Mexico’s Most Luxurious New Resort Is Modeled After the Mayan Underworld

“In the Mayan religion, the universe consists of the earth, the heavenly celestial realm, and the underworld. The architecture of the St. Regis next door is all white and airy, representing the heavens. The EDITION—that’s the underworld.” The daughter of an Edmonds International architect explains this to me as we wait for the hotel shuttle outside the Cancun airport’s Margaritaville. I apologize for asking her a journalistic question after a 6-hour flight from LA, but she says it’s good to rehearse her spiel before the walkthroughs. Knowing the launch weekend is going to be a bacchanal of influencer selfies, late-night beach parties, and open bars, I start musing on the concept of the underworld. Seduction, sin, leaving my retainer in LA—it feels good to be bad. I am reminded of that episode of The Twilight Zone where a man, believing he is in heaven, suddenly begins getting everything he’s ever wanted—endless riches, beautiful women, decadent meals—until he finds himself trapped in this world of effortless satisfaction. The twist: this is actually hell. Knowing I have a return flight booked, this three-day sojourn to the underworld seems like the perfect amount of time for unbridled indulgence.

We arrive at the EDITION Riviera Maya at Kanai precisely in time for sunset. As I enter the canopied, high-ceilinged lobby, I see the horizon meet the infinity pools to create a seamless mirror image of the orange skies. Like all of the hotelier Ian Schrager’s endeavors—from Studio 54 to the EDITION’s boutique hotels—the space immerses you in a theatrical fantasy, with each sightline full of promise and designer furniture. During his press conference Q&A with documentary filmmaker Matt Tyrnauer, Schrager shares a quote arguably attributable to Da Vinci, “Simplicity is the ultimate form of sophistication.” Irked by the overuse of the term “minimalist,” Schrager much prefers this alternative. He explains that simplicity is deceptive in that it is a far more rigorous practice when “you can’t hide anything under wallpaper or carpet.” Tyrnauer shares an anecdote of going on a walkthrough of a soon-to-be-opened EDITION with Schrager, who stopped to point out a barely visible light strip two inches away from where it was supposed to be. “That’s a fantasy-ruiner,” Schrager told Tyrnauer. This is Schrager’s specialty: seamless fantasy.

The space immerses you in a theatrical fantasy, with each sightline full of promise and designer furniture

In the following days, I keep an eye out for fantasy-ruiners, from my hotel room to the restaurants to the spa, but none emerge from the literal and figurative woodwork. Well, except for the guest-inflicted fantasy-ruiners, like influencers flying their drones over the cacao ceremony, or the realization that you totally can see me naked on my balcony from the path to the beach; turns out, Sartre was right: “hell is other people,” even if you’re already in the underworld. Thankfully, my hotel room is its own private fantasy. Each room boasts sand-colored limestone floors, a king-size four-poster bed, a freestanding bathtub, a walk-in rainforest shower, and a private balcony overlooking the 620 acres of mangroves leading to the cartoonishly aquamarine shallows of the Caribbean Sea. Lounging in the tub, steeped in the EDITION’s signature La Labo Black Tea fragrance, it’s almost enough to seduce me away from exploring the rest of the hotel. Thankfully, I summon the strength to venture out in time for my dinner reservation.

Sartre was right: “hell is other people,” even if you’re already in the underworld.

All of the food on-site is authentic to the hotel’s locale, specializing in seafood and traditional flavors as well as Mexican mezcals, tequilas, and wine. Ki’is, the upscale dining option helmed by internationally acclaimed Chef Francisco “Paco” Ruano, features an innovative tasting menu with bespoke drink pairings. The restaurant Kitchen is an all-day dining option with a menu that offers all the comfort foods of a traditional hotel restaurant, like eggs benedict and chilaquiles. SO’OL, named after a Mayan word for “oyster,” is the beachfront restaurant and bar alongside the infinity pool that looks out onto the ocean. Unlike the bottle-service-babe brand of typical beach clubs, SO’OL offers a menu of fresh seafood curated by the award-winning Chef Tomás Bermudez, in addition to a long list of refreshing cocktails. Between the restaurants, the pool bar, and the Lobby Bar, there is no shortage of alcohol at the EDITION Riviera Maya, and many of the guests spent the majority of the weekend thoroughly pickled.

Alongside the many sinful indulgences available, there are extensive wellness options, from a holistic spa to a sleek gym. I personally do not use the gym due to the aforementioned pickling, but I certainly opt for an afternoon at the spa. I receive an incredibly restorative Swedish massage; shout out to Beatriz, who does not pull any punches when I ask her to go harder on me. The Spa offers hydrotherapy pools, a Turkish Hammam, and a steam room alongside six private indoor-outdoor treatment rooms.

While the EDITION Riviera Maya is clearly built from the same brand DNA as every other EDITION, the architecture pays unique homage to the region's history. Cenotes—subterranean bodies of water native to the area—served as both the visual and editorial inspiration for the hotel. Its unique architectural features mimic the ethereal spirituality of these underground water sources, which ancient Mayans believed to be entrances to the underworld. Water features cast dancing shadows across covered walkways, circular skylights illuminate the spa from above, and a wave-like canopy over the yoga deck mimics the blast of a meteor (scientists believe cenotes are formed along the ancient ring of the meteorite impact that killed the dinosaurs 66 million years ago). The hotel offers a field trip to a neighboring cenote, Cenote Sac Actun, affectionately nicknamed “Pet Cemetery” because there are fossils of long-extinct animals such as a prehistoric camel.

Overly coddled by the comforts of the hotel, the trip to the cenote comes as a bit of a rude awakening to some guests, and not only because most of us had been up until 4 a.m. at the beach party and had to catch the shuttle by 8 a.m. At each step of the tour, there is a Wonka-esque series of eliminations of guests dropping out of the tour group—one girl is too hungover, another feels the water is too cold, someone has a phobia of bats, and another person is on the verge of a panic attack due to claustrophobia. Armed with wetsuits and our phones tied around our necks in plastic bags, the rest of us descended into the cathedral-like caves.

The water is a color of blue I’ve only seen in artificial candy flavoring and quite chilly if you don’t opt for a wetsuit (forfeit the bikini pics—it’s worth it). Swimming between the jaws of the limestone stalactites and subaquatic stalagmites, it doesn’t take long to surrender to the ancient majesty of the caves. I can only imagine that for the person who first stumbled upon this however many thousands of years ago, it would have been nearly impossible not to feel as though they’d trespassed into a spiritual realm. I took sloppy little photos with my bagged iPhone 10, but they all fell predictably short of reality. Returning to the hotel from the cenote, I have a renewed appreciation for this particular type of lightning the architects are trying to bottle and offer to us on a silver platter. Did I have a pervasive paranoia that the setting and guest list were perfect ingredients for a White Lotus-style crime? Yes. But at the EDITION, that feeling falls under the verboten category of “fantasy-ruiner.” So, instead, you sip mezcal as you watch the sunset from the rooftop pool of the largest penthouse suite in North America and surrender to the fantasy. Simplicity is, after all, life’s greatest luxury.