Something & Son is the creative force behind FARM:shop, a three-storey city farm that produces everything it sells on-site, from fresh tilapia – courtesy of a mini aquaponic fish farm – to a vast selection of plants grown in hi tech indoor allotments that are more like laboratories.
Its innovative design led to Something & Son being approached to come up with an art and design installation in Barking, east London, in the run up to the 2012 Olympic Games. The concept they put forward was the Barking Bathhouse – a ‘social and affordable’ pop-up spa inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area.
Situated in a car park, Barking Bathhouse resembled a giant beach hut from the outside. Inside it had a café/bar serving organic cocktails under a growing canopy of cucumbers, an outdoor/indoor relaxation garden and a shingle beach for sunbathing. The spa also had a wood-fired sauna, an ice room, and three therapy rooms with time slots staring at £10 (US$16, €12) for 15 minutes and going up to £35 (US$56, €42) for an hour. It became so popular that it stayed open for 11 weeks (three week longer than planned). Co-founder, Paul Smyth, says the concept is now going to be used to create a permanent facility and that this in turn is likely to be duplicated in two other cities. We talk to him about how it all came about.
How would you describe the design? Eco-industrial chic. We were inspired by Barking’s industrial past and with the idea of converting an old warehouse into a spa with trees growing through the building and furniture crafted from reclaimed materials.
It cost around £230,000 (US$369,000, €273,900) to set up – we were really cautious about investing too much because we knew it wouldn’t be there for long. But the simple aesthetic was actually very popular.
What worked well? The Barking Bathhouse was a very sociable spa space where people could really relax. We had a lot of regular customers who praised the simplicity of what we were doing and also really liked the competitive pricing.
Being a pop-up gave us more freedom to experiment with the design, the fit-out and the operation, but it also presented some unusual challenges because of the temporaray nature of the operation.
What obstacles did you face? Although we got a three-week extension, we weren’t as busy during that period because we didn’t market it as well and lots of people though we’d closed by that stage.
Also the bar slightly underperformed. It was quite busy, but we would’ve liked to have sold more food and drink, and for it to have been more lively in the evenings. And, at times, the outside spa facilities were cold.
These are all things we’ll address in the permanent Barking Bathhouse which is due to open on a new site in Barking in May 2014.
In the meantime, we’ve recreated three of the treatment rooms at the back of the Barking Learning Centre, as we wanted to keep the concept going and keep the team together. We’ve used the time to connect with people in the local area, which we didn’t have the time to do with the pop-up, and bookings have really increased recently.
What will the permanent Barking Bathhouse be like? We’re still finalising plans, but it will feature three and a half treatment rooms – the spaces will be flexible, with partitions that allow us to transform them into larger spaces for classes and events. It will have a bar and café, but we’ll expand on the food offering.
The design will be timber again and industrial, but slightly more finished than the pop-up. The spa will have a big chimney, centred around a wood-burning furnace providing heating for the building.
We’ll have a wood-fired sauna and we’re looking at bringing in some clever, low-energy, low carbon systems to run hot tubs. We also hope to have standalone greenhouse/solarium. The design will retain the indoor/outdoor experience, with a walled garden, but it will be designed for year round use.
What opportunities do you see? We’re talking to organisations in Bristol and Brighton (in the UK) about creating more bathhouses. Our key criteria is to partner with organisations which share our vision and love the concept. We’d be really open to working with an established spa operator or someone who wanted to invest.
We genuinely want to change spa culture, make spas more affordable, and to get people to use them more regularly.
Read more from this issue of Spa Business magazine
Interview: Helene Goetzelmann
L'Occitane's international spa director tells Rhianon Howells how the consumer retail company has become a spa operator with 60 facilities
Ask an expert: Profit & Loss
Hotel spas need to fight capital expenditure allocation said an investor panel at this year's Global Spa & Wellness Summit
Research: All rise
There's been an increase in the five top key performance indicators in the US spa industry shows the 2013 ISPA study
Company Profile Promotion: ESPA promotion
As ESPA's 20th
anniversary year draws
to a close, founder and
CEO Sue Harmsworth
explains how and why the
company is still evolving
Safari Spa: Animal instinct
Safari spas are the staple for Amani, one of South Africa's largest spa chains. Lisa Starr talks to MD Ronleigh Gordon
Trends: Brief encounters
We take a look at some of the most innovative spa pop-ups, a growing trend across the leisure sector
Interview: Paul Smyth
Something & Son designer shares his insights on creating pop-up spa facilities. Magali Robathan reports
Summit review: Upping the ante
Katie Barnes reveals the takeaway messages from the 2013 Global Spa & Wellness Summit in New Delhi, India, attended by 375 industry leaders
Research: Local news
Domestic travellers dominate the global wellness tourism market which has an economic impact of US$1.3 trillion. SRI's Ophelia Yeung reports
Research: Thai up
Prantik Bordoloi analyses a 2013 Thai spa industry study based on both spa consumer and spa operator opinions
Software news: Tech talk
The latest developments and news from spa software suppliers from around the world
Rachelle Moulai, the spa manager at Barking Bathhouse has a background in running five-star spas and headed up So Spa at London Sofitel St James before being approached by Something & Son to help with its pop-up. “They asked me to choose between fun and security and I chose fun,” says Moulai who quickly hired five therapists on a self-employed basis who paid the pop-up a 25 per cent commission on their takings.
