A Glimpse into the Wellness Trends

That will take shape in 2017 and beyond.

- Taru Bahl

With stressful lives, overworked populations and a general global unrest, wellness has become a guiding light for the hospitality industry. They have pampered their faithful clients and wooed an entire generation of holiday seekers with products and services that conform to the highest standards of wellness. Within the wellness space too there has been a lot of debate, discussion and reinvention as guests became more discerning and selective.

The Global Wellness Summit has in recent years emerged as a key platform for some of these wellness trends to be refined. The 2017 edition held in Kitzbühel, Austria, brought together more than 500 leaders from as many as 46 countries representing the travel, spa, beauty, fitness, nutrition, technology, medical and architecture fields to shortlist eight wellness trends for 2017.

Many of the old concepts were challenged as experts brainstormed on ways in which they could expand some of their products and refine existing ones. A new era for wellness seems to have dawned with eight strong contenders vying for space.

Moving from an intimate to a sociable sauna experience

Saunas have been around for thousands of years. History accounts have detailed descriptions of kings and warriors in Central and Eastern Europe having a sauna before readying for battle or other state functions in enclosures that were akin to amphitheatres.

According to wellness experts, the repackaged sauna experience will be the biggest wellness trend of 2017 and these will move away from the earlier preference of intimate and private saunas to the theatrical and spectacular. Mostly, the sweatier the sauna is and the more socialisation it provides, the more in demand it is going to be.