Huntington Hartford II, the A&P grocery heir, built his private paradise on this northeastern tip of Paradise Island in the 1960s, transplanting a twelfth-century Augustinian cloister stone by stone from France — purchased originally by William Randolph Hearst — as the centerpiece of terraced gardens that cascaded down to the sea. That layered history gives The Ocean Club, A Four Seasons Resort its most distinctive quality: a sense of accumulated time that no amount of resort design can manufacture from scratch. The gardens, attributed to landscape designer Dick Cole working from Hartford's original vision, climb through fourteen terraces planted with bougainvillea, frangipani, and palms toward a classical colonnade visible in the images, the whole composition carrying the feeling of a private European estate that has slowly gone tropical. The resort's 107 rooms and suites are spread across low-rise colonial structures with white-painted balustrades, covered verandas, and hipped rooflines that defer to the garden rather than competing with it. Interiors follow a register of warm walnut ceiling panels set into coffered frames, herringbone stone flooring in a cool grey, and large walnut headwall panels anchoring each guestroom — a palette grounded by striped blue or charcoal wool rugs and pendant glass bedside lights. The central courtyard, its diamond-patterned stone terrace punctuated by date palms and a formal reflecting pool with coral stone coping, connects the colonial wings in a composition that balances resort amplitude with something closer to private house calm.

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