A Fox House Takes Root in Pererenan
On a sloping plot near Canggu, not far from the coast, a pair of ochre stone foxes flank the entrance to Rumah Rubah, which translates from Indonesian as "fox house." The name is a quiet nod to its owner: Gildas Loaëc, the French co-founder of fashion and music label Maison Kitsune, whose brand takes its name from the Japanese word for fox. When Loaëc is away, the three-bedroom property operates as a rentable guesthouse, making it one of the more distinctive private-turned-public stays in the Pererenan area.
The details were first reported by The Peak Magazine in a July 2026 house tour by Luo Jingmei.
From Barren Field to Living Ecosystem
The site's backstory is as important as its design. Architect Maximilian Jencquel, Venezuelan-born and now based in Bali, describes the land as it was when he first encountered it: dry, depleted, and nearly barren after years of cassava farming on what had once been a rice field. The plot also drops almost ten metres down to a creek that feeds into the traditional Subak irrigation system, which meant drainage, access, and level changes all had to be resolved with care.
Jencquel's response was less about imposing a design and more about rebuilding what had been lost. Trees were selected and positioned to generate shade, encourage air circulation, and establish a microclimate over time. The landscape design emerged from observation rather than prescription: watching where shade fell, where breezes moved, where water gathered. The result is a garden of over 43,000 square feet that includes a traditional drum tower.
Spatial Logic Borrowed from Balinese Tradition
The architecture draws on Balinese thinking about sequence and threshold. Rather than routing movement directly through rooms, the layout encourages circulation around spaces, creating alternating moments of compression and openness. You pass through layers of landscape before the house reveals itself. The pool sits between the building and the wider garden, functioning as a threshold rather than a feature. A central courtyard anchors the interior, and evaporative cooling from the pool provides comfort through the day and night without mechanical intervention.
Materials are tactile and locally grounded: reclaimed teak floors, ancient doors relocated to the site, timber screens, monolithic bathtubs, paper lamps, and furniture that mixes designed pieces with found objects. Solar panels, batteries, and rainwater harvesting sit alongside these traditional elements. Loaëc describes the combination as representing Bali itself.
Many construction decisions were made on-site in conversation between Jencquel and local craftsmen, rather than from finished drawings. That collaborative, improvisational process, the architect argues, is what gives the house its atmosphere.
Living Almost Entirely Outdoors
Loaëc, who has been visiting Bali five or six times a year for more than two decades, says the house allows him to be outdoors essentially all the time. The open-air layout, the patio, the garden, and the way interior and exterior blur together are what he values most. Rumah Rubah sits alongside his broader Bali project, Desa Kitsune, which includes a nightclub, restaurant, store, and cafe in the same ecosystem. The villa is described as a side experiment pointing toward a future hotel.
Why It Matters for Hosts
Rumah Rubah is a useful case study for independent operators in Bali considering how to position a private residence as a rentable property. Its appeal rests not on luxury amenities in the conventional sense but on spatial storytelling: a deliberate arrival sequence, materials with provenance, a garden that took ecological restoration seriously, and passive cooling that reduces reliance on mechanical systems. Guests are paying for a sense of place that took years to cultivate. Hosts in similar villa markets, particularly around Pererenan and Canggu, can take a practical cue from this: investing in landscape maturity and locally crafted interiors tends to create a guest experience that photographs and reviews cannot fully capture, which builds repeat interest over time.
First reported by Bali Travel.