Paradise on a mountain

A two hour drive from Mexico City lays Valle de Bravo, a small colonial town that has long been a cosmopolitan weekend playground for the wealthy elite seeking to escape the noise and bustle of the nation’s economic and industrial hub.
Set in an area of great natural beauty, ideal for adventurous outdoor pursuits, such as hiking, mountain biking, horse riding and hang gliding, it is one of Mexico State’s most visited tourist destinations. 
After traveling about 10 miles from the town, you will find a very different place.

Located on a mountain, rising majestically besides Valle de Bravo’s lake, is El Santuario, a resort designed for people who want a break from everyday life but who are also seeking an uplifting experience.
Built as a spiritual oasis and blessed by the Dalai Lama, El Santuario caters to the body, mind, and spirit. It has none of the austerity of a traditional retreat, seeking instead to combine spirituality and luxury, harmony and exclusivity, and featuring a variety of amenities that ensure maximum comfort for its guests.

Facilities include 64 hotel suites, the largest and most luxurious spa in Latin America, a golf club, a marina and yacht club, an equestrian club, and a convention center.

It is an undeniably beautiful and peaceful place, a natural paradise set between the lake and the sky on a mountain veined with quartz, and clothed in a rich variety of species of trees, flowers and plants, where the only sound to disturb the tranquility comes from a 50-meter high cascading waterfall. Even the weather is perfect, registering eight degrees Celsius higher than the rest of Valle de Bravo.

“El Santuario is a place that alters your life. You cannot pass through it without changing in some way to a lesser or greater degree,” says entrepreneur Michel Domit, the man who built the resort 17 years ago.
For him, the creation of El Santuario has been – quite literally – the realization of a dream. He claims the inspiration for it came to him from his late father, the founder of the family shoe business, which Michel took over at the age of 20, reluctantly putting aside his ambitions to become a filmmaker.

“For me, it was the project of a lifetime. It was a very hard time in my life where I had to choose between reason and heart. My heart told me ‘Yes you have to do this.’” Michel Domit, founder of El Santuario

“My father, who died when I was 12, appeared as I was meditating at night and told me very clearly, ‘You have to buy this mountain, and you have to make it a global example of coexistence between man and environment.’”
He says his father dictated all the features of the project, insisting that 85% of the site, which extends over two million square meters, should be kept as an ecological reserve, and only 15% should be built on.
Although it seemed crazy in economic terms, he accepted his father’s commission. “And from there, a lot of small miracles began to happen.”

There were numerous difficulties to overcome. Mr. Domit was broke after his $5 million Nike plant fell victim to cut-rate Chinese prices, and didn’t have the money to buy the mountain. The Governor of the State of Mexico had put a ban on building permits until a development plan had been designed for the Valle de Bravo area. And even just as Mr. Domit was starting to get the project off the ground, Mexico was plunged into an economic crisis when the peso was devalued in December 1994, threatening him with bankruptcy.

Finding the necessary funding was one of the biggest challenges, but it is a tribute not only to the strength of his belief in what he saw as his “spiritual mission”, but also to his ability to overcome skepticism and convince others that it was viable, that the dream became a reality.
“For me, it was the project of a lifetime,” he says. “It was a very hard time in my life where I had to choose between reason and heart. My heart told me ‘Yes, you have to do this.’
“At first when I told my story, people would say this is totally crazy! Even now, many of my acquaintances think I’m crazy, but they also think my madness is extraordinary because it gives a good economic performance.”

Since the foundation of El Santuario, the value of the land has increased 100 times, while the hotel receives around 5,000 guests a year.
For El Santuario’s founder, however, “Money is only a means of changing the world.” What interests him is the transformative effect he hopes the project will have.
“The most important thing is that El Santuario is a global example of coexistence between humans and their environment,” he says.
Within 10 years he hopes to create 20 sanctuaries around the world.

“This year 2012 – as announced by the Mayans – is a year of change where people understand that we have to change belief systems,” he says. “We have to respond to the challenge of saving the planet, to preserve it for our children, and our grandchildren, and great grandchildren.
“It is up to us to transmit to the world that it is time to change your way of thinking. It is time to start caring for the planet because when we begin to care for all, our little piece will survive. But not otherwise.”