Spa Struck
Take a well-earned break with these top spa escapes
A little self care can be just the ticket to get you ready and re-energised for a new season. If time allows, a couple of days ensconced in a spa hotel will enable you to properly switch off, retune and relax. Proving you don’t have to travel far for top-notch treatments, we round up the best spas less than two hours from London.
Zen by the sea
The whole beach-chic, driftwood vibe of The Gallivant in Rye is designed to chill guests to perfection and it’s now added yoga retreats to its soothing calling card. The weekend yoga retreats run every few months (the next is on 2 September) and the hotel also runs weekly yoga classes for residents. Book a garden room with a cosy courtyard, take walks along the dunes and neighbouring golden sands and Zen out in picture-perfect surroundings. The cute Beach Hut on site offers massages, facials and beauty treatments in the wild flower garden while The Gallivant’s restaurant is one of the best dining offerings on the South Coast with a menu dedicated to locally sourced produce.
www.thegallivant.co.uk
Spa and snooze
Hunker down in this quintessential English country house hotel and you’ll soon feel stresses ebb away. Mallory Court’s new Elan Spa has 12 luxurious spa bedrooms meaning guests can sashay from bed to pool in just a few slippered footsteps. Once spa-side, there’s a bubbling outdoor vitality pool, glazed outdoor sauna, Rhassoul mud room, seven relaxing treatment rooms, and a jet-filled indoor hydro pool, sauna and steam room.
The Warwickshire hotel has an additional 31 rooms in the grand manor house – our favourites look out over the pretty gardens. The spa menu has a real emphasis on soothing mind and body with stand out treatments including the ESPA strength & resilience massage, which uses aromatherapeutic formulas to soothe muscular aches, yogic stretches to awaken the senses and reflexology to stimulate the body. Country elegance and a superb spa – the Dining Room restaurant and impeccable service only adds to the appeal of this couple’s getaway.
www.mallory.co.uk
Hydrotherapy happiness
Set amidst the wild, natural beauty of the New Forest, Carey’s Manor has a dreamy candle-lit hydrotherapy pool and hydro spa boasting a crystal steam room, herbal sauna, blizzard shower, ice room, laconicum, experience showers providing tropical dousings of ‘Caribbean rain’ and ‘Atlantic storms’ and a blissful tepidarium with heated mosaic loungers. Stressed out? Try the lava shell massage, where tiger clam lava shells and aromatherapy oils warm the body and melt away knots. And once you’re buffed and blissfully relaxed, recharge with bracing walks around the open heaths and pastures where New Forest ponies roam free.
www.careysmanor.com
Closer to home
Spa Verta
Located on the riverfront in Battersea’s Crowne Plaza hotel, Spa Verta offers a little urban escapism and the subterranean spa is a good option for a quick pampering pit stop. Along with beauty and massage treatments and an OPI nail bar, Verta’s new Lava Shells massage uses essential oils and bespoke massage techniques using warmed shells for spine-soothing relaxation. The oils are natural, organic, vegan, pregnancy friendly and smell divine.
www.spavertalondon.com
Charlotte Cave
Proof that small touches make all the difference, Charlotte Cave’s two hair and beauty salons in Balham and Clapham feel intimate, cosy and high end. Perfecting everything from tresses to toes, clients can enjoy movies from comfy leather lounge seats while getting a mani pedi or book in for a luxury facial or massage in one of the soothing therapy rooms. On Monday mornings, an Ofsted nanny is on hand to entertain kids with films, smoothies and popcorn while parents enjoy some much-needed downtime.
Brooklands hotel
Caudalie facials and body treatments, luxury manicures and a range of massages are on offer at this Weybridge hotel next to Mercedes-Benz World, with packages to please all with drivng and spa breaks!
Foxhills
This luxury hotel near Chertsey is a beautiful setting for a pampering experience. As well as indoor and vitality pools, there is a spa garden with a sauna and natural pool. Choose from a signature treatment to match your needs or go for the likes of a results-driven Elemis facial. There’s a golf course too – another quick weekend getaway to please all.
The Lensbury
With a personal hydrotherapy bath, a relaxation room with views over the Thames, and a wide range of massages and facials, a session at the Teddington health club will leave you relaxed and refreshed.
