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Somewhere in the world, a famous guest is stepping quietly into Aman. No fuss. No grand welcome. Whether you’re arriving by sea or mountain, the experience is seamless and discreet. At Aman, you arrive and vanish, all at once.
That’s why you’ll find names like Princess Diana, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Leonardo DiCaprio among Aman’s guests.
Today, Aman is a $3B brand (last valued at $3B in 2022), regularly charging upwards of $1,000 a night for entry-level rooms, with some of the highest occupancy rates in the industry.
But did you know this luxury brand of 35 hidden retreats didn’t begin in the West?
It started with a Chinese-Indonesian from a small town in Indonesia, far from the world’s luxury capitals.
🌱 From doctor dreams to hotels
Zecha grew up in Sukabumi. His family was once wealthy, but they lost much of their fortune during the war and Indonesia’s revolution.
Starting over wasn’t easy. His father hoped he’d become a doctor, but Zecha found himself hunched over books on political theory, then pounding out stories as a journalist, then running a publishing house—with magazines covering news, lifestyle, culture, travel, and more.
After selling his publishing house in his late thirties, Zecha was searching for what to do next.
⛷️ Building something new
Then, luck hit. A friend offered him the chance to scout hotel sites for Marriott in Asia. (Yes, that Marriott.) Through his connections, Zecha found sites in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Bangkok.
But the 1973 oil crisis killed Marriott’s expansion plans before any deal was signed. Still, it gave Zecha his first real “in” into the hospitality scene.
Shortly after, he met Robert Burns (ex-Hilton and Waldorf Astoria) and Georg Rafael (ex-InterContinental). Both were experienced global hospitality execs, and together with Zecha, they launched Regent International Hotels. There, Zecha led development and financing.
Regent quickly became one of Asia’s most celebrated luxury brands. Zecha called it his “real-world MBA,” learning the ins and outs of luxury hospitality on the flagship Hong Kong property.
But as Regent grew, Zecha’s frustration with the corporate, institutionalized hotel world only deepened. He watched luxury brands chase scale, standardization, and soulless efficiency.
The spark for Aman came from quiet rebellion. A desire to create something radically different. Intimate, personal, and free from the strict, standard corporate rules.
🏝️ Seeing opportunity
In the mid-1980s, Zecha landed in Phuket, Thailand, one of his usual vacation spots.
But this time, he was chasing the dream of a second home. The search dragged on for two years, until an old friend pointed him to a patch of land on Pansea Beach—a quiet, secluded stretch few tourists knew.
The first time Zecha set foot there, dense plants pressed in from all sides, the air thick with the scent of earth and salt. Not exactly the peaceful getaway he had in mind.
But after trudging up a steep incline, the trees parted. Before him: a crescent of white sand, water like polished glass. Suddenly, the world fell away, and you felt peace.
This was it. Zecha started buying the land, piece by piece.
🏠 From home to hotelier
Soon, friends wanted in. They dreamed of holiday homes along the same stretch of sand. For years, Zecha had been the connector. Organizing gatherings, making introductions, and bringing people together in beautiful places.
So when his friends wanted homes on the same Phuket beach, his instinct was to help. Maybe he’d look after their properties, or maybe run a private club.
But as more friends wanted in, the idea evolved. Zecha realized there was a bigger opportunity: a place for people who valued privacy, beauty, and genuine hospitality.
Even though he’d never run a hotel before, he saw a gap for something intimate and personal, far from the corporate luxury hotels he’d helped build at Regent.
The property was hard to reach and lacked the amenities typical developers wanted. Regardless, Zecha decided to build a small collection of pavilions that would challenge everything he disliked about traditional hotels.
His friends were skeptical. There was no brand, no marketing budget, and no proven model.
💸 Money on the line
If friends were skeptical, banks were even tougher. No one wanted to fund a hotel with no brand, no blueprint, and no promise of profit. Too small, too unconventional.
But Zecha wasn’t about to let that stop him. He and three other friends put their own money on the line. At first, it was just the four of them. But as the vision took shape, word spread.
Eventually, 19 villa owners joined, each drawn by the promise of something different. A place that felt like home, but better.
The risk was real: if they failed, they’d lose more than just cash—they’d lose face, and maybe even friendships.
🤔 Go with your gut
Zecha didn’t have a business plan. He had a gut feeling.
Instead of adopting stricter controls to reassure his backers, Zecha obsessed over how guests would feel the moment they arrived—relaxed, surprised, and cared for in a space that felt personal.
