Andermatt, a burgeoning community sequestered high in the Swiss Alps, has long attracted a cosmopolitan clientele with its cinematic beauty. Sean Connery filmed Goldfinger’s infamous car-chase scene here, and visitors have included everyone from Queen Victoria to Elvis Presley. But its remote location limited its growth—something Egyptian property tycoon Samih Sawiris has worked to change.
Since first glimpsing its peaks from a helicopter in 2005, he has pumped an estimated $2 billion into the most expansive development project in the Alps.
Sawiris was granted a unique exemption from stringent Swiss laws limiting foreigners from acquiring property, and until it expires in 2040, you, too, can buy real estate here. Over the past 19 years, his determination to create a resort rivalling Verbier and St. Moritz has resulted in scores of projects, including the 119-room Chedi Andermatt hotel and Reuss, a new residential district. He has even augmented the local ski area. Today, Andermatt offers 180 sq km of pistes—more than Courchevel. The options are varied, so you can savor untracked descents punctured by tight ravines, open powder bowls, and challenging off-piste terrain. At the top of Nätschen mountain, you’re as likely to encounter skiers as you are gourmands trekking to one of two Michelin-starred restaurants at Gütsch, right next to the gondola station. Despite the scale and ambition of Sawiris’s master plan, Andermatt’s old town retains its rustic charm. It’s a quixotic blend of past and present, at once authentically Swiss and definitively international: Over a third of the new homes in Reuss are owned by non-Swiss residents. Join them—before the area gets hardpacked.
