transformative, transcendent Sterrekopje
I've been lucky enough to sleep at some of the world's most celebrated hotels and resorts. I've had Michelin meals in glitzy Tokyo high-rises and swum with horses in Sumba Island’s azure-hued waves. I've gorged myself on champagne, truffles and caviar, but Sterrekopje, a 'healing farm' cradled in the Franschhoek mountains just north of Cape Town, has something you cannot buy: soul.
"We wanted to transport our guests," said Nicole Boekhoorn, who opened Sterrekopje with her wife Fleur Huijskens in the spring of 2022. "It's neither a hotel nor a retreat but a house filled with love and warmth, where guests can truly feel at home and heal themselves from within." The farm is a culmination of Boekhoorn's lifelong search for true grounding. This search brought her from rural corners of Southern France to the Balearics and her native Holland before a wedding invitation led her to this 17th-century Cape Dutch estate in the shadow of sombrero-shaped Sterrekoppie mountain.
Before the couple took over in 2019, the estate had changed hands only once; the family who built the estate in 1694 passed the property down for five generations before eventually selling. Overgrown vineyards and wild jumbles of olive trees had colonized more than 50 hectares of undulating farmland. To bring back the farm to its former glory, Boekhoorn enlisted the help of of South African garden guru Leon Kluge. The brief? A return to Mother Nature.
On my first morning, the sun still low on the horizon, Kluge took me on a tour around the gardens. We brushed past fields of tall, fuzzy grasses ablaze in the golden light and walked through cloud-like clusters of wildflowers and fynbos buzzing with insects. We passed a chicken coop strung with chandeliers and a pigsty inhabited by two affectionate hogs, Croissant and Frangipani, kept not for their meat but for their manure. At the back of the lot, vegetable gardens unfurled like a raw-edged patchwork of cabbage and coiled vines heavy with cherry tomatoes and green peas. There were wood-clad garden beds fragrant with thyme, garlic and oregano and wild roses whose tiny red fruits would soon be harvested to make syrup.
Kluge explained that every plant — most of them grown from seed in the farm's on-site nursery — has a role in this play. Some grow bounty for the kitchen, others, like the wild mint, are here to attract bees or chase pests away. "It’s like a stage production," he said, while pushing aside the drape-like vines of a weeping mulberry tree. "Every season reveals a different scene; months ago, the gardens would look white, then Barbie pink. Now, it's brown with jolts of blue."
The farm's interiors were just as considered. Spread across the barn and a few detached cottages, Sterrekopje's 11 suites take their design cues from Boekhoorn's travels across the globe. Kaleidoscopic Berber rugs. Embroidered drapery from India. "I wanted it to feel like a journey around the places that have inspired me," she said. There are antique flea-market chairs upholstered in luminescent jacquard and four-poster beds with billowing drapes made in Lamu. Bathrooms received special attention. Some have roll-top copper bathtubs with views over the gardens; others feature outdoor showers or fireplaces and wooden bathing barrels.
The Bath House, however, is really the heart of Sterrekopje. Guests dip in and out for scalp massages and herbal oil scrubs, cleansing rituals in the marble-clad hammam and reiki workshops. In lieu of a spa menu, guests sign up for two- to seven-night 'healing journeys' that include a multitude of daily treatments, rituals and workshops. "Lengthy spa menus used to be synonymous with luxury," Boekhoorn explained. "But we wanted the exact opposite, to take away the choice overload that causes so much stress." Healing turns inward as the week progresses: guests begin with cleaning rituals and body scrubs and end with conscious breathwork and hypnotherapy sessions.
But it wasn’t just the AD-worthy interiors, the lush gardens and the blissful spa that made my stay here so fulfilling. It was the refreshing take on hospitality, unscripted and devoid of formalities, that made Sterrekopje stand out in an increasingly formulaic hotel scene. It was the breakfasts of just-foraged fruits and homegrown honey shared with strangers in the shade of olive trees. It was the smell of fresh bread and basil wafting from the open kitchen. It was an art atelier at the ready when creativity struck. "I've collected boxes full of hand-written letters from previous guests," Boekhoorn told me as my stay came to an end. "Many people leave here immensely moved."
Chris Schalkx
With words and images in Travel + Leisure, Condé Nast Traveler, Architectural Digest and Bloomberg Pursuits, our friend Chris is undeniably in the know. From luxe camping in Antarctica to two unforgettable weeks in Bhutan with a toddler in tow, he’s done it all. When he’s planning trips, Chris starts with a killer hotel and lets things unfold from there. It’s about the journey rather than the plan for him. With his nearly indestructible Rimowa carry-on and camera in tow, this culture fiend is perfectly suited for discovering the undiscovered.
