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Every March, the peninsula smells of paint. Winter on an Aegean island is not gentle to buildings — salt spray dulls the whitewash, the meltemi tests every hinge — and so the hotel spends six weeks each spring being taken apart and put back together, brighter.

The rituals

The order never changes: whitewash first, always from the sea-facing walls inward; then the pools are drained, resealed and refilled; then the gardeners arrive with truckloads of bougainvillea and lavender that must be in the ground before the first heat. The last week belongs to the small things — polishing brass, pressing linens, arguing lovingly about the breakfast menu.

The team drifts back the same way the swallows do: the head gardener first, then the chefs, then the front desk, half of them returning for their tenth or twelfth season. The night before opening, everyone eats together on the terrace at one long table. It is the best dinner of the year, and no guest ever sees it.

By the last week of April the ladders vanish, the scaffolding comes down and the peninsula holds its breath. Then a car comes up the drive with the first guests of the year, and summer officially begins.