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LOCATION
Over three split-levels of a strikingly designed six-storey glass structure, linked via a blue-striped glass box to the Sheraton Hotel on Festival Square near Edinburgh Castle.
DECOR
A sharp mix of wood, steel and glass. Eye-catching features include a wall of cascading water and an ozone swimming pool lit by coloured lights that looks spectacular at night.
CREDO
'Healing spa waters, heat and steam experiences and a state-of-the-art fitness
studio join together with holistic treatments from around the world and across the ages.'
FACILITIES
Superb. The 19-metre ozone pool is big enough to swim laps; the varying jets in the hydropool massage each part of your body in turn; the fitness studio has technology that 'stores your individual programme and workout history'; and the spacious cherry-wood changing rooms have full-length lockers. A thermal suite offers a range of heat experience from an orange-scented tropical shower to a laconium (a sweating room, with heated seats and floors), Finnish (90°C) and Bio (70°C) saunas, a hammam, an aroma grotto and a glorious 'fog shower' of peppermint essence for rounding off heat treatments. Plus 11 treatment rooms.
DAY PACKAGES
Go for the signature ESPA Ritual with rebalancing aromatherapy facial, a real tour de force lasting four-and-a-half hours. During the welcome ritual my therapist, Jo, poured herbal tea, bathed and massaged my feet and assessed my needs. This was followed by a purifying Herbal Linen Wrap incorporating Hot Stones, an exfoliation, a soothing mud envelopment and scalp massage, and an Ayurvedic massage, during which warm
oil was poured into the small of my back and smoothed all over my body.
SERVICE
Hard to fault. The treatments flowed seamlessly one into the other, my therapist really tuned in to my mood and her two hands felt like 10.
FOOD
The Spa Café menu is overseen by Gino Santin, who runs two Italian restaurants, Santini and Santini Bis, in the same building. I had sea bass steamed in lemon grass served on mange-tout with a citrus dressing, and panna cotta with a raspberry coulis