Tried and tested: Find a new communal experience at Contrast Wellness, City Walk

A refreshing brand of wellness…

What’s new in the world of Contrast, you might ask. The innovation of husband-and-wife trailblazers Layla Kardan and Hamdan Al Khafaji, this wellness haven has been inviting seekers of serenity and healing into its world for a while now, at the first Palm Jumeirah branch. The newest outpost, in the heart of the city in City Walk, has all the best things from the past and some wonderful new things in the present to elevate the experience. It’s truly the most communal space.

What’s new?

To be more specific, the new additions are the Social Contrast Room, the Contrast Hydro Room and the Remedy Room. The Contrast Hydro Room has introduced a new form therapy – alternating between hot magnesium baths and ice baths. Ice baths and the temperature shocks are incredibly beneficial, but the novelty lies in the magnesium, that when absorbed through the skin, regulates cortisol levels and improves mood. The increased magnesium stores in the body also help improve energy, calm nerves and anxiety, all leading to a better night’s sleep.

The Remedy Room offers the Normatec Compression Therapy, a treatment using dynamic compression technology to improve circulation, ease muscle soreness, and speed up recovery. It’s meant to feel like a gentle internal massage. Also included are IV drips tailored to individual needs.

It’s all in the eye

The whole space is washed in tones of sand and beige, with smooth arches and billowing curtains for doors that make it feel very zen. The calm and quiet comes from the minimalism of it all, the simple accents of thoughtful greenery and the low, soft lighting inside the rooms, wooden benches and wicker baskets. This is the slow life.

Wellness beyond the body

On this particular visit, we try the highlight of the new venue – the Social Contrast Room. Designed as a unique space for socialisation, bonding, relaxation and spending quality time with those close to you, the room is a big cave inside the establishment. Afterall, wellness is more than just physical, and draws so much from what is going on up there. This space especially, makes use of those elements – happiness, mental clarity, stress relief and stunning aesthetics that soothe your brain.

The room accommodates four or more people for a one hour session and has a large traditional Finnish sauna room, complete with an impressive TV display outside where you can catch up on Netflix with your friends, two ice baths, three showers and plenty of space to lounge around and relax. The finishing touches include two full-length mirrors and a space on the side with a curtain for you to change.

The sauna is a wholesome, sweaty experience, with all of us being sauna beginners. We stay in there for as long as we can, around 20 minutes, and then step out to cool off before we step into the significantly colder ice baths. The temperature is set at 10 degrees Celsius, since we’re ice bath beginners as well, and no plunges are really taken. We start with a foot and then a leg and so on and so forth.

Once we’re all in, we end up spending nearly 30 minutes inside. It comes as a surprise, but we can feel all the muscles relaxing and the knots from life melting away, and it’s truly a rejuvenating experience, made that much better with some gossip, some laughs and a break in time – the concept is working. So, if you’re looking for the next memorable thing to do with your gal or guy pals, this is it.

Contrast Wellness, City Walk, daily, 7am to 10pm, , Tel: (0) 50 521 8044, @contrastwellness 

Images: Supplied