Too much structure, he believed, would dull that spirit. Even the name reflected what he wanted to build: “Aman” means “peace” in Sanskrit and several Asian languages, and “Amanpuri,” the name of the first resort, means “place of peace.”
🚧 Building without a blueprint
The construction was chaotic. Again, Zecha had never operated a hotel, and almost everything had to be improvised. Contractors argued over responsibilities. Deliveries arrived in the wrong sequence.
Some weeks, nobody could say who was in charge. Rooms were redesigned after walls were built if something didn’t feel right. Materials were ordered without formal budgets so the team could respond to inspiration in real time.
Staff had no documented scripts, only conversations about how to create the sense of quiet belonging that became Aman’s hallmark.
🪧 Against the norm
From the start, Zecha insisted Aman would never operate like a conventional chain. Every guest received their own unique personal care. No scripts dictated how staff should behave. No signage reminded visitors they were in a commercial property.
No front desk. No uniforms. Staff greeted guests by name, their warmth as natural as the breeze. Pavilions nestled into the hillside, roofs peeking through the palms, every detail whispering welcome.
But the world didn’t change overnight.
The industry still believed luxury meant marble lobbies, white-glove service, and as many rooms as possible. Zecha saw the future in the opposite direction: fewer rooms, more intimacy, and service that felt like friendship, not formality.
🫧 Behind the curtain
Yet the very qualities that made Aman extraordinary—deep personalization and no standard scripts—also made daily operations a quiet struggle.
Aman never had standard procedures. Staff relied on memory, instinct, and observation instead of formal systems.
On the surface, it looked calm and effortless. But behind the scenes, it was often a mess. Reservations were scribbled into notebooks that disappeared for days. Housekeeping had no fixed schedules and sometimes cleaned rooms twice or not at all.
Special requests were passed along by word of mouth and easily forgotten. Some employees found it inspiring. Others quietly burned out.
The lack of structure gave Aman its soul but also made it fragile. As the brand grew, the confusion behind the scenes led to missed revenue, uneven service, and growing frustration among both investors and staff.
🔑 Doing things differently
So Zecha doubled down on what made Aman unique. He capped each property at under 50 rooms, creating scarcity and mystery. He hired staff for attitude, empathy, and creativity, not just hotel experience.
Every Aman was a love letter to its setting, with local materials, local hands, and stories woven into every wall. Zecha personally scouted every site, often securing hidden gems others overlooked. He built relationships with local families and dignitaries to get access, ensuring every property was a true deep dive into local culture.
Aman’s marketing was just as unconventional. No splashy ads or grand openings. Zecha sent handwritten invitations and preview postcards to a tight circle of tastemakers and loyal guests.
Early guests received personal notes and private invitations to pre-opening stays, where they’d experience the new resort before the public even knew it existed. If you knew, you knew. There were no loyalty points, no public discounts.
Instead, Aman built a sense of discovery and belonging. Guests whispered about their stays to friends who valued privacy and discretion as much as they did.
That’s how the “Amanjunkie” tribe was born—a global network of repeat guests who would cross continents for the next Aman.
Growth was never about speed. Zecha opened new properties only when he found a site that felt magical.
He partnered with local artisans and architects to ensure every Aman felt like it belonged to its place. Each new opening was a risk.
Often in remote or untested locations, always with high upfront costs and no guarantee of success.
But Zecha’s discipline paid off: Aman’s average occupancy rates and nightly rates became the envy of the industry, and the brand’s mystique only deepened with each new resort.
Inside each Aman, the staff-to-guest ratio was legendary, sometimes as high as six-to-one.
Every interaction was meant to feel spontaneous and tailored, not transactional. Managers were encouraged to run their resorts as if they owned them, fostering pride and accountability.
This sense of ownership drove innovation and guest satisfaction, and kept the Aman spirit alive as the brand expanded.
🌊 Here on out
But success brought storms. Investors circled, excited to scale what Zecha had built. Ownership battles raged. Zecha resisted. He was forced out, returned, and forced out again, but the Aman DNA he set in motion was never completely lost.
Today, Aman has 35 sanctuaries across four continents. The world’s elite still slip through Aman’s doors, seeking not just escape, but belonging.
Zecha didn’t just build a hotel. Aman’s story is proof that the boldest brands are built from the nerve to do things differently—even when the world says you’re wrong.
Takeaway Scoop
Lessons you can take from the Aman story.
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