Ulaman Eco Luxury Resort - A Bamboo Sanctuary In The Tabanan Jungle

There's a version of "eco resort" that means a few solar panels and a sign about towel reuse. Ulaman is not that. This is a place where the walls are literally compressed earth, the staircases are woven bamboo, and there's a hand-carved wine cave hidden behind a stone wall that took years to chisel out.

It sits deep in Tabanan, about 20 minutes from Canggu, and somehow manages to feel both like a five-star retreat and like someone's genuinely obsessive passion project - because that's exactly what it is.

Location

Ulaman sits among rice fields and coconut groves in Tabanan, roughly 20 minutes from Canggu. It's close enough to reach easily but far enough that you get the quieter, more rural side of Bali - rivers, jungle, and terraced rice paddies rather than beach clubs and traffic.

One Man's Jungle Obsession

The story starts with a Canadian named Dino Magnatta, who'd been visiting Bali for two decades and wanted to build a retirement home there - something jungle-adjacent, bamboo-heavy, and nothing like the cold winters back home.

In 2018, a friend introduced him to a patch of waterfall jungle land near Kaba Kaba. An earlier deal for the land had fallen through with someone else, but the land stuck in Dino's memory, and he eventually tracked down the owner and leased it.

From there, things escalated. He linked up with local architects who hadn't worked in bamboo before but were on board with the vision anyway, and the designs they came back with were bigger and bolder than anything meant for a single retirement villa. Rather than scale the plans down, Dino changed his own plans instead and decided to build a resort.

During construction, he got hands-on with rammed earth technique, working with a fellow Canadian to figure out the process, testing different material recipes, and training local workers on the method himself. He also brought in Balinese stone carvers to turn a cliffside wall into a sprawling relief depicting Buddha's journey, drunken monkeys, and other scenes now scattered throughout the property.

The build took just over a year. Then came the hard part: opening a hotel right as COVID shut down international travel. Dino and his staff chose to stick it out, pivoted to the domestic market, and ended up going viral locally, hitting 50% occupancy overall and full capacity during peak periods. He used the pandemic downtime to build a second phase across the river, which opened in October 2022.

The Architecture

The signature move here is bamboo - curved, arched, sculptural bamboo that looks like it grew that way rather than being built. It shows up in the ceilings, staircases, and roof lines throughout the property, all shaped around the existing jungle and river.

Alongside it is rammed earth, used for the main walls of the villas and the lobby. It's an old technique - compacted layers of local mud, sand, gravel, and lime, sometimes with pigment added - and it's dramatically lower-carbon than concrete while also managing heat well in Bali's climate.

Reclaimed ironwood (locally called "ulin") shows up on decks and in bathrooms, teak is used for furniture and bathtubs, and recycled glass turns up in spa floors and decorative pieces. Even Styrofoam gets a legitimate use here, reinforced with fiberglass to build the spa's domed structure, since it insulates well and cuts down on steel and heavy formwork.

The Restaurant

Food happens at E.A.R.T.H. Restaurant and Lounge, led by Chef Alvin, a Balinese chef who's been cooking since childhood and specializes in Balinese and Nusantara cuisine alongside Italian, Thai, and other international dishes. The menu is a joint effort between Alvin and Dino, who brings his own food and wine background into the mix.

The kitchen runs on a farm-to-table setup, sourcing fruit and vegetables from local farms, markets, and the property's own garden, delivered in bamboo baskets instead of plastic. The restaurant sticks to local chicken and freshly caught fish, with a solid range of vegetarian and vegan dishes worked in throughout the menu.

Romantic Dinners

If you want dinner with a bit of theater, Ulaman has a couple of standout settings. The Floating Koi Deck sits above the property's natural spring-fed lake, lit up at night with the glowing lake villas visible in the background and koi fish swimming below the deck. It's built for a four-course chef's selection menu with a welcome drink and a bottle of house wine included.

Then there's the Twin Waterfalls setup, arguably the more dramatic of the two - dinner served right in front of the resort's actual waterfalls, decorated with local flowers and palm leaf arches. Both are run by Chef Alvin's team and built around a surprise seasonal menu using local ingredients.

The Villas

Accommodation at Ulaman comes in several distinct styles, each built with the same material language of bamboo, rammed earth, and reclaimed wood, but with different layouts and settings. Floating Lake Villas sit above the resort's natural spring-fed lake with private floating decks and hammocks. Avatar Tree House Villas are elevated 9 meters (about 30 feet) up and reached via a bamboo tunnel, with sky balconies looking out over rice fields.

Jungle Garden Pool villas are tucked deep into the jungle near a waterfall, each with a private saltwater pool. There's also a single large Grand Lagoon Private Pool villa with panoramic views across the whole property, and Ulin Poolside villas set closest to the main saltwater pool.

Cocoon Jungle Villa

Worth calling out on its own is the Cocoon Jungle Villa, elevated among the treetops and built almost entirely from woven bamboo, right down to a black bamboo bathroom.

It has the largest private balcony of any room type here, ideal for breakfast overlooking the jungle, garden, and pool, plus the most refined en-suite bathroom on the property. Inside, you'll find a king-sized bed, automatic curtains, and interiors built from a mix of natural materials.

The Spa

Riverside Spa runs along the Ulaman River, with treatments including traditional Balinese massage, hot stone therapy, bamboo massage, and four-hand massage, plus facials and body scrubs using natural ingredients. The space has a few distinct design touches: a floating glass-lit floor, leaf-shaped hammocks strung over the river, and backlit bathtubs for flower baths.

Facilities include individual and couples massage rooms, a mani-pedi lounge, hot and cold plunge pools, an infrared sauna, a steam room, and private showers.

There's also a separate Waterfall Spa treatment room with a hand-carved stone bathtub and sink positioned to overlook the waterfall directly, finished in teak flooring with bamboo architectural details.

Cliffside Yoga Shala

Perched above the jungle valley, the Cliffside Yoga Shala is an open-air bamboo structure built for yoga and meditation sessions, holding up to 30 people in a yoga or meditation setup and up to 40 in a seated arrangement. It's fully open-air, with natural ventilation and views straight out over the jungle below.

Pools, Waterfalls, And A Hidden Lake

Ulaman's main saltwater pool runs alongside the property's central communal areas, feeding into a broader setup that includes the Bamboo Waterfalls Deck and access to the in-house waterfall.

Separately, the resort has Bali's only natural spring, bio-filtered lake, home to koi fish and bordered by the Floating Lake Villas. It's this lake that the Floating Koi Deck dining experience overlooks, and it doubles as a quiet, ecologically self-contained feature that sets Ulaman apart from most pool-and-jungle resorts in Bali.