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Health Through Water: Ladywell’s Vitality Spa & Sauna By Grace Jensen
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early every culture around the world has some kind of bathing tradition. Whether it involved soft heat, jumping in cool pools, breathing deeply in a room filled with ancient and therapuetic salt, or all of the above, bathing and the sauna have long been viewed as a means to detox and purify both body and mind. Greenwood-based Ladywell’s Vitality Spa & Sauna seeks to create an experi-
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meet mata amritanandamayi, renowned humanitarian and spiritual leader
MAy 23-26
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free public progrAMs
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Friday, May 23 Morning, 10:00 am, Evening, 7:30 pm
May 24 – 26 Pre-registration required
Monday, May 26 Devi Bhava begins at 7:00 pm Hyatt regency Bellevue 900 Bellevue Way NE Bellevue, Washington 98004
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Om LOkah SamaStah SukhinO Bhavantu • may aLL BeingS everywhere Be happy
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ence for women summarized by the ancient Romans as “salus per aquam,” health through water, and make the healing and restorative tradition of the sauna available to the Seattle area. “I first experienced ‘taking a sauna’ in Russia and I was hooked,” says owner Crystal Carlson. “Putting yourself through the circuit of heat and cold is so rejuvenating and it immediately and visibly improves your health. I started wondering why we didn’t have a spa like that in my own neighborhood, and was inspired to create one,” she continues. It would be a seven year journey, but Carlson opened the doors to Ladywell’s Vitality Spa & Sauna just over one year ago. For an entry fee of $36 ($25 early bird rates before 2 p.m. Tuesdays through Friday), women have unlimited access to three heat therapy rooms, a dry cedar sauna, an infrared Himalayan pink salt sauna, an herbal steam bath, three stainless steel spas, hot tub (103 degrees), tepid tub (96 degrees), and cold plunge with waterfall (56 degrees). Guests also enjoy complimentary organic herbal tea in the resting lounge, which offers a couch, stretching mats and a hanging chair. Ladywell’s provides a locker and towels, shampoo, body wash, and conditioner. There is no time limit. Massage therapy services using house-made natural products are available for an additional charge. The spa is open to women only, and most guests choose to experience the spa nude, although swimsuits are allowed. Women come to Ladywell’s alone or with friends, and it has become a popular place for quiet, relaxed birthday parties and other celebrations. “Taking a sauna, or taking the baths is one of the oldest forms of preventative healthcare medicine we have as humans,” Carlson says. “In very simplified terms, when you heat your body up it thinks it has a fever, when you contrast with the cold plunge or cool rinse, it thinks it gets a chill.”