Six Senses Kyoto Channels a Playful, Poetic Sense of Place

Located downtown, among the winding alleyways of the well-preserved Higashiyama district, the 81-key Six Senses Kyoto marks the luxury wellness brand’s first foray into Japan (BLINK is also handling the design of the forthcoming Six Senses property in France’s Loire Valley), and Nagata was keen for it to reflect and honor a local perspective.

“We knew we needed to dig deep to distill the essence of what it should be. There was a lot of research and understanding of the past to weave the story together,” he says. “I’m a fourth-generation Japanese-American, and through this process, I’ve learned about my own culture.”