Is Your Superyacht Really Super if it Doesn’t Have a Spa On Board?

A spa — or perhaps a gym tucked beside the thrumming engine room — was once little more than a “nice to have” on the wish list handed to a superyacht designer. Today, wellness is influencing how yachts are conceived from the keel up.

“I wanted a vessel that encouraged movement, relaxation and healthy routines in a much more natural way,” says Scott Blum, an American superyacht owner and seasoned charterer. Frustrated by yachts that treated wellness as an afterthought, he decided to create his own replicable model. Working with the designer Bernd Weel, he launched the company Dutch Design with plans to build a limited series of ten yachts, of which the 42.5m Sea Rover is the first.

Instead of treating exercise and recovery as private chores to be done below deck before coming up for the fun stuff, Sea Rover brings them front and centre. Occupying prime real estate on a deck above the bridge, the woody Japanese spa, in the onsen (hot spring) style, packs in a dual-temperature plunge pool and an infrared therapy wall, and opens directly onto outside spaces, so guests can sip their post-massage tea in the sea air. The adjacent gym has sculptural equipment custom-made in Poland by Pent and its small team of carpenters, leatherworkers and engineers. On the adjoining aft deck, there is a mini sports court that can be adapted for basketball, pickleball, padel, volleyball and yoga — owners could even store their sports car or submersible there.

The minimalistic design, influenced by Japan and California, reinforces the sense that wellness is “woven into the entire experience,” as Blum says. The first Sea Rover is due for delivery in 2028.

For a similar wellness-focused project — the 72m Ananda (from the Sanskrit word for “inner joy”) — the established Dutch yard Heesen consulted “human health engineering specialists”. When the superyacht is finished in 2030, guests at its 1,000 sq ft water-level spa will stroll past waterfalls and via a spa pool hewn from raw stone to spill out on to the seascape via a vast fold-down platform on the side of the boat. For divers there’s a hyperbaric chamber, and there’s an exhilarating mix of sauna, steam room, ice bath and snow shower (which, yes, rains snow).

The 44m explorer yacht Nasiba, built by the Italian yard Cantieri delle Marche, takes a more sensory approach to wellness. “Every element, from pebble floors to the meditation altar, has been designed to slow time, engage the senses, boost wellbeing and celebrate both craft and nature,” says Jennifer Smith of the London-based Winch Design, which created the bespoke interiors. Nasiba is “built not just to travel the world, but to live well within it,” she adds.

Winch is researching organic finishes while exploring surfaces that actively contribute to wellbeing. On Nasiba, natural, non-toxic materials (including a moss wall), Himalayan salt walls, soft forms and carefully choreographed circadian lighting combine to create interiors that calm the senses.

Anders Kurtén, chief executive of the superyacht brokerage house Fraser Yachts, notes that a relationship with the natural world is becoming increasingly important on board. “The [73m Sanlorenzo] Virtuosity incorporates a living tree into its interior, a striking way of bringing nature on board, while the [52m Baglietto] Daybreak features a three-level beach club that transforms the aft section of the yacht into an expansive waterside living space,” he says. Perhaps most strikingly, spas are no longer being treated as private retreats but as social spaces. Of Heesen’s 67m Sparta, which devotes a deck to its spa, Julia Roestenberg of Winch Design says: “We deliberately lowered the sightlines, sinking a circular wooden pool so bathers could converse easily with guests in the surrounding spaces.”

These spaces speak to a desire for recuperation, contemplation and communion — whether with nature or each other. Perhaps the ultimate luxury is more than having the space to escape, but in creating spaces that make you feel better when you leave than you did when you arrived.

Estel Arapoglou
estel@shaminabas.com
+1-561-676-3173