Vicky Spratt

‘When a man (person) is tired of London,’ as Dr Samuel Johnson wrote in 1777, ‘he is (they are) tired of life.’ Well, it’s fair to say that Johnson wasn’t running for the tube before squeezing himself into a sweaty, crowded carriage and then spending the day being bombarded with short videos about apocalyptic geopolitics on TikTok, Instagram, and Twitter? London is the greatest city in the world, but should you find yourself a little tired and in need of some R&R what better way to recover than booking yourself into one of London’s world-class spas? And, better still, getting a massage or, even, a facial with a bespoke sound journey while you’re at it? Spa culture - from high-end luxury to community spaces - is really starting to take off in London. On our list, you’ll find standout spas and treatments, five-star hotels and community spots all offering you the chance to unplug and unwind, regardless of whether you’re on a champagne or lemonade budget. Here - in no particular order - are our absolute favourite places to relax in the capital. Best spas in London at a glance Best for affordable pampering: Ironmonger Row Baths Best for a serious splurge: Ushvani Best for men’s grooming: Thai Square Spa Best for couples’ visits: Aire Ancient Baths Best pool: Surrenne at The Berkeley Best facial: Salon C Stellar RECOMMENDED:The best saunas in LondonThe best facials in LondonThe best hotels in London

Are you a Londoner in need of a bit of R&R? A quick trip on the Lizzy line to Reading will take you to this award-winning and historic lido and spa. This place was originally built as a ladies-only swimming bath in 1902 before ultimately closing to the public in 1974. It reopened in 2017 after a three-year restoration project and now contains a heated pool, hot tub and saunas, as well as massage rooms.  This is where old-school lido culture meets modern spa (affordable) luxury. Swim in the warm open-air swimming pool in winter and watch the sun set in the hot tub before enjoying a delicious meal in the lido restaurant. During the summer, grab a spot to sunbathe before enjoying a cocktail. Massages here won’t break the bank and are set against the backdrop of people splashing around gently in the pool below the treatment rooms. The classic lido massage is brilliant, and, at £85, a lot more accessibly priced than treatments at a lot of spas. The food here is incredible too; make sure to book a table in the restaurant, where you will sit underneath the original beams from the 1902 building. 

Not many spas feature a swimming pool that helped bring down a government – but then again, there aren’t many places like Cliveden.  In 1893, the American millionaire, William Waldorf Astor (1848–1919) purchased this luxury country home in Berkshire for $1.3 million. This historic house then became home to the ‘Cliveden Set’, which included Nancy Astor, the first woman Member of Parliament in Britain. Today it’s a five-star hotel.  Cliveden’s spa is equally historic. It is home to the only listed outdoor pool in the UK; set inside a walled garden, here you can swim where Christine Keeler reportedly swam naked during her affairs with Britain’s married minister for war, John Profumo, in a scandal that eventually brought down the Government.  Treatments are far more soporific than scandalous, however. Massages take place on heated waterbeds, which are nothing short of otherworldly, and the indoor pool is perfect for getting some lengths in. Scented oils are named after Nancy Astor and Lady Anna Maria, who founded Cliveden with the Duke of Buckingham in the late 1600s, and accompany each treatment. This is for you if you like your spa time to come with a side of British history.

Pennyhill Park is one of the largest spas in Britain and, reportedly, Europe. Visiting is the ultimate day trip from central London. Here you’ll find no fewer than eight swimming pools, three saunas and more steam rooms than I was able to count. This really is the Universal Studios of spas.  The Pool Bar (open in summer months) serves cocktails, and there are plenty of loungers to lie out on around the 60ft outdoor pool. The indoor 80ft Ballroom pool is heated for the cooler months, and if you put your head under the water, you’ll hear music playing. There’s also an outdoor hydrotherapy pool, indoor hot tub and several outdoor Canadian hot tubs. The thermal suite features herbal saunas (juniper was particularly good), steam rooms (the salt inhalation room is quite something), laconica, tepidarium, a mud treatment room, several foot spas, a cold plunge pool, and an ice room. Massages, facials, body treatments, manicures and pedicures take place in one of a whopping 23 treatment rooms, and the indoor bar serves slushy cocktails.  This is really girls’ day out, so we’d recommend going with the gang. And if you want to stay over and feel you haven’t indulged enough, book into the hotel’s Michelin Star Latymer restaurant. 

