Bentota Lounge Chair (Cane)

The Bentota Lounge Chair was designed for the Bentota Beach Hotel, a resort developed by the Sri Lankan government in the late 1960s. The Bentota Beach Hotel (now Cinnamon Bentota Beach) is a landmark of Bawa’s early modernist style. Situated on a sandbank between the Indian Ocean and the Bentota River, the hotel’s seamless integration with its surroundings and climate set a new standard for hotel design across South and Southeast Asia in the 1960s and ’70s.

The Bentota Lounge Chair draws inspiration from the verandah armchair (hansi putuwa in Sinhalese), a colonial-era classic known for its high back, wide armrests, and woven cane seating. Variations of this chair can be found across India, Southeast Asia, the Caribbean, South America, and Africa. The same chair has similarly inspired several reinterpretations in the postcolonial world. Cuban-born designer Clara Porset’s Butaque chair, created in Mexico in the 1940s and ’50s, for instance, was also inspired by the same type of chair. Porset’s adaptation was commissioned by architects such as Luis Barragán—whose work Bawa admired—and Mario Pani.

Bawa’s reinterpretation removes the armrests of the original verandah chair, maintaining its relaxed, cooling effect while fostering more open interaction between those seated alongside. A distinctive feature of his design is the turned braces between the legs, giving the chair its unique character.

Phantom Hands’ re-edition of the Bentota Lounge Chair is based on the version found at the Bentota Beach Hotel. Bawa’s original is refined by adjusting the thickness of the wooden frame to enhance ergonomics, while retaining the exact side profile of the original. The re-edition maintains distinct design elements for each variation of this classic chair—the turned crossbars differ slightly between the cane and upholstered versions, as seen in Bawa’s originals.