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Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea

Wailea, Hawaii, United States · Four Seasons · Grand Luxury

Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea: ExteriorFour Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea: Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea | Fine Hotels + Resorts | Amex TravelFour Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea: Bedroom

HBO filmed the entire first season of The White Lotus here in late 2020, closing the resort to the public for a six-month COVID production bubble. Opened February 9, 1990 as Four Seasons' first Hawaiian property and only its third resort worldwide, the Wailea oceanfront address is Maui's only resort holding both AAA Five Diamond and Forbes Five-Star, with Wolfgang Puck's Spago as its beachfront dining flagship.

About Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea

History

When Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea opened on February 9, 1990, it was simultaneously the brand's first Hawaiian property and only its third resort anywhere in the world — and it arrived on a stretch of Maui's south shore that was still being invented. The Wailea resort corridor had barely existed a decade earlier; the master-planned luxury development on Maui's leeward coast had only begun in the early 1980s, and the 15 oceanfront acres along the Wailea Alanui Drive that Four Seasons acquired sat between the future sites of the Grand Wailea and the Fairmont Kea Lani, all three properties establishing simultaneously what a premium Hawaiian resort could be.

The original resort was designed by Wimberly, Allison, Tong & Goo, the Honolulu-based firm that became the definitive architect of Pacific resort hospitality in the late twentieth century. Their design organized the property as a series of open-air pavilions cascading down toward the sea, with the Pacific always visible from the lobby and the gardens threading between the three pools and the 3,000 linear feet of oceanfront. Interiors by Brayton Hughes Design Studio layered Hawaiian art and Asian antiques through the public spaces, establishing a version of tropical luxury that the industry would spend years attempting to replicate. Forbes Travel Guide awarded it a Four-Star rating in its very first year of operation.

Wolfgang Puck's Spago opened here as one of its earliest resort outposts, and the Maui iteration — the only beachfront open-air Italian restaurant in Wailea — earned its own Forbes Four-Star and AAA Four Diamond recognitions. A $50 million renovation in 2007 refreshed the rooms and public spaces, and a further two-year renovation from 2014 to 2016 completely redesigned all 383 guestrooms and suites, adding private lanais and ocean-view soaking tubs. Sushi restaurant KOMO, anchored by Tokyo-born chef Kiyo Ikeda who sources fish from Japan twice weekly, joined the resort's culinary program in subsequent years.

The resort entered a different kind of cultural history in late 2020, when the property closed entirely to accommodate the filming of the first season of HBO's White Lotus. The satirical drama, which became one of the most discussed television events of 2021, was shot entirely on property during a six-month COVID-controlled production bubble. The exposure introduced millions of viewers to the resort's architecture, pools, and beach in vivid detail. In 2024, Mick Fleetwood — a longtime Maui resident who lost his own restaurant in the 2023 Lahaina wildfires — delivered an impromptu performance of "Landslide" at the hotel's lobby bar, a moment that went widely shared and encapsulated the resort's place in the island's emotional landscape.

The setting

Four Seasons Resort Maui at Wailea occupies 15 oceanfront acres at 3900 Wailea Alanui Drive in the core of South Maui's luxury resort district. Wailea Beach, one of Hawaii's finest, is a ten-minute walk from the grounds, and Polo Beach is reachable in fourteen minutes on foot; the open-air luau venue Te Au Moana sits sixteen minutes to the south. Opened in February 1990 as the first Four Seasons resort in Hawaii and the brand's third worldwide, it was developed at an estimated $180 million on a prime Wailea coast parcel. Flanked by landmark resorts within half a kilometer, this address in Wailea's 1,500-acre master-planned enclave has long held the distinction of the area's most coveted oceanfront position.

Restaurants and bars

Experiences

Amenities

Awards

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