Welcome to the era of the statement spa, where the design is as breathtaking as the treatments are soporific. The first spa I saw that made an architectural statement was O2, in Barcelona, a shiny cube of steel and glass with a wonderful thermal suite hewn from cool, dark-grey slate. The next to open will be the Marques De Riscal, near Bilbao, with its eagerly awaited, Frank Gehry-designed Caudalie spa. And now, in the UK, we have Thermae Bath Spa, Nicholas Grimshaw’s block of glass and stone, which is home to the country’s only thermal waters you can bathe in.
I went to Bath on its opening day and it was buzzing. Yes, it’s three years late. Yes, it’s £30m over budget. But it will open up the joys of the spa to a far wider audience, even with two-hour spa sessions costing £19. When I went, there was a queue snaking round the block. It reminded me of getting into a nightclub. Thermae Bath Spa is a truly democratic, municipal operation — no frills, no Buddha statues, no fluffy robes, no sorbets after treatment — and it is all the better for it. It is also man-friendly, and that morning there were lots of men wallowing in the downstairs Minerva bath, like hippos half submerged in an African river. One disconcerting thing: the changing rooms are unisex, though they have cubicles. This did give me a shock.
What of the treatments themselves? I had watsu with a wonderfully calm, gentle woman called Jan — it was like being a baby rocked ever so slowly in amniotic fluid. For pure, lulling dreamlike ambience, it was the best treatment I’ve ever had. And because it was in the thermal waters, which Jan says are denser and more therapeutic, it had a magical muscle-melting effect. The other treatments are by Pevonia, a great spa brand, huge in America and purveyors of some truly figure-morphing wraps. I had the peat mud wrap, but in the past I’ve had Pevonia’s green coffee wrap at the Monart spa, in Ireland, which took inches off my waistline. I also had a Pevonia Plantomer facial, in which they use numinous ampoules of propolis and lavender to soothe and hydrate the complexion.
Bath spa? Well worth the wait and the wedge, I’d say.
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TOP FIVE TREATMENTS AT THERMAE BATH SPA
1. Watsu (£55 for 50 mins)
Idyllic underwater massage and manipulation — it feels like a regression to the womb.
2. Pantai Luar (£55 for 50 mins)
A sybaritic hot oil massage where you are patted and massaged with a compress stuffed full of herbs.
3. Alpine Hay Bath (£38 for 30 mins)
Submerge yourself in hay for the ultimate in detoxification.
4. Green Coffee Wrap (£55 for 50 mins)
A fabulous Pevonia treatment that depuffs and debloats your body. It should slim you down by a couple of inches.
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5. Plantomer Facial (£60 for 50 mins)
Ultra-hydrating facial that deep-cleanses the skin with exfoliation and masks, then nurtures it with propolis.
Bookings: 01225 331234, www.thermaebathspa.com