Barbaros Bay Turkey

Barbaros Bay’s award-laden Six Senses Spa – 5,500 square metres of holistic health and beauty treatments – lies at the heart of a photogenicresort in southwest Turkey. Perched above the Aegean near Bodrum, it blends Asian philosophy with Ottoman design to offer what it says is ‘an exhilarating sensory journey’. That, roughly translated, is spa-speak for a range of therapies in peaceful, light-drenched treatment rooms, sun-bleached decks and an exquisite hammam of layered marble. It covers the Six Senses signature massages, wraps and facials, as well as bespoke treatments for men and Asian therapies, such as shirodhara, which uses medicinal oil to stimulate the pineal gland, producing serotonin and melatonin to fight ageing and tension.

Outside the spa, the crisply contemporary Kempinski resort offers 149 rooms and 24 suites. Olives restaurant serves Turkish cuisine,and there’s a beachside seafood eaterie too. Barbaros Bay’s swimming pool is one of the Mediterranean’s most beautiful, its emerald water punctuated by minarets that at night glow with an otherworldly beauty.

Huvafen Fushi Maldives

Huvafen Fushi has what may be the most beautiful spa on Earth – it’s certainly the most unique. The two underwater treatment rooms sit on the seabed, 50m offshore, beneath a labyrinth of thatched pavilions and translucent shallows in North Malé atoll. While you’re being slathered in essential oils, a multi-coloured blizzard of reef fish swarm around the tiered banks of coral outside the vast windows (book a 7pm massage to see an elegant daily procession of stingrays returning from sunset feeding).

‘We’re part therapists, part marine biologists,’ says head therapist Dhanya Sreekumari. ‘We know about coral and fish as well as facials and massages.’ Given the Lime Spa’s extraordinary setting, there’s one must-have treatment: a Turquoise Explosion blends an Indian Ocean algae cleanse with a coconut-oil massage and seaweed scrub. The sub-aqua spa, with the ambiance of a highly scented submarine, is what attracts most guests, but you can also be pampered above the waves. The spa pavilions offer Anne Semonin therapies and glass floors, through which you can gaze into the dazzling shallows.

Huvafen Fushi has 44 wood-thatch pavilions, and superb food (try the carpaccio of avocado, reef fish and pomegranate at Raw). It has also pioneered the use of in-house marine biologists, who run coral preservation schemes and ‘spaquarium’ talks.

Royal Malewane South Africa

At Royal Malewane safari lodge, you may well want to reappraise your idea of the Big Five. Instead of lion, elephant, buffalo, leopard and rhino, think the African Awakening, Malewane Pedicure, Royal Treatment, and Sefako and Moru rituals. They’re all bespoke treatments at this superbly located spa in the heart of the wild and remote South African bushveld. Nestling in a private reserve on the edge of Kruger Park, Royal Malewane offers top-notch ‘spafaris’ that combine expert pampering with prolific wildlife.

Unlike several lodges that offer token massages, this is a fully equipped spa and gym offering panoramic views, a steam room, Jacuzzi, and private casitas for Dermalogica therapies mixing indigenous ingredients with mineral-rich water from the reserve’s underground stream. The courtyard’s blonde stone, white sun loungers and deep-blue heated lap pool are worthy of a chic urban spa – the fact it’s surrounded by raw nature is simply extraordinary.

Fifty kilometres from Hoedspruit, the rest of Royal Malewane is similarly luxurious. Its thatched lodge hosts 20 guests in palatial colonial-style suites with white sofas, African art and vast beds alongside decadent bathrooms. The sun decks have rim-flow pools and gazebos overlooking the bush, and there’s more in-house game viewing from the dining area above the watering hole and twice-daily drives, as well as horseback, balloon and helicopter safaris.

North Island Seychelles

Nature and man – or rather soft-fingered therapists – combine to serene effect on this dreamy granitic speck in the Seychelles. A haunt of Hollywood A-listers and high-end castaways, the shabby chic 11-villa bolthole is set around a pristine island of jungle-clad peaks and white-powder beaches. Its spa offers balm and recuperation in open-sided pavilions, washed by warm trade breezes among the palms above the eastern shore. As with the acclaimed cuisine, treatments use plants, herbs and oils harvested within a coconut’s toss of the spa, including – stressed urbanites look away now – The Touch of North Island: a rice and turmeric body scrub followed by a tamarind, honey and yoghurt wrap, and deep relaxation massage.

