Location: Kapalua, Maui
May 1, 2006
The rain in kapalua looks almost like delicate grains of rice falling with
improbable slowness. When the sun showers fade into mist and a perfectly formed
rainbow appears, with one vivid end cutting into the lush West Maui Mountains
and the other arching down to a broad, curvaceous beach, it is hard to imagine a
more eye-pleasing setting on earth. For decades, people of means have come to
Kapalua, to a land of sturdy Norfolk pines, golden sands and sloping emerald
green hills.
Soon, more of them will be coming. The first wave of development
made homeowners of several cast members from The Carol Burnett Show—Vicki
Lawrence and Tim Conway as well as Burnett—but that initial influx is now only a
memory. “They all sold,” says Jo Dorner, who has been selling homes in Kapalua
since 1981, adding that it was not luxurious enough for the Hollywood jet set.
But Kapalua is now primed for a renaissance, one that will be
witnessed by such local homeowners as Joe Torre, Carlos Santana and professional
golfer Jim Furyk. The transformation will revitalize the area to such a large
extent that Kapalua will be almost unrecognizable. Kapalua now has 803
residential units; plans for this ambitious redevelopment call for 850
more.
First to come on the market were the 25 single-family homesites at
Honolua Ridge, with three- to 25-acre lots starting at $1.7 million. Another 25
lots form Phase II of Honolua Ridge. In September 2005, the Kapalua Land Co.
broke ground on Phase I of what will be a 40,000-square-foot mixed-use
development called Honolua Village, which will offer shops, entertainment and
residences. All this change requires a visionary, and the Kapalua Resort now
has one; the property is owned by the estimable Maui Land & Pineapple Co.
(ML&P), whose largest hareholder is Steve Case.
Case, a native Hawaiian
with substantial holdings in Kauai, became, after acquiring more than a 40
percent interest in ML&P, the second-largest landowner in Hawaii. But the
AOL mastermind is no robber baron. In the last two years, in an ambitious effort
to bring together hospitality, development and wellness, Case has bought
controlling interests in both Exclusive Resorts, the luxury vacation club, and
Miraval, the renowned Arizona spa.
The redevelopment of Kapalua Resort
has Case’s mark all over it, and will put into practice the Hawaiian values of
ho’okipa (hospitality), lokahi (harmony), kuleana (responsibility) and malama
’aina (stewardship of the land). Stewardship is a word constantly on the minds
of Kapalua’s developers: The resort plans to use more organic maintenance and
less fertilizers and pesticides; its golf courses already qualify as certified
Audubon Cooperative Sanctuaries. Former AOL executive David Cole, who now serves
as ML&P’s president and CEO, notes that Kapalua Resort’s 23,000 acres
include the state’s largest private nature preserve, at 8,600 acres.
In this case, harmony means no one gets left behind, as Kapalua Resort lays
plans for Pulelehua, a mixed-use community slated to include moderately priced
housing for the working families of West Maui. Harmony also comes in the form of
a 30,000-square-foot ocean-theme day spa, with 25 treatment rooms on Kapalua Bay
and a mountaintop immersion spa within the 690-home expansion of the resort to
be called Kapalua Mauka.
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