There are spas, and then there are spas. Beaverbook’s Coach House falls into the latter category. Set in the grounds of another historic house on the outskirts of London, once owned by British newspaper tycoon, Lord Beaverbrook, the Coach House spa is home to an outdoor pool, an indoor pool, a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, and a thermal spa with steam and sauna rooms, plus a beautiful relaxation area set underneath a painted stained glass ceiling. Medicinal plants from the on-site apothecary garden are used in treatments and teas. The standout treatment here is the Vibrational Sound Bodywork performed in The Meadow Hut – a private, tranquil hut located within the spa grounds and looking out over the Surrey Hills. This 90-minute ritual, it incorporates energy cleansing with sage and rosemary, a full-body massage, and sound healing, featuring the use of chimes, gongs, Tibetan bowls and tuning forks. Master practitioner Lino Zinchi has created something truly unique here. Bespoke facials and private yoga and pilates sessions are also available. At the end of my treatment, I sipped herbal tea and looked out across the horizon. A storm was coming in, and an enormous rain cloud, shaped like a hare, began to move across the landscape. For a moment, so light did I feel after Zinchi’s treatment, I seriously considered moving into the hut, throwing away my smartphone and becoming at one with that cloud. Beaverbrook has no fewer than seven restaurants and bars, so make sure you save some t

On the 10th floor of the Four Seasons Park Lane, you will find heaven, in the form of a sauna with views of Hyde Park and Battersea Power Station. When asked how you’d like the curtains at the Four Seasons Hotel spa, definitely, definitely say ‘open’.  Bespoke massages and facials are carried out in treatment rooms with similarly breathtaking views, which suspend you above the city while you relax. After the massage, you’ll be gently ushered to a private relaxation pod where you can sip tea, or prosecco if that’s more your thing. There are also pools and steam rooms, but do note that these are gender segregated, so if you’re planning a romantic afternoon with your heterosexual partner for one of the spa’s couples’ treatments, you won’t be able to enjoy these together. When you’re done at the spa, the cocktail bar downstairs - Bar Antoine - is a hidden gem with concept tonics that you can have with or without alcohol, depending on how you’re feeling post-massage. For more R&R, here is our full list of the best spas in London.

A grand old dame of Park Lane, first opened in 1931, The Dorchester has it all: heritage, prestige and exemplary modern service. Entering the hotel is, I imagine, how it would feel to wander right into a royal wedding - chandeliers and soft powder colours accent opulent antiques and incredible art deco design. No coincidence given that Queen Elizabeth II dined at the Dorchester on the eve of her 1947 engagement to Prince Philip.  The spa is located in the basement. You’ll have no problem finding it, the lifts have a button which simply reads ‘spa’, and they will transport you to tranquillity. As you exit the lift, you’ll be greeted by a display of Dorchester roses. Off to one side, an elegant ‘Spatisserie’ serves afternoon teas and flutes of champagne to would-be virtuous ladies in robes. The facials and massages here are indulgent and performed by world-class therapists. If that’s not enough, in 2026, the Dorchester Spa’s wellness residency is bringing experts together to offer a range of other holistic and beauty treatments: award-winning clinical aesthetician and facialist Natasha Clancy, reflexology expert Marzena Zawadzka, and acupuncturist and holistic therapist Renata Nunes. Across the road, you’ll find the pool, steam and sauna at sister hotel 45 Park Lane, where you can unwind some more. Post-spa, make time to eat at The Dorchester Grill, where I had a life-changing steak tartare courtesy of new head chef Jacob Keen-Downs. And, if money is no object, stay the night a

Community Sauna Baths is a not-for-profit venture started by sauna enthusiasts who wanted to make sauna and cold plunge accessible to a wider range of people, including those on low incomes. And, boy, have they succeeded. Now, if you text someone to ask whether they fancy a drink, it’s not uncommon to get the response ‘on my way to Hackney sauna, can meet after’. Probably the most well-known and popular branch – there are also locations in Stratford, Peckham and Bermondsey – this sauna is a sweltering oasis in the concrete-y maze that is Hackney Wick, each with its own charm – this sauna is a sweltering oasis in the concrete-y maze that is Hackney Wick. Facilities are basic - straightforward saunas and cold plunges in metal tubs – but the atmosphere is communal and convivial. 90 minute sessions start at £10 for off-peak times, or you can go to a morning drop-in for £8.50, or you an hire a five or 22-person sauna for the exclusive use of you and your mates. For the ultimate sensory experience, take the plunge into one of the ice baths in an old whiskey barrel. It’s very Hackney. 