Twenty minutes by helicopter from Mahe, it also has vast villas of wood, thatch and tastefully muted earth tones, complete with decks, plunge pools and African gazebos. And then there are the extraordinary communal areas. The architects behind Botswana’s mould-breaking Jao and Mombo safari camps have created mesmerising structures with Daliesque columns of faded takamaka trees, sunken sofas, linear reflection pools and mother of pearl chandeliers – the casually elegant setting for menu-free dining with dishes cooked to suit your mood.

Amanusa Bali

If any location’s synonymous with relaxation and Zen-like calm, it’s Bali – the spa’s spiritual home. And if anybody does serenity well, it’s Aman. The two meet and meld on a garden hillside in the south of the island, where super-stylish Amanusa offers widescreen views of tropical forest, Nusa Dua’s white beaches and an emerald expanse of Indian Ocean.

In keeping with Aman’s reputation for understated excellence, the treatments are light, deceptively simple and highly mobile. There is a designated room of honeyed stone, wood and thatch, with a divinely soothing ambiance, but therapies can also be provided in your own suite or in one of the shaded gazebos on the bleached sands of the Amanusa Beach Club.

The resident therapists blend traditional Balinese techniques with Swedish massage and acupressure, and offer the likes of a two-hour lulur body scrub: an exfoliation and polish, climaxing with an island massage and herbal bath. Beauty treatments use bespoke organic products, while for alternative therapies the resort has its own in-house reiki master.

Amanusa’s white, bright, light suites are all about pared-back, understated elegance, with wooden four-posters draped in netting, sunken indoor bathtubs and outdoor showers – eight also have pools – with discrete garden courtyards for private dining.

Lime Wood Hampshire

Few images are more quintessentially English than a Regency manor set in ancient woodland. Lime Wood Hotel, near Lyndhurst in the New Forest, may look the part, but with its boho-chic vibe and unconventional spa, it’s a very contemporary take on the traditional country house. Stylishly converted into a 29-room retreat, it offers highly rated cuisine with seasonal, locally sourced ingredients.

You, however, are just as likely to be drawn to the hotel’s south coast home by its spa, Herb House. With ten treatment rooms and an ozone-treated lap pool gazing out on the trees, its therapies make use of its forest location. Forget hermetically sealed anodyne spas; at Herb House you can meditate on the roof surrounded by mint, gnarled olive trees and a sweet scented riot of herbs, soak outdoors alongside your partner, or cover your skin with gloop from an Austrian glacier while basting in the mud room’s fragrant steam.

Using British products from Bamford and Tri-Dosha to VOYA and NUDE, Herb House offers bespoke therapies, including a walnut and seaweed body buff, along with Ayurvedic treatments, such as Forest Dream – an indulgent blend of four hands massage and oil therapy. The spa intensifies their benefits with the healthy fare of Raw and Cured, serving meat and salmon from the hotel’s smokehouse and bespoke juices like Swamp Water and Ruby Roots. They’re unconventional, slightly irreverent and supremely tasty – much like Lime Wood itself.

Peninsula New York

Cynics say it’s hard to spot the symptoms of a nervous breakdown in New York, where ordinary life is so stressful. So it’s no surprise that America’s spikiest city also has the country’s top spa, a selfproclaimed ‘oasis of serenity’ far above the madding 5th Avenue crowds. The Peninsula Spa, part of the hotel but also open to nonresidents, offers ESPA’s blend of Asian, European and Ayurvedic influences in rooms of stone, mellow wood and rich hues, washed by soft light – 21 floors and a world away from daily Manhattan life. Along with the Heat Experience (aromatherapy steam rooms, saunas and ice fountains) it has a state-of-the-art fitness club, an alfresco sun studio and a pool surrounded by glass walls.

As well as therapies specific to the hotel – Tissue Experience offers free-flowing joint-release techniques – others are borrowed from around the globe, including a Jade Hot Stone Massage from Beijing. It also offers bespoke rituals, including Escape from the City: body wrap, Swedish massage, facial and a super-healthy meal. The therapy menu has recently added five ‘results-oriented facials’ – hey, this is New York – including Triple Lift, which sounds like bad news for America’s plastic surgeons.

