The Lure of the Sea

Words by Hannah Tapping

A stay at the St Moritz Hotel, reimagines what it means to escape.

It begins, as all great retreats do, with the sea. Beyond the hedgerows of North Cornwall, where the Atlantic rolls in with metronomic grace and the land falls away in soft cliffs and secret coves, the white silhouette of the St Moritz Hotel stands sentinel. But this is not some stiff-lipped seaside relic. Instead, St Moritz is a hybrid – a hotel, yes, but also with the benefit of coastal villas or apartments. Even the hotel rooms offer versatility with the option of interconnected room pods. Each pod comprises a suite, a king room, and a cosy room, which combine to create an apartment connected by a private hallway and are ideal for groups or families, offering a blend of bedroom privacy and communal spaces. The coastal villas, houses and sea view apartments are perfect if you prefer the amenities and ease of a hotel stay combined with a more independent escape – in short St Moritz offers the best of both worlds.

Floorplans are open, sightlines are clean, and the kitchens offer ritualised spaces where guests can gather around bowls of wild samphire, scallops from the morning market and local fizz chilled just enough to catch the light from an Atlantic sunset.  And still, it never feels performative. The villas feel effortless. Natural fibres, neutral palettes, raw textures – the aesthetics are as calming as the views. Nothing shouts, everything is considered.

What distinguishes these stays is not just the design, but the detail. Pre-arrival provisioning transforms the moment of arrival into one of immersion. Imagine finding you fridge quietly stocked with Camel Valley sparkling rosé, homemade chutneys from a local smallholding and sourdough still warm from a Rock bakery. Imagine hosting an impromptu dinner party on the terrace, orchestrated with the help of the hotel’s concierge: linens, flowers, a private chef and a three-course menu that began that morning on Padstow’s harbourside.

Food, naturally, forms the heart of the experience. The hotel’s Shorecrest Restaurant serves a rotating menu anchored in what local growers, foragers and fishermen offer that week. On any given evening the delights of peppered hake with chicken butter sauce and oyster mushrooms or Cornish lamb and pressed potatoes with grilled courgette tempt taste buds, or feast on sharing platters and small plates for a more informal take. Whatever dishes you choose at The Shorecrest Restaurant, menus do not dictate to ingredients; they form around them. A dish begins not with an idea but with what is at its peak, what is being pulled from the ground, hauled from the water. Vegetables come from Restharrow Farm, just a stone’s throw from the hotel. Asparagus from St Enodoc, bass and mackerel from Bro Diplock’s boat off Rock, whole Cornish lamb from Kittows Butchers in Fowey. The raw materials are the story, and the chef’s job is to listen, to shape, to let the produce speak for itself. It’s the culinary equivalent of slow fashion: local, seasonally dictated and lovingly prepared.

At the more casual Seaside Café guests wander up from the beach, sand-dusted and sun-drunk, for steaming bowls of Cornish mussels or fresh garden salads grown just up the hill. Seaside classics – fish and chips are always a favourite and the ‘smash’ burger is perfect for hungry surfers. 

It’s not about providing more – the location, view, accommodation and food speak for themselves – it’s about making every detail matter more; a mantra we can all learn from. In place of over-structured schedules or themed menus, guests are encouraged to co-create their own experience. One night may feature a barefoot stroll on the beach followed by dinner at Shorecrest, the next a visit to one of the nearby restaurants, chauffeured in the hotel’s complementary electric minibus.

Yet, when you want a little glamour, it’s there. The main hotel, a gleaming white modernist structure with subtle Art Deco inflections, channels a Riviera nostalgia without the pretence. There’s an indoor and outdoor pool, tennis courts, and the famed Cowshed Spa – the only one in the UK outside Soho House properties which can be found in luxury locations across the UK, Europe and the States. Adopting the original Cowshed philosophy developed at Babington House in Somerset, which was “to inject a little country calm into people’s busy lives,” treatment-led natural therapies are based on English country garden botanicals to nourish body and soul. There’s also a Wellness Area area as luxurious as the rest of the hotel, where attention to detail is obvious at every turn. But even here, you can step lightly. You might fancy a cocktail while dipping your toes in the pool, lulled to the sounds of a laid-back summer DJ set. If not, then that’s fine, as on your private patio you’ll find space, the scent of the sea and Cornish quietude.

And perhaps this is what makes St Moritz feel so particular. It doesn’t seek to dazzle in the ways luxury often does. Instead, it cultivates an elegance of choice. Guests don’t arrive for one version of Cornwall, but to write their own. A surf lesson in the morning; a boat to Rock for lunch. The hotel’s concierge service boasts well-versed hosts who can arrange everything from restaurant bookings to watersports. Local adventure partners include Wavehunters and Camel Ski School from which you can choose surf, SUP, water ski or wakeboard adventures. A tour of a biodynamic vineyard one day, a quiet afternoon on the lawn with a book the next. It is, in the truest sense, a retreat – not from life, but toward a different pace of it.

The hotel’s success lies in how it sidesteps the usual binaries of coastal accommodation. It’s not simply a hotel, nor a set of holiday lets. It’s a design-led sanctuary where freedom is expertly scaffolded by care. Self-catering here isn’t about self-sufficiency, it’s about self-expression. And that expression is quietly, profoundly local.

You come to St Moritz for the view. You stay for the silence, the suppers and the stillness that good design – and good service – can bring. But mostly, you stay because here, at the edge of the land and the start of something else entirely, you feel like your life has room to unfold.

  stmoritzhotel.co.uk