More than two months after it officially opened, Beaches Resorts held a grand opening celebration for the new Treasure Beach Village at Beaches Turks and Caicos, a $150 million ground-up expansion that added 101 suites to the 29-year-old property.
With four existing villages at the resort, Adam Stewart, executive chairman of Sandals and Beaches Resorts, acknowledged that there “wasn't an actual need” for a fifth—but the company’s leadership saw an opportunity to create a new product. The village is the first example of “Beaches 2.0,” which Stewart described as an elevation of the brand—“moving it up in a direction that's above anything we've ever achieved in the past.”
Beaches 2.0
Treasure Beach Village’s design, Stewart continued, was inspired by the Turks & Caicos and reflects the colors of the adjacent ocean along with local elements like conch shells. (A conch installation in the lobby, he said, was created by a local artist.) In all, the project took 16 months that involved everything from infrastructure and construction to operational planning, design execution and team training.
“We spent a tremendous amount of time listening to guests, travel advisors and our own team members,” Stewart said of the village’s development. The brand’s history in the region and the age of the property itself provided access to what he calls “a really talented group of architects, designers and operational leaders” the team could lean on throughout the process.
“Operationally, flow and flexibility were huge priorities,” Stewart continued. “We spent a lot of time thinking about how guests move through a resort experience and how to make every part of the stay feel intuitive and easy.” Luxury, he added, is about “creating an environment that feels open, effortless and comfortable, even at full occupancy.”
To that end, the entire village was designed around that sense of “effortless” comfort, from larger suites to expanded dining concepts. “As a dad of three, I know firsthand that even deciding where to eat can become complicated when everyone wants something different,” Stewart said. The village’s Pinta Food Hall has four culinary stations—Mexican, Asian, Italian and an à la carte grill—as well as Beaches' debut live churro station. In the mornings, the restaurant becomes a breakfast buffet with hot entrees and continental options.
Beyond the new village, the resort is upgrading its existing accommodations to incorporate some of the 2.0 elements to the tune of $350,000 per key.
Challenges and Solutions
Over the course of the 16-month development, the team focused on implementing features and elements that would genuinely improve the guest experience. “It’s easy during a project like this to keep adding more, but we stayed very focused on creating spaces and experiences that felt purposeful,” he said.
Some of the best ideas came from watching families at the resort’s existing villages, he continued. “You see parents trying to entertain kids after dinner, grandparents wanting quieter spaces or teenagers wanting independence, and you realize luxury family travel has to work for everyone at the same time.”
This, he continued, shaped a lot of the decisions, from introducing the first-ever movie theater at Beaches to the lagoon-style pool with a swim-up snow-cone bar to bringing Butch’s Island Chop House (a staple at Sandals resorts) to the Beaches brand for the first time.
“Of course, building in the Caribbean always comes with logistical challenges, but we’re fortunate to have decades of experience operating and developing resorts across the region,” Stewart said. “Having a strong local team and trusted partners makes all the difference.”
Next Steps
The new village, Stewart said, sets “a strong foundation for where the brand is headed” and “will absolutely influence future projects” and “the future of Beaches.” Looking ahead, the company will expand into The Bahamas with Beaches Exuma next year and will bring the Beaches brand to Barbados with 600 new rooms on the Gold Coast in 2028. Beaches Runaway Bay is set to open on Jamaica’s North Coast in 2029 and a Beaches is slated for Saint Vincent and the Grenadines to complement the existing Sandals hotel there the following year.
“It's five new resorts in five years—more than a $1 billion investment into the Beaches brand,” Stewart said. The new additions are set to double the brand's footprint over the next several years.
The properties will not have a “copy-and-paste approach” he added, but will “feel authentic to its destination,” with design and layout varying from island to island. Some properties may have village-style concepts like Treasure Beach, while others may be organized differently—“depending on the land, the destination and the experience we want to create there.”