Rosewood now plans to open Blue Palace in 2027, bringing its first Greek property to the Gulf of Elounda. The programme is unusually specific for a house still on the drawing board: 154 rooms and suites, private pools attached to 85 of them and six restaurant and bar interiors assigned separately within K-Studio’s resort-wide design. Those numbers describe intent. They cannot yet describe a stay.

The setting

The property occupies the coast between Plaka and Elounda, with Spinalonga visible across the water. That relationship already exists in Blue Palace and will survive the change of operator. It gives the redevelopment a fixed orientation: rooms and terraces can be redrawn, while the small island in the gulf remains the point from which the site takes its bearings.

Phāea retains ownership. Rosewood brings a new operating identity to a known Cretan resort, with the redevelopment using the ground and buildings of Blue Palace. Expectations should begin with that continuity as an established property enters another chapter under Rosewood in Elounda.

Earlier schedules have fallen away; 2027 now governs while construction and preparation continue. A future opening gives the designers room to change details, so the numbers below describe the current programme for an unfinished house.

The design

A high arched portal, pale stone, cypresses and a formal circular court make the proposed arrival ceremonial and axial. K-Studio is responsible for the resort architecture and interiors. The published images are renderings, so they establish the intended forms and planting without proving how the spaces will feel in use.

Afroditi Krassa has a narrower and clearly stated brief: the interiors housing six restaurants and bars. Separating that brief from K-Studio’s wider role matters, because the two practices have different responsibilities on the project. The dining rooms may therefore carry a distinct visual argument within the resort, although menus and service remain beyond what the present plans can substantiate.

The challenge is continuity. Blue Palace already has an identity tied to its stepped site and views across the gulf. Rosewood and K-Studio are retaining the address while changing the sequence through it. The result will have to make the old relationship with the water legible after a much more formal entrance has been introduced above.

The rooms

Private water is intended for 85 of the planned 154 keys. The figure covers a majority of the accommodation, placing individual pools inside the basic room strategy and across far more than a small top category.

Three further outdoor pools are proposed across the shared ground. On a stepped coastal property, that distribution may reduce the daily pull towards one central terrace. It also adds substantial water infrastructure to a site on Crete. The finished treatment of shade, planting and resource use will matter alongside the clean blue geometry shown in the studies.

The table

Six planned restaurants and bars allow for different hours and settings across a house of this size. At this stage, the spatial brief is the firmer story; proposed concepts remain unnamed. Krassa’s rooms can be assessed when they are built and the kitchens have names, leaving the count as the present extent of the programme.

The wellness

Asaya is the named wellness programme, with hydrotherapy areas, a movement studio, fitness centre and yoga pavilion planned alongside it. The language should remain equally provisional because the facilities are intended for 2027, and Asaya’s treatments and outcomes can be assessed only after opening.

The present facts leave a productive uncertainty. Rosewood Blue Palace has a date, a room count, a clear division of design responsibility and an existing coast to answer to. Its 85 private pools are the sharpest measure of the planned room strategy; whether the finished resort feels like a careful continuation of Blue Palace will depend on everything built around them.