The mountain resort increasingly devoted to cosseting the super-rich was conceived as a place for the poor to ski during the Second World War. France’s first purpose-built ski village, Courchevel 1850, was planned as “the people’s resort” by the Vichy government, as an alternative to the Rothschilds’ exclusive playground at Megève, and the anglo-funded Méribel. Seventy years on, 1850 has eclipsed them both, the dazzling star of the largest ski area in the world, with one of the most efficient lift systems, the best “corduroy” groomed motorway pistes, a dozen Michelin-starred restaurants and the French Alps’ only six-star hotels. With visitors such as the Beckhams, George Clooney and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, where better to build lavish chalets with swimming pools, cinemas, gyms, mini-nightclubs and spa suites? The resort’s first spa-based development, the Six Senses Residences Courchevel, a branded collection of 53 high-end apartments with ski-in, ski-out concierge services, will be launched next week. The properties, averaging €20,000-€25,000 per sq metre, are possibly the most expensive apartments in the French Alps, and constitute the first new-build scheme in 1850 for 12 years.
Prices start at €1.5 million for a 70 sq m one-bedroom apartment and rise to to €9.6 million for a five-bedroom 300 sq m penthouse with private treatment rooms. The interiors are styled in contemporary neutral, with alpine twists — the rooms are luxuriously large by French resort standards — and kitted out with the latest smart-home technology, with balconies overlooking the slopes from the development’s central location, handy for the Chanel and Hermès boutiques. Furniture packages cost from €100,000 to €200,000, and service charges are €75 per sq m a year — a chunk of which can be recouped by renting out your home through the management scheme, commanding rents of €10,000 to €60,000 a week (12 weeks being a “good” season in 1850) — plus you can reclaim your 20 per cent VAT if you let. Owners get a three-year membership to the Six Senses spa (the holistic brand located in exclusive hotels around the world), which has indoor pools, a sauna, a steam room and a juice bar, but just as importantly the 24-hour concierge will procure access to the resort’s best restaurants, the famous Les Caves nightclub, a private jet from the altiport and make sure that owners do not have to carry their skis or boots “one single step” to the chairlift. There’s a lot of talk about the flight to quality in the Alps — other openings in 1850 including a White 1921 hotel by the LVMHgroup this year, and the Four Seasons is arriving in Megève the next — but who is buying? The ten owners at the Six Senses so far are predominantly “self-made” British 35 to 45-year-olds — the big force in 1850 now that the Russians tend to rent rather than buy trophy homes. That said, the record sales price per metre this season in 1850 has been to a Russian for €41,666 — but only Russians with their money in sterling or euros are buying, according to Jérôme Lagoutte, of Savills, the agent for the Six Senses Residences. “The typical British buyer in 1850 wants three bedrooms and will spend €1.5 million to €6 million,” he says. “Apartments cost from €10,000 per sq m to no limit.” Savills’ offerings include a four-bedroom, four-bathroom apartment in the upper Pralong area for €2.5 million, or a three-bedroom, three-bathroom flat in the centre for €2.1 million. Lagoutte denies that prices in 1850 have “risen out of sync with reality”, saying that people would not still be buying if they didn’t think that the properties were worth it. “Buyers are now considered after the ‘fake bubble’ of price speculation before the global downturn,” he says. “There’s been an adjustment in values and any new project has to have substance. It has to be truly functional as well as look good.” Many of the 17 cranes in 1850 this summer will have been on new chalets, and while many of the old properties in the sought-after slopeside Bellecôte area have been redeveloped, space is running out in the desirable Cospillot and Jardin Alpin areas, according to Olivier Nicolai, of the estate agency John Taylor. He suggests a “starter” chalet for about €25,000 per sq m. “We sold a 245 sq m four-bed chalet for €5 million this year,” he says. A similar chalet would cost about €3-3.5 million in Courchevel 1650 or 1550 — you go down the hill for greater value. Courchevel 1550 has the benefit of being directly linked by lift to 1850, and there you can buy a two-bedroom apartment for about €400,000; but the big game-changer for 1650 (or Moriond) is a sensational aquacentre that will be linked by a new lift to 1850 — not far from the Aga Khan’s two new chalets. This 12,000 sq m of dramatic glass curves housing indoor/outdoor pools — and a Nikki Beach café — cost €45 million and will bring a much-needed summer dimension to the Trois Vallées when it opens this month. In the lowest-lying 1350 (or Le Praz) — a traditional village popular with Brits but with a shorter season — you can get a beautifully restored seven-bed chalet for €3.4 million (through Savills), and hop on the lift to dip a toe in the glitz of 1850. And that’s the great thing about Courchevel — whether you’re spending €10 or €1,000 on lunch, you’ll still be on the same superb pistes. Maybe not so divorced from the masterplan after all. This article originally appeared on The Times of London.