their Codes

There is a tier of hotels on the Costa Smeralda whose names are largely shorthand for the whole region. Hotel Cala di Volpe, the Hotel Pitrizza, the Hotel Romazzino, the Hotel Cervo — all part of the Marriott-owned Costa Smeralda portfolio, all renovated in the last decade, all offering the original Couelle architecture with contemporary interiors. Of these, Cala di Volpe remains the institutional answer, with the longest history and the most theatrical setting; Pitrizza is the most secluded; Romazzino is the most family-oriented; Cervo is the most central.

There is, in addition, a smaller scale of properties: the Hotel Capriccioli, the Petra Segreta, the L'Ea Bianca, the Petra Bianca. These offer a more individual experience, often at a meaningful discount to the headline names, and for the right client we will steer the conversation toward them. For the most demanding parties we arrange private villas — the inventory along this coast is genuinely exceptional, and a beachfront property with full domestic staff and a yacht moored at the property's slipway is an experience the hotels cannot match.

The Boats and the Bays

The Costa Smeralda, like the Amalfi Coast, was made to be experienced by sea. The harbours are full from June through September, and the question for our clients is rarely whether to take a boat but what kind of boat, for how many days, and to which anchorages. For a week's stay we typically recommend a charter yacht of thirty to forty metres with a captain who knows the archipelago — particularly the protected waters of the La Maddalena National Park to the north of Porto Cervo, where the most beautiful anchorages of the entire region lie.

The bays of the Maddalena archipelago — Cala Coticcio on Caprera, Cala Granara on Spargi, the famous pink-sand beach of Budelli, the small inlets at Santa Maria — are among the most beautiful bays in the western Mediterranean. They are also, since the establishment of the marine park, regulated: anchorage permits are required, swimming is restricted in some areas, and the captain we work with handles the paperwork. A day's circuit of the archipelago, with lunch on board at anchor and a return to the home port at sunset, is the perfect Costa Smeralda day.

The Tables and the Evenings

The dining on the Costa Smeralda is a particular kind. The high-style restaurants — Phi Beach for the sunset cocktail, Il Fuoco Sacro at the Cala di Volpe for the dinner, the Yacht Club for the formal evening — are part of the social architecture of the place, and we arrange them for clients who want that experience. But the more rewarding tables, in our experience, are the smaller and more local ones inland from the coast: Rifugio Pastori at Porto Pollo for the grilled fish, Il Pomodoro at San Pantaleo for the seafood pasta, Tanca Manna for the Sardinian inland cuisine that almost no foreign visitor finds.

And then there are the evenings on board — the dinner at anchor in Cala Volpe with the boat's chef cooking on deck, the bottle of Vermentino di Gallura cold, the lights of the coast a kilometre away across glassy water. These are the evenings that, for the right client, make the cost of the week feel quite reasonable on reflection.