Our Editor Natalie Bannister laces up for a set of doubles at the first Lacoste padel club to open in Bali, where a French fashion house has built a sport to match its wardrobe.
Padel has gone from niche to everywhere in the space of a few short years, and Bali, never one to miss a moment, now has its most stylish court yet. Club Lacoste at W Bali – Seminyak is the first dedicated Lacoste padel concept in Asia Pacific, backed by the full weight of the French fashion house, crocodile and all.
Two courts, a standalone Lacoste boutique and a très chic little café for coconuts and coffee between games; it is less a hotel facility than a fully formed world, and that is exactly what makes Club Lacoste such an intriguing arrival to Bali. It backs a global sporting moment while doing something completely new for the island, and it does so at W Bali —Seminyak, Bali’s most style-literate corner, where a fashionable crowd was always going to take to a game that looks as good as it plays.
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Club Lacoste x W Bali – Seminyak: the ultimate padel destination in Bali
The W Bali — Seminyak setup for Club Lacoste is generous. Two dedicated courts sit at the centre, open daily from 8 am to 8 pm to hotel guests and the wider Seminyak set alike, so the mood stays social rather than sealed off behind a resort gate. Morning is the time to play, before the heat arrives, and I can report the courts rarely sit empty for long.
Look closely, and Lacoste is everywhere, not stuck on as branding but built into the fabric of the place: the crocodile worked into the glass of the court walls, the deck chairs to collapse into between games, the green and white that has meant the same thing for nearly a century. This high-tier collaboration is considered down to the smallest touch, and it is what makes a game of padel here feel like stepping into the world of Lacoste for an hour.
Playing padel at Club Lacoste x W Bali – Seminyak: a set of doubles, dressed for the part
Of course, I had to play. I am no athlete, and my tennis is best described as enthusiastic, so I did not hold high hopes. Padel, thankfully, is far kinder than tennis. The enclosed glass walls keep the ball alive long after a tennis rally would have collapsed, and within minutes we were trading proper shots, dressed for the occasion in a fresh Lacoste polo, sunglasses and cap from the boutique. A doubles match is an easy, social thing, over almost before you notice the score, and we finished the way you should, side by side in the courtside deck chairs with a chilled coconut each. Turns out padel is very easy to fall for!
The fresh fit came, of course, from the Lacoste boutique that sits right alongside the courts, and it is worth a look whether or not you plan to play. This is where the collaboration feels most tactile. Alongside the newest padel collection, the first dedicated capsule of rackets and footwear, the shelves carry Lacoste’s wider racket sports range: fragrances, watches, eyewear, apparel and accessories. Come off court and wander in, and the line between playing the sport and wearing it quietly dissolves. It reminds us that Lacoste was a sportswear house long before it became a fashion one, and it plays to that history in full.
Club Lacoste: padel in Bali, for every level
Club Lacoste has arrived in Bali at the right moment and landed in the right place. Padel is a sport on the rise, and Seminyak, with its appetite for anything that pairs leisure with style, was always going to take to it. It helps that its home is W Bali – Seminyak, a hotel that has always run on music, fashion and design, and treats a good time as something to be built properly rather than left to chance. The courts welcome every level, first-timers and seasoned players alike, so there is no barrier to giving it a go, whatever your history with a racket. What Lacoste adds is the look, so this becomes a sport you actually want to dress for, on one of the best stretches of beachfront on the island. Best of all, a match need not be the whole of it: with courts open from morning to evening, a game slides easily into pool time and then into sunset cocktails at Alunê, the hotel’s fabulous new beach club (much more on that to come). Whether you come to play or simply to watch from a deck chair, coconut in hand, it is one of the more original ways to pass the time in Bali right now.