When the permanent facility opens, she says therapists will be paid a salary and the spa will cover all operating expenses unlike at the learning centre which lets the space for free and covers the bills.
“It was scary coming to this project but it’s turned out to be the job of my life,” says Moulai. “I don’t have that corporate pressure here and everyone is happy: we are doing a good thing for the community, and we still have those very high standards I had at my previous jobs.”
Magali Robathan is the managing editor of Leisure Management, a sister publication to Spa Business Email: [email protected] Phone: +44 117 9723101
Barking Bathhouse opened in the run up to the 2012 London Olympic Games
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
Le Atelier by C.O.D.E. doesn't offer a standard bespoke service, it provides a highly
customised approach to designing massage beds and loungers in high-end wellness
environments. [more...]
Something & Son is the creative force behind FARM:shop, a three-storey city farm that produces everything it sells on-site, from fresh tilapia – courtesy of a mini aquaponic fish farm – to a vast selection of plants grown in hi tech indoor allotments that are more like laboratories.
Its innovative design led to Something & Son being approached to come up with an art and design installation in Barking, east London, in the run up to the 2012 Olympic Games. The concept they put forward was the Barking Bathhouse – a ‘social and affordable’ pop-up spa inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area.
Situated in a car park, Barking Bathhouse resembled a giant beach hut from the outside. Inside it had a café/bar serving organic cocktails under a growing canopy of cucumbers, an outdoor/indoor relaxation garden and a shingle beach for sunbathing. The spa also had a wood-fired sauna, an ice room, and three therapy rooms with time slots staring at £10 (US$16, €12) for 15 minutes and going up to £35 (US$56, €42) for an hour. It became so popular that it stayed open for 11 weeks (three week longer than planned). Co-founder, Paul Smyth, says the concept is now going to be used to create a permanent facility and that this in turn is likely to be duplicated in two other cities. We talk to him about how it all came about.
How would you describe the design? Eco-industrial chic. We were inspired by Barking’s industrial past and with the idea of converting an old warehouse into a spa with trees growing through the building and furniture crafted from reclaimed materials.
It cost around £230,000 (US$369,000, €273,900) to set up – we were really cautious about investing too much because we knew it wouldn’t be there for long. But the simple aesthetic was actually very popular.
What worked well? The Barking Bathhouse was a very sociable spa space where people could really relax. We had a lot of regular customers who praised the simplicity of what we were doing and also really liked the competitive pricing.
Being a pop-up gave us more freedom to experiment with the design, the fit-out and the operation, but it also presented some unusual challenges because of the temporaray nature of the operation.
What obstacles did you face? Although we got a three-week extension, we weren’t as busy during that period because we didn’t market it as well and lots of people though we’d closed by that stage.
Also the bar slightly underperformed. It was quite busy, but we would’ve liked to have sold more food and drink, and for it to have been more lively in the evenings. And, at times, the outside spa facilities were cold.
These are all things we’ll address in the permanent Barking Bathhouse which is due to open on a new site in Barking in May 2014.
In the meantime, we’ve recreated three of the treatment rooms at the back of the Barking Learning Centre, as we wanted to keep the concept going and keep the team together. We’ve used the time to connect with people in the local area, which we didn’t have the time to do with the pop-up, and bookings have really increased recently.
What will the permanent Barking Bathhouse be like? We’re still finalising plans, but it will feature three and a half treatment rooms – the spaces will be flexible, with partitions that allow us to transform them into larger spaces for classes and events. It will have a bar and café, but we’ll expand on the food offering.
The design will be timber again and industrial, but slightly more finished than the pop-up. The spa will have a big chimney, centred around a wood-burning furnace providing heating for the building.
We’ll have a wood-fired sauna and we’re looking at bringing in some clever, low-energy, low carbon systems to run hot tubs. We also hope to have standalone greenhouse/solarium. The design will retain the indoor/outdoor experience, with a walled garden, but it will be designed for year round use.
