When you go down the elevator at the Greenwich Hotel, it feels like the doors open into another realm. The dim lobby of the The Shibui Spa is lit by Japanese lanterns, and the tone of the staff is professionally, soothingly hushed. To begin, I was escorted into the locker room, where I was offered sake and a sparkling yuzu drink. After a dip in the pool—which was warm, but not too warm—and a steam in the locker room, I followed my massage therapist through a winding otherworldly maze to the treatment rooms.
I was led up a step into a wooden-accented massage room that felt like a Japanese mountain cabin. I opted for a reflexology massage, and it lulled me into a psychoactive dream state, thoughts slipping by like little rafts in a stream. My massage therapist seemed to literally shed layers of tightness in my shoulders which had accumulated over the week. Every guest seemed to leave their treatment in the same stupefied haze of relaxation.—A.G.L.
Photo: Courtesy of Four Seasons New York Downtown
While the OG Midtown Four Seasons is known the world over for its iconic I.M. Pei design, its Lower Manhattan outpost, which opened in 2016, is home to one of the finest spas in the city. Let’s start with the showstopper: the 75-foot lap pool—one of the city’s largest—which is surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows. The pool is perfectly heated at about 82 to 85 degrees, and the floor is set at a temperate 85 (meaning no teeth-chattering strides back to your towel). There are seven treatment rooms, a Peloton-packed fitness center, a steam room, infrared sauna, and a sundeck that overlooks Downtown Manhattan. The Four Seasons Downtown is the kind of place you’d expect Succession’s Shiv Roy to turn up. Stylish and discrete, the hotel is for those who live in quiet luxury (but who’d never utter such a phrase). The spa is just as refined—all white marble and dappled sunlight—with plush sitting rooms for whiling away the afternoon or taking over a business empire. —Jessie Heyman, executive director, strategic content initiatives
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Photo: Michael Kleinberg, Courtesy of The Ritz-Carlton NoMad