Ironmonger Row opened its doors for the first time in 1931, when it was established by the Finsbury Metropolitan Council to offer washing machines for men and women at a time when at-home laundry was not yet standard for all households.  Today, the historic building is home to an affordable spa and swimming pool, which dates back to 1938, when the building was updated to include Turkish baths. Thanks to careful restoration in 2012, you can sauna and steam alongside the building’s original features: there’s a steam room, three hot rooms, an icy plunge pool, relaxation areas and marble slabs for hammam body scrubs and massages. Two-hour thermal spa sessions start at £44, while full spa days start at £275, including a £40 food and drink voucher.

This traditional Russian spa in East London is hidden away in the basement underneath a block of flats. If you’re wondering ‘Am I in the right place?’, that’s a sign that you have indeed arrived. At Banya, you can use the public spa or book a private session. Either way, perhaps the most relaxing thing about this establishment is the fact that staff - known as bankshiks - shepherd you around, telling you what to do and removing the need to think for yourself for as long as you’re here. Bliss.  A Russian banya is hotter than your average sauna. For that reason, you’ll be handed a grey felt hat to protect your head from the heat. Inside the sauna, one of the banshik’s will operate the cast-iron oven to crank up the temperature while waving a fan around. If you’re nattering too much, he may also tell you to be quiet.  Other treatments include paranie - a Russian sauna ritual which is supposed to improve blood circulation. This involves lying down inside a sauna while one of the banshik’s gently whacks your entire body with a bouquet of aromatic birch, oak and eucalyptus branches. This is more relaxing than it sounds, but it is an extremely hot treatment, so afterwards, you’ll want to dunk yourself in the ice-cold plunge pool. The traditional Siberian mud mask and honey and salt body scrub are also worth trying, and somewhat gentler.  In between treatments, you’ll be able to relax in the restaurant where you can order from an extensive menu of Eastern European and Russian delica

Hidden away in the heart of Soho, Salon C Stellar is the most unique wellness destination in London. Founded by skincare guru Andrea Pfeffer, this clinic offers cutting-edge sensory and experiential skincare and wellbeing treatments and is quite unlike anywhere else in the city.  Bespoke sound healing is available as a standalone individual treatment or with a group. But if you want to combine sound healing with a facial, Pfeffer has commissioned musicians and artists to design soundscapes to accompany her treatments. As you lie back in the treatment bed, a playlist from model Erin O’Connor or Tom Hiddleston reading poetry by Lord Byron is piped into your brain via headphones, which cocoon you in sound and make you forget that you are a few steps away from Regent Street. Microneedling and radiofrequency treatments are also available.  Salon C Stellar’s ‘Astro Facial’ is perhaps the most unique treatment on offer in London - why not have your astrological chart read so that your therapist can match your treatment products to your moon sign? Before you head back out into the hustle and bustle of London, take a few sips of Salon C Stellar’s bespoke Stellar Tonic, which is infused with Holy Basil, Sea Moss, Hibiscus and charged with Ruby Crystal. What does that mean? All I know is that I’ve never felt so unbothered by the Saturday shoppers cutting up my path as I make my way through central London at the weekend before. This one’s for you if you’re more treatment-focused and look

How do you feel about maximalism? If the answer is that you are bad, incredibly bougie, like truffle pasta, enjoy eating your meals in pristine candlelit rooms, and love visiting marble toilets that are bigger than your London bedroom, then you’ve come to the right place.  Il Borro, on Berkley Street, has taken over what was once the site of Nobu. Il Borro means ‘the gorge’ in Italian and is also a real place in Tuscany: a medieval hamlet at the source of the Arno River which (for the history heads) has been inhabited for more than a thousand years by the Etruscans, the Medici family and Alessandro dal Borro, Field Marshal of the Holy Roman Empire, known as the ‘Terror of the Turks’.  The food and drink is all sourced from this part of Tuscany, which is known for both its deep gorges – or borri – and the produce that it spawns: wine, chestnuts, durum wheat, wild boar. Today, the 750-hectare organic Il Borro estate is owned by the Ferragmo family and the Mayfair restaurant is a minimal cream-hued outpost for their farm-to-table vision. Hearty Italian cooking but make it glamorous, this is exactly what you’d expect from the West End: women with immaculate blow dries, first dates and people who appear to be having business dinners fill the restaurant.   Hearty Italian cooking but make it glamorous Like nearby Murano (Angela Harnett) this is modern Italian dining. To begin, butter-like carpaccio di manzo (raw, thinly sliced beef tenderloin) arrives with rocket leaves, Parmesan a

