In 1979, Geoffrey Bawa designed a private residence in Colombo for corporate executive Ratna Sivaratnam. The home stayed within the family for decades until Jetwing Hotels acquired it in early 2024, rescuing it from the fate that has claimed many of Colombo’s finest old properties, which is demolition for a high-rise.
Jetwing brought in Vinod Jayasinghe, Bawa’s protégé and a long-time collaborator, to adapt the house into a four-room boutique property. The restoration is deliberately restrained. Original furnishings, lampshades, wooden screens, and courtyard gardens remain largely untouched. An ensuite was added where one was missing, some furniture was replaced where necessary, and little else changed.
The result is a property that feels less like a hotel than a well-kept family home. The double-height main salon, flanked by courtyards on two sides, sets the tone: unhurried, quietly elegant, and rooted in Bawa’s signature tropical-modern sensibility.
The four rooms range from two standard rooms at the rear of the house, previously the children’s bedrooms, to a deluxe attic spread across two levels beneath a pitched roof. A fourth room, accessible from the first courtyard, offers the most seclusion and suits longer stays.
