Review: Future Found Sanctuary

"Some places stun you and leave you breathless. This one stuns you and lets you breathe."

A Living Blueprint

Tucked into the forested slopes of Table Mountain National Park, Future Found Sanctuary offers more than a stay. It’s a living blueprint for how place, people, and purpose can align. A deeply designed, regenerative estate shaped by rhythm, intention, and intimacy — expansive, yes, but never performative.

You don’t pass through this place. You pass into it.

This is what happens when two visionaries—Jim Brett and Ed Gray—commit not just to building an estate, but to building relationships. With the land. With local artists and craftspeople. With architects who understand place. With a team that has grown alongside the property itself. The result feels less like a resort and more like an invitation into a way of being that feels both ancient and entirely new.

Built by People Who Build Worlds

Perhaps most remarkably, this isn’t a story of outside expertise imposed on a place. Genuine passion for a place, followed by investment in its people, creates exponential returns. Jim and Ed have dreamed and constructed over more than a decade. What began with the purchase of Maison Noir has grown into an ever-evolving, ever-integrated system: five structures, a working garden, an embedded team, and a regenerative mission that honors the land and the people who move through it.

The vision? Create a place that feels like possibility. Where guests remember how to feel. And the team brings that vision to life every day.

You will likely meet Emelio, who helped build the original house. Today, he’s at the front desk, handling reservations and guest needs with the kind of care that comes from personal investment in place. Eight team members live on-site; the full team of 30 reflects the local community—diverse, vibrant, exuding the confidence that comes from being truly valued.

Made by South African Hands

Walk through any room and you’re experiencing a master class in local art, craft, and design. Nearly every object you see and touch — every chair, painting, vessel, textile — is made by South African hands. This isn’t curatorial collecting; it’s relationship building made tangible.

Take the ceramics of Andile Dyalvane, one of our personal favorites—pictured above. Twenty years ago, Jim was importing his small pinch bowls and now Andile exhibits his work on the global art stage, just one of many examples that speak to the depth of vision and commitment to talent. The Mudge siblings — Rosie (painting), Lucinda (ceramics), and James (furniture) — each bring their medium into the space: color, form, texture. Their work is quietly electric, folded into daily experience rather than displayed behind glass.

You feel the difference when you're surrounded by authentic original creativity. A digital guide allows you to dive deeper into each artist's story and work—transforming your stay into an intimate gallery experience.

Land That Leads You

The grounds are a journey — you don’t need a map. It’s better to wander.

Water flows through the property, connecting ponds, water features, and forest paths, cloud hedges and bee hives. The garden rooms and pods unfold like chapters — from close lush landscapes to floral experimentation to still, open views that frame the mountain.

Ed partners with master horticulturalist Cherise Viljoen, whose expertise has been honed over decades at globally celebrated Kirstenbosch National Botanical Gardens. Together with a dedicated long-term team, they’ve created something that feels both wild and intentional. Fynbos dominates the landscape, supported by propagation and restoration efforts. You’ll find seasonal vegetables grown steps from the kitchen, and tree tomatoes ripening in the sun.

The property backs onto Table Mountain National Park—an invitation to go deeper, to hike trails that few tourists ever find and vistas that will expand your understanding of scale and beauty.

Birds, bees, fish — the property pulses with interconnected rhythms. Around Maison Noir, you’ll notice an abundance of koi glide through carefully integrated ponds, their presence adding movement and tranquility to the water systems.

“Wellness is possibility, not prescription—your choice.”

There's a natural plunge pool that feels more like a private pond. Three salt treated fresh water pools on property. A full gym. Yoga decks and spa treatments and breathwork options, sound baths and guided hikes. The spa interiors, designed by Ohkre Collective, are serene and luxurious—spaces that seduce you into stillness.

Guests come to Future Found to rest, recalibrate, and breathe. Whether it's a swim at dawn, a two hour intense hike or a nap after lunch—being well is almost inevitable when you're on property.

From Soil to Table

Malika van Reenen, the property’s dedicated executive chef, and her team tap the kitchen gardens and estate grounds and work in partnership with local farms and purveyors to shape daily menus — turning seasonal harvests into experiences that connect soil to plate and place. There’s a synergy between the food and the land, the kind that delights and satisfies while also deeply nourishing you.