When was the last time you were truly speechless? It happens to me rarely, but believe me when I say that I left Al Mare – the flagship all-day-dining Italian restaurant at the Jumeirah Carlton Tower Hotel in Knightsbridge reeling.  Look, I hadn’t been to Knightsbridge for years, Okay? I wasn’t sure if Harrods was still there and I didn’t particularly care. The area is, I thought, a vacuous haven for property investors and their empty second homes. So why did I bother going in the first place? Al Mare (literally ‘to the sea’ in Italian) promised culinary theatre which would change the way I thought about Italian food. And Al Mare did not disappoint. Here, your initials are stamped on the ice served in your cocktail (a classic Campari Americano to start). Skilled waiters arrive at your table with a trolley and quick hands as they seamlessly carve up your branzino al sale (a whole sea-salt-crusted wild sea bass served with crushed potato and salmoriglio). Head mixologist Enrico comes over, tells you to close your eyes and spritzes your final cocktail (a refreshing mix of gin, yuzu and grapefruit) with a basil infusion ‘made with the herbs from his family garden in Italy’. My pal and I ate and drank almost everything on the menu. This was the most flavoursome classic Italian fare with the lightest possible touch – punchy but never stodgy and filling but never sickening.  My brain felt tricked, it felt excited and it wanted more Our sommelier, the wildly knowledgeable Melody, r

You don’t need me to tell you that fewer and fewer young adults are becoming homeowners. At the age of 27, those born in the late 1980s had a homeownership rate of 25 percent, compared with 43 percent for those born ten years earlier. This is, in part, because house prices have risen to record levels and banks generally want a 10 percent deposit before they’ll dish out a mortgage. Given that the average home in London currently costs £648, 942, 10 percent is hardly a small whack. If you’re renting privately and handing over, on average, more than a third of your monthly income to a landlord, saving this much is a Herculean task. That’s where Help to Buy and Shared Ownership come in.  So, they’re an attempt to help young people actually be able to buy? That’s right. Help to Buy and Shared Ownership are solutions from different governments to the same problem: mainly attempting to boost younger people’s chances of getting a foot on a property ladder that, as they live and breathe, is being pulled up before their very eyes. However, as the crisis worsens, we know that older people need help too and there is no age limit on either scheme. Help to Buy is only available to first-time buyers but Shared Ownership is not. Are they essentially the same thing? No. Help to Buy and Shared Ownership operate differently. What they have in common, though, is that they require a lower deposit than a regular mortgage does. With Help to Buy, you only need to pay a 5 percent deposit of the prop

Rumour has it that Dante based his concentric circles of torment on London’s property market. Housing expert Vicky Spratt explains how to do a big move without it becoming hellish. 1. It might not feel like it, but now is a good time to haggle Trying to move can make you frustrated and jaded. But, right now, there is less demand for housing in many but not all (see: Newham, Bexley and Greenwich) parts of the capital than there has been for years. In fact, house prices are actually falling as people leave London because of the pandemic. So it’s important to remember that you have more power than you think. Hold your ground. Haggle. Negotiate. And, if something sounds like it isn’t right, if you feel like you’re being fleeced or told half a story – whether that’s about moving-in dates or how much you’re about to be charged for something – then question it.  2. Beware of ‘wear and tear’  Too many landlords seem to think of tenants’ deposits as a little bonus. I have heard story after story of tenants being automatically charged for professional cleaning when they move out of a rented home. Your landlord can charge you for genuine costs to restore the property to its original condition, but this excludes ‘reasonable wear and tear’. In my experience, landlords and letting agents interpret what’s ‘reasonable’ very elastically, so quote Shelter’s definition at them and push back. If you’re not getting anywhere, the best way to challenge these deductions is through your deposit prote