Bali’s ultimate dinner ’n’ show

Last year I wrote a review on Luna Beach Club, the centrepiece of the then new Nuanu “creative city”, a 44ha sustainable development project in Bali with giant statues covered with 3D projection mapping that borrow design cues from the Burning Man festival in the US. It was a good night out but fundamentally no different to other high-end beach clubs in Bali. However, management promised there was much more to come in terms of art and stimuli and that I should return for a follow-up review when the ambitious project was complete. So I took them up on the offer.

After passing security, an electric open-air vehicle, basically a long golf buggy, ferries guests through the grounds of Nuanu, past a 21m-wide digital art dome and a pair of giant totemic gateway statues, to the reception at Luna Beach Club and Restaurant 369, the largest of five food and beverage venues. Set inside a vortex-shaped bamboo building that leads to a series of oasis-shaped pools with footbridges and poolside dining, Luna represents the pinnacle in bamboo construction and tropical beach-chic design.

Between our entrees and mains, a waiter directs us to an under-the-sky clifftop dance floor only moments before a live music performance reaches a crescendo. Perched atop a lofty DJ stage garnished with a giant steel frame statue shaped like the Buddha, percussionists in tribal costumes smash drums as a troupe of fire dancers burst through stage doors, followed by a troupe of traditional Balinese dancers, lights and lasers lighting up the night sky. My partner looks at me and smiles. “What the f...? I thought we were just coming for dinner,” she says.

But the best is yet to come.

Towards the end of the night, we are taken to the top of the THK Tower. There are 108 steps and five levels, and every level has a vertigo-inducing glass centre. The top floor has 360-degree views of the west coast of Bali and an aerial view of the Nuanu city masterplan. Bamboo buildings fan out with Fibonacci geometry alongside lagoons of interconnected swimming pools with a “river slide” leading into an underground cave-style nightclub. The complex interplay of architectural domes and green spaces dotted with colour-lit sculptures is like nothing else in Bali — and perhaps nothing else in the world.

A night at Luna Beach Club is not just about dinner. It’s dinner and a show.

Dave Smith was a guest of Luna Beach Club. They have not influenced this story or read it before publication.