You can never leave the property and have a rich culinary experience, yet some of the best restaurants on the continent are very close to where you’re resting and are worth venturing out for. Even the local bakery is exceptional by any standard. Partake.

How to Stay

Whether you’re seeking a few nights in an intimate space to reset your world, or you plan to take over the entire estate for a once-in-a-lifetime gathering, Future Found operates as both sanctuary and celebration space.

The accommodation options span from pods embedded in the landscape to expansive villas, each designed for guests who value the luxury of intention. Your private spaces — whether in a pod or villa — feel less like hotel rooms and more like the guest wing of a friend’s impeccably designed estate. Every thread, every surface, every detail chosen intentionally.

This is where groups come to reconnect before or after safari. Where creators retreat to remember why they create. Where the full estate becomes a private world for those moments that deserve nothing less.

You’re minutes from downtown Cape Town, but it feels like a different world. The Atlantic’s most beautiful beaches beckon for morning walks, swims and surfing sessions. Constantia’s legendary wine estates sprawl nearby, where exceptional vintages, fantastic food, and sweeping views combine for memory-making experiences.

Partnership in Practice

This place exists because of relationships — not just between owners and team, but between vision and land, tradition and innovation, local expertise and global perspective.

Emelio’s journey from construction to management tells one story. But it’s part of a larger narrative that includes the landscape team, the local farmers, the bee keepers, the craftspeople and artists whose work fills every room. This is partnership made tangible — personal and expansive through practice, dedication, and time.

The result speaks for itself: a place where every element serves the whole, when vision meets patience, when investment flows toward creation and community rather than extraction. Luxury is redefined: depth rather than display, integration rather than isolation, where the sum becomes something greater than its parts.

Why This Matters Now

In a world of performative sustainability and surface-level luxury, Future Found Sanctuary represents something rarer: genuine integration. This is what regenerative travel looks like when it’s done right—not as marketing copy, but as lived practice.

This isn’t just somewhere to go. It’s a way to be.

How We Experienced It

I stayed as a guest of the owners, longtime friends whose vision I’ve watched unfold over years. This fully realized version of the CANAVA project didn’t exist when I visited — my experience was not intended to be published nor gifted with that purpose in mind - but I have to tell the world about this wonderful place.

I stayed in a guest cottage that is part of Mountain View, the owners’ residence when they are on site. I swam, hiked, meditated, walked the grounds, met the team, wandered the gardens, joined other guests for large bespoke dinners, took morning coffee and meditations around the property. I learned about the gardens from Ed and Cherise, the area and farms from the chef, architecture and art and craft from Jim and Ed both.

I rented a car and used Future Found as my base for exploring the entire cape, ate out at some fantastic spots (full Cape Town guide in the queue). I met penguins and took in the remarkable topography, art, history, culture and the present day world of Cape Town. I didn’t “do the sights” I saw the place and I know how lucky I am to have had that access, that freedom.

This trip helped me clarify how I define access at CANAVA — not purchased, contrived, or limited—but earned through curiosity, authenticity, relationship and time. The kind of genuine entry into a place that reveals its true character, its daily rhythms, its quiet magic.

My visit to Future Found became a blueprint for how I want to encourage everyone to move through the world: with attention to, appreciation of, and in genuine partnership with the places and people who welcome us in.

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Future Found Sanctuary offers bespoke stays for individuals and groups, with full property rental options available. The property maintains 24-hour security, providing peace of mind in a setting designed for complete relaxation. The true luxury lies in the curation — they've built the world and assembled a team that allows you to define exactly what constitutes your perfect stay. Located minutes from central Cape Town.

The estate is managed by Newmark Hotels, Africa's premier luxury hospitality management company. With properties across South Africa, Mauritius, Zanzibar, Tanzania, and Nigeria, Newmark brings world-class expertise to independently owned properties that prioritize authentic luxury and local partnerships.

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This article was originally published on CANAVA.

Photography by: Geren Lockhart