Wellness starts from the inside with the new Wellness Programmes at Talise Spa…

Rewind five years, and the role of the hotel spa was simply to offer pampering massages that kneed out the knots and kinks, and a menu of glow-inducing facials that enhanced holiday skin. But now, hotel spas are so much more than that.

Pioneering the way is Talise Spa at Jumeirah Al Qasr, a premier wellness destination that has added a collection of eight comprehensive wellness programmes to its extensive offering. Each plan is governed by four key pillars: mental wellness, mindful movement, internal wellbeing, and restoration. Aiming to go deeper than the traditional spa setup, Talise Spa’s bespoke programme’s can be curated over three, six, or seven-days, fusing spa treatments with wellbeing-driven activities and healthy menus that, when combined, promise to be transformative and enriching experiences for physical and emotional wellbeing.

The setting couldn’t be more relaxing. Against the backdrop of Madinat Jumeirah’s winding waterways, Talise Spa is a collection of treatment rooms, relaxation areas, luxe spa facilities and zen-inducing shalas nestled within tropical gardens. When we visit to experience a taste of the Detox Programme, a refreshing ginger tea is served in the instantly calming reception area. A floral fragrance wafting through the air adds to the aura of calm.

Our own session, designed to offer a day of mental and emotional clarity, begins with an hour of energy healing. Using a pendant to channel into our subconscious, therapist Reema unpacks and releases trapped negative emotions both past and present to help restore internal balance. The session comes with feelings of tiredness, heaviness and some hesitation, all of which we’re told are natural reactions. Do we leave feeling lighter? Not immediately, but there is a sense of relief that follows in the next day or two.

The next session is art therapy, a mental wellbeing technique that allows us to tap into our inner child. In a dimly lit treatment room we position a cushion on the floor and take our fingers to the paper, using a rainbow collection of colours to express our current feelings through paint. It feels therapeutic to simply be getting creative for no other reason than to relax, and when we talk through the rhyme and reason behind some of the colour and print selections with the art therapist, it’s both thought-provoking and offers a surprising emotional release.

To conclude our trio of sessions (guests embarking on the three-day wellness programme typically complete six sessions over three days), we return to a more traditional spa therapy, Chi Nei Tsang. An abdominal massage that’s designed to help release emotional tension through recycling negative energies that constrict the natural flow of Chi, or energy, through the body, at Talise Spa it’s combined with stretching techniques all aimed at releasing toxins from the body and ensuring total relaxation. And that’s exactly how we feel when we leave after our Detox session.

Talise Spa, Jumeirah Al Qasr, Jumeirah, 10am to 9pm daily, Detox Programme from Dhs9,800. Tel: (0)4 366 6818. jumeirah.com