What opportunities do you see? We’re talking to organisations in Bristol and Brighton (in the UK) about creating more bathhouses. Our key criteria is to partner with organisations which share our vision and love the concept. We’d be really open to working with an established spa operator or someone who wanted to invest.
We genuinely want to change spa culture, make spas more affordable, and to get people to use them more regularly.
Read more from this issue of Spa Business magazine
Interview: Helene Goetzelmann
L'Occitane's international spa director tells Rhianon Howells how the consumer retail company has become a spa operator with 60 facilities
Ask an expert: Profit & Loss
Hotel spas need to fight capital expenditure allocation said an investor panel at this year's Global Spa & Wellness Summit
Research: All rise
There's been an increase in the five top key performance indicators in the US spa industry shows the 2013 ISPA study
Company Profile Promotion: ESPA promotion
As ESPA's 20th
anniversary year draws
to a close, founder and
CEO Sue Harmsworth
explains how and why the
company is still evolving
Safari Spa: Animal instinct
Safari spas are the staple for Amani, one of South Africa's largest spa chains. Lisa Starr talks to MD Ronleigh Gordon
Trends: Brief encounters
We take a look at some of the most innovative spa pop-ups, a growing trend across the leisure sector
Interview: Paul Smyth
Something & Son designer shares his insights on creating pop-up spa facilities. Magali Robathan reports
Summit review: Upping the ante
Katie Barnes reveals the takeaway messages from the 2013 Global Spa & Wellness Summit in New Delhi, India, attended by 375 industry leaders
Research: Local news
Domestic travellers dominate the global wellness tourism market which has an economic impact of US$1.3 trillion. SRI's Ophelia Yeung reports
Research: Thai up
Prantik Bordoloi analyses a 2013 Thai spa industry study based on both spa consumer and spa operator opinions
Software news: Tech talk
The latest developments and news from spa software suppliers from around the world
Rachelle Moulai, the spa manager at Barking Bathhouse has a background in running five-star spas and headed up So Spa at London Sofitel St James before being approached by Something & Son to help with its pop-up. “They asked me to choose between fun and security and I chose fun,” says Moulai who quickly hired five therapists on a self-employed basis who paid the pop-up a 25 per cent commission on their takings.
When the permanent facility opens, she says therapists will be paid a salary and the spa will cover all operating expenses unlike at the learning centre which lets the space for free and covers the bills.
“It was scary coming to this project but it’s turned out to be the job of my life,” says Moulai. “I don’t have that corporate pressure here and everyone is happy: we are doing a good thing for the community, and we still have those very high standards I had at my previous jobs.”
Magali Robathan is the managing editor of Leisure Management, a sister publication to Spa Business Email: [email protected] Phone: +44 117 9723101
Barking Bathhouse opened in the run up to the 2012 London Olympic Games
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
The ‘eco-industrial chic’ design was inspired by an original 1890s bathhouse in the area
Premium London health club, KX Chelsea, will imminently unveil its most significant
redevelopment since its launch in 2002 to create an integrated wellness model combining
training, recovery and relaxation.
Rosewood Le Guanahani St Barth, on the northeast coast of Saint Barthélemy in the French
West Indies, is offering a programme of ocean-inspired yoga classes between 8-14 June to
celebrate Global Wellness Day (GWD).
Hotel de France, located on the British Isle of Jersey, has created a wellness retreat package
that includes a hot yoga session that will take place in Jersey Zoo’s butterfly sanctuary.
The Ritz-Carlton, Langkawi, in Malaysia, has revealed a schedule for Global Wellness Day
(GWD) that includes guided rainforest walks, mindful movement and guided coastal meditation
experiences.
Longevitix, a clinical platform for preventive and longevity medicine, has launched its AI-
powered intelligence system to help physicians deliver continuous, personalised longevity-
focused care at scale.
Atmantan Wellness Centre, an integrative wellness destination in Mulshi, near Pune in India, is
expanding its portfolio by adding a new centre in Hyderabad that will launch between 2028 and
2029.
A recent survey by the UK Spa Association (UKSA) into the industry’s approach to cancer care
has revealed that almost half of participating respondents (46 per cent) are unaware that
cancer is a disability and guests with a cancer diagnosis must be given
Mexican operator, Solmar Hotels and Resorts, is hosting a series of events in celebration of
Global Wellness Day, including a Temazcal ceremony at its Playa Grande Resort and Spa in Los
Cabos.
Mandarin Oriental has announced a standalone residence brand, Mansions, which will debut at
Emirates Palace, Mandarin Oriental Mansions, Abu Dhabi, in 2029.
Le Atelier by C.O.D.E. doesn't offer a standard bespoke service, it provides a highly
customised approach to designing massage beds and loungers in high-end wellness
environments. [more...]
