On brisk winter mornings at Fogo Island Inn, guests can take long walks on foot trails that meander along the rocky coast, and after a lunch at the glass-enclosed dining room overlooking the Atlantic, they can spend an afternoon by the window of an ocean-view guestroom (all rooms face the sea). Hand-crafted armchairs are perfect for reading, and a wood stove keeps the room toasty, though electric heat is also available. During spring, icebergs drift past the window, and summer means sunbathing on the tantalizing roof deck.

Fogo Island Inn, not yet 3 years old, is a wood and glass contemporary-designed property partially lifted off the rocky beach on stilts. From a distance, it looks like a huge, white bird about to soar into the sky. Even visitors who have seen photographs of the building are taken aback when it first comes into view. Compared to the small, wood structures guests pass as they drive to the property from the ferry landing 15 miles away — including wooden saltbox houses, waterside storage sheds, one-story shops and convenience stores — the modern Fogo Island Inn looms like a mirage on the landscape.

Placing a 43,000-square-foot, multimillion-dollar, design-driven hotel on the beach of the tiny, isolated fishing community of Joe Batt’s Arm, with a population of 700, seems like a controversial decision. But Fogo Islanders, skeptical at first, now enjoy the new revenue and employment opportunities the hotel brought to the island and are proud the project was conceived by an eighth-generation Fogo Island resident and designed by a Newfoundland-born architect.

All the wood furniture for the Inn is constructed at a small workshop nearby by Fogo Islanders who have experience building their own homes and fishing boats. The fabrics for the chair coverings, bedspreads, curtains and pillows are hand-stitched by the women of Fogo Island, a tradition that dates to the 1700s. Enroute rated the inn’s dining room as one of the top 10 restaurants in Canada, and Executive Chef Murray McDonald, a Newfoundland native, has been winning culinary awards using locally sourced root vegetables, fresh seafood and traditional ingredients like sea buckthorn, spruce tips, caribou moss and dried chanterelles.

Other amenities at the 29-room inn include a mini cinema with movie theater-style seats, a fully equipped fitness room and conference facilities. The top floor includes additional rooms and loft suites, sauna and steam rooms, an outdoor shower and a roof deck.

Fogo Island Inn

210 Main Road
Joe Batt’s Arm
Newfoundland and Labrador
NL A0G 2X0, Canada
tel 709 658 3444