Swag bag
The Swag, CDMX real estate, Via Aurelia, Kona Village, Eleven Madison Park, Wildcrust, Kudu, best fine dining in France, MORE
GETAWAYS • North Carolina
Appalachian heart
The Skinny: A serene all-inclusive hideaway in the Smoky Mountains spread across 250 acres with great hiking, rustic charm, and outstanding food and drink? You won’t be the first to fall in love with The Swag: Annie and David Colquitt first visited it on their honeymoon — seven years later, they purchased the resort. They joined Relais & Châteaux and upgraded the rustic nature retreat with refreshed interiors and world-class hospitality, without diluting its heritage and intimacy.
The Scene: Driving up the winding five-mile Hemp Hill Road to The Swag feels like sneaking off into the woods for a reckless tryst. Alas, I was traveling solo, with nobody to play board games with, but it’s easy to make new friends at nightly hors d’oeuvres before the dinner bell rings promptly at 630p, when guests are congratulated on anniversaries and wished happy birthdays beneath animal pelts and antler chandeliers.
The Rooms: 18 suites and standalone cottages are well-stocked with snacks and locally made bath amenities. Log cabins are ostensibly old-school with wood-burning stone fireplaces and thick timber beams, but heated stone bathroom floors, soaking tubs, steam showers, and private saunas add modern comforts. Most rooms have private balconies or patios and original local art.
The Amenities: Soaking up time in nature’s brilliant beauty is The Swag’s raison d’être and hiking trails for all abilities begin just outside the main house, which hugs the national park boundary with the Cataloochee Divide Trail. On a rainy day, reading or working on a stave puzzle while enjoying molasses cookies in the main lodge is a perfectly peaceful way to pass the time. A small spa offers massages and facials, with an infrared sauna that guests are welcome to use anytime.
A robust experts in residence program hosts local artists, authors, foragers, retired park rangers, and naturalists to share their knowledge and passion for the Great Smoky Mountains with guests through complimentary programming including hikes, presentations, classes, and workshops. History professor and author Dan Pierce was visiting during my stay, and I thoroughly enjoyed his presentation on North Carolina’s history as the moonshine capital of the world.
A four-course dinner is included nightly (feel free to order multiple desserts if you’re feeling indecisive). Cast-iron seared lion’s mane mushroom steak from Black Trumpet Farm resembled a juicy striploin thanks to a beet juice, red apple skin, red wine, tamari and shio koji marinade, and was the most impressive dish of my stay. Locally roasted Orchard Coffee is a morning highlight.
FOUND Pro: Guests also have access to new sister property Cataloochee Ranch just down the road, with additional activities including UTV tours, horseback rides, a ropes adventure course and golf simulator.
Why It’s FOUND: The Swag and Catalochee Ranch are the nicest places to stay within 100 miles, with a humble Appalachian heart that feels like you’re being welcomed into the family. There’s good reason most guests book their next stay before departing. –Amber Gibson
→ The Swag (Waynesville, NC) • 2300 Swag Rd • Rates from $900/night.
REAL ESTATE • First Mover
Three for-sale properties in Mexico City with outdoor spaces listed from $1M to $2M.
→ Condesa 0 (Condesa, CDMX) • 3BR/5BA, 2680 SF • Ask: $1.401M • restored Neoclassic in Condesa neighborhood w/ chefs kitchen, roofdeck, and private parking • Agent: Wilfried Persevalle.
→ Calle Huichapan 6 (Condesa, CDMX) • 6BR/5BA, 2691 SF • Ask: $1.455M • 1930s Art Deco Colonial ornamentation and classic wrought-iron balconies, rooftop garden surrounded by trees • Agent: Kristel Fischer, James Edition.
→ Alfredo Musset 222 (Polanco, CDMX, above) • 3BR/3.1BA, SF sqft • Ask: $1.713M • 2-story penthouse w/ stylish corner balcony nearby city’s high-end boutiques and hotels • Agent: Laura de la Torre de Skipsey, Sotheby’s Real Estate.
RESTAURANTS • San Francisco
Gold standard
At the base of Visa’s new headquarters in a space overlooking McCovey Cove and Oracle Park, the team behind Che Fico has opened one of the most anticipated San Francisco restaurants of the fall season, the Tuscan-inspired Via Aurelia.
Chef David Nayfeld has already proven his prowess with Italian cuisine at Che Fico. Via Aurelia finds him flexing those muscles, with cleverly conceived and beautifully plated dishes like a dry-aged bluefin tuna belly tartare with cucumber, trout roe, and sea lettuce oil. A 30-ounce American Wagyu slab is Nayfeld’s version of bistecca alla Fiorentina, beautifully salted on its crust, served with a Sangiovese jus.
The restaurant anchor for the new Mission Rock development has landed with ease, bringing with it a Tuscan focus that’s been missing in SF’s already strong pantheon of regional Italian cuisine. –Jay Barmann
HOTELS • Hawaii
Volcanic vista
The open-air Kona International Airport is breezy and calm, a gentle preview of what’s to come at Kona Village, Rosewood’s respectful revival of a Big Island legend. Once a fishing village at the edge of a black lava field, it became an off-the-grid resort frequented by the likes of Steve Jobs and Jim Morrison (who, legend has it, downed 21 Mai Tais in a single sitting) before being wiped out by a tsunami in 2011.