Any remaining stress will disintegrate in the hotel’s rooms: neutral cocoons with dark wood furniture within easy reach of Central Park, MoMA and the Rockefeller Centre. Do venture out to eat, though. Alain Ducasse’s Benoit is just down the street, a Paris bistro in Midtown. For American, head three blocks south to the 21Club for a Cobb salad in this super-masculine former speakeasy.

Marques de Riscal Spain

Hotel Marqués de Riscal, tucked into Spain’s Basque country inland from Bilbao, is a Rioja landmark, with Frank Gehry’s mammoth tangle of titanium ribbons rising above its vineyards in an avant garde splatter of 43 rooms and suites.

Its small but perfectly formed spa has a serene pool, deep red walls decorated with gnarled vines and treatment rooms of blonde oak, cedar and teak, and offers wine-based balm. Caudalie vinotherapists combine warm spring water with grape and wine extracts to produce treatments such as crushed cabernet scrub, grape marc exfoliation and ‘pulp friction’ massage with fresh grapes. It also offers merlot wraps and premier cru facials.

Marqués de Riscal vintages complement the Michelin-starred cuisine of Francis Paniego, who gives traditional Riojan dishes a radical modern tweak to create the likes of foie gras with red wine caviar and red pepper, and tomato tartar with Norwegian lobster and cold garlic soup. Almost as exciting is the restaurant design, with its steel custard-cup lamps that drop from towering ceilings, and copper and onyx counters, and vast window framing the village of Elciego and St Andrés Church, built in the 16th century. Tear yourself away from the hotel – with its rooms individually designed in leather and maple wood – and local vineyards, the wild Basque coast and San Sebastián are within easy reach.

Slieve Donard Northern Ireland

Slieve Donard, on the edge of Newcastle, 50km south of Belfast, gazes across Dundrum Bay. It conjures up images of buckets and spades on Irish Sea beaches and red-cheeked walks on the Mountains of Mourne. But the 115-year-old hotel, a red-bricked Northern Irish grand dame, hosts a twostorey spa – art of a multi-million pound refit five years ago – that confidently claims to be one of Europe’s best.

Its coolly elegant, white-walled pool has floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook a surf-lashed beach. The 16 treatment rooms offer mood lighting and sensory showers, and a thermal suite takes you from an amethyst steam room to rock sauna and vitality pools. ESPA therapies, meanwhile, promise expert balm for the body and mind without breaking the bank.

Alongside the mix of hot-stone therapies, wraps and massages, there are Ayurvedic treatments tailored to skin and personality types. But the menu of men’s spa treatments is perhaps the most memorable with a Swing Revitaliser – for golf rather than anything more flamboyant – and a therapy known as The Irish Man: 55 minutes of pampering for the head and face involving hot towels, ESPA aromatherapy oils and a relaxing scalp massage. It apparently works for English, Scottish and Welsh men too.

Slieve Donard doesn’t appear to do small. To go with the generously sized spa, the hotel has 178 rooms and suites offering expansive views of gardens, mountains, the coast and golfing greens – it’s slap bang on the world-famous Royal County Down course – along with a restaurant serving local Kilkeel prawns and rack of Antrim lamb.

Bad Ragaz Zurich

If the Swiss run the cream of Alpine spas and accommodation, then Bad Ragaz is the crème de la crème. The country’s largest wellness centre, an hour outside Zurich, channels the healing properties of thermal water that has gushed from nearby Tamina Gorge since medieval times. The resort’s health centre has 70 staff offering everything from weight management and minor plastic surgery – fittingly, Bad Ragaz recently underwent a £80 million facelift – to sleep analysis and counselling. It’s home to the Swiss Olympic medical centre, Michelin-starred Abtestube restaurant, a PGA championship golf course and two five-star hotels, including Grand Hotel Quellenhof, whose spa suites contain some of the most hi-tech bathrooms on the planet.

An expansive menu of traditional spa treatments, including a decadent caviar firming facial and choco therapy, harnessing the cocoa bean’s mineral salts, vitamins and antioxidants, are provided in the resort’s private 36.5º Wellbeing & Thermal Spa. But mindful of its spectacular location, 15 minutes from Pizol’s ski slopes, Bad Ragaz also offers the magnificent architecture of the Tamina Therme public day spa. A fusion of Scandinavian design and New England materials, it juxtaposes curved columns of white wood, vast oval windows and impossibly blue pools.