The property’s new incarnation honors its past with intention. Some returning guests book the same room they stayed in 40 years ago — and still place a coconut outside their door instead of a ‘Do Not Disturb’ sign, just like they used to. The Shipwreck Bar, a sailboat-turned-cocktail lounge, still anchors the beach, while the Talk Story Bar remains a nightly ritual for sunset drinks.
Spread over 81 acres, the 150 free-standing hale (traditional Hawaiian villas) feature thatched roofs, outdoor showers, and views of the ocean, lagoons, or lush gardens. The interiors blend the outdoors in, layering wood, linen, lava rock, and Hawaiian artwork in a barefoot, considered style. Despite the luxury, the mood is unmistakably laid-back. –Victoire Loup
AROUND FOUND • Other Notable Intel & Recs
→ PARIS: On the corner of Rue de Fleurus and Rue Guynemer, right across from the Jardin du Luxembourg, sits one of this city’s most charming (and tiny) clothing stores, Prairie de Paris (above). The clothes themselves are timeless: French, classic, chic. Everything looks as good on a 20-year-old as it does on a 90-year-old, and it’s all made in France, in small batches.
→ NEW YORK: The legendary honey-lavender duck has made its triumphant return to the menu at Eleven Madison Park. It arrives with a palpable sense of renewed energy in the dining room. The revival began on October 14 when (after four-plus years as a vegan restaurant) EMP debuted a fall menu with an option for guests to select their proteins for certain courses, including the iconic dry-aged bird.
→ LOS ANGELES: In recent years, LA has become a hotspot for sourdough pizza and pop-ups channeling pandemic-era popularity into permanent setups. For a long time, the city has been home to an outsized number of excellent strip mall restaurants. Highland Park’s new Wildcrust, founded and run by a family of Angelenos, checks all three of those boxes, making it a near-guaranteed hit.
→ LONDON: You can tell a lot about a restaurant’s ambition by its bread-and-butter offering, and the one at recently relocated, South African-inspired restaurant Kudu may force other joints to up their game. Airy, pillow-soft, and presented in a cast-iron pot alongside a pool of citrus, herbed, brown shrimp butter, it set the expectations appropriately high. But the star of the show is the meat coming off the braai. We went for the pork chop with monkey gland sauce (a rich, tangy, and, crucially, primate-free South African concoction), which delivered everything you could hope for from grilled meat: the blackened, smoky hit of charcoal, crisp, beautifully rendered fat, and tender meat that had been properly rested.
ROUTINE • Goods & Services
Select answers to the FOUND ROUTINE query, What store or service do you always recommend?
→ JULIAN GELDMACHER, co-owner, Ceres (NY): Anything and everything Antonio Ciongoli designs. He’s the founder of clothing line 18 East. Check them out around the corner from Ceres on Elizabeth Street in Nolita.
→ RAFI AJL, owner, The Long Confidence (SF): Understory in Temescal Alley is a deep cut for the most interesting clothing in the East Bay.
→ DAMIEN ANGLADA, Balvenie brand ambassador, William Grant & Sons (Paris): For whisky lovers:
La Maison du Whisky on Rue d’Anjou. It’s a true institution in Paris, offering bottles as rare as they are exceptional. The service is impeccable, and the welcome is always warm.
Julhès, a gourmet grocery and cellar, where most of the whiskies are available for tasting before purchasing.
Lastly, The Whisky Shop at Place de la Madeleine for a finely curated selection of exceptional bottles.
GETAWAYS LINKS: Jamaica’s resorts face long recovery from Hurricane Melissa • Barcelona Pool House, Soho House’s third outpost in the city, opened this week • Forthcoming Six Senses London sets early ‘26 opening • Chasing the elusive southern lights in Tasmania • The illusion of knowledge in luxury hospitality.
GETAWAYS •The Nines
Fine dining destinations, France
The Nines are FOUND’s distilled lists of the best. Additions or subtractions? Hit reply or email found@itsfound.com.
Maison Troisgros (Ouches), family legacy in Lyon countryside, w/ dining room framed by gardens; breakfast alone worth the trip
La Ferme du Vent (Saint-Méloir-des-Ondes), Olivier Roellinger’s windswept retreat near Cancale, w/ 6 kleds (cabins), Celtic baths, and views toward Mont-Saint-Michel, intel
Auberge de la Roche (Valdeblore), 2 chefs, 4 gardens, wild Mercantour setting yields inspired tasting menus and suites that feel like luxurious mountain refuge, intel
Auberge Sauvage (Servon), family-run former presbytery turned 3-room sanctuary in Normandy, daily menus born from foraging and fishing
D’Une Île (Perche), Septime’s Bertrand Grébaut and Théo Pourriat’s rustic hideout, no cell reception, minimalist rooms, locavore dishes, stunning hikes
Baumanière (Les Baux-de-Provence), Provençal icon at foot of Les Alpilles, w/ terraced gardens, timeless rooms, fine dining institution dating back to 1945
Le Doyenné (Saint-Vrain, above), regenerative farm 36 km from Paris where chefs James Henry and Shaun Kelly let garden dictate the menu; 10 serene rooms to prolong the dream
La Grenouillère (Montreuil-sur-Mer), Alexandre Gauthier’s singular retreat, dine in glass-and-steel cocoon, sleep in futuristic huts scattered through garden
Bras (Laguiole), modernist aerie overlooking Aubrac plateau for vast horizons and plates where wild herbs and flowers lead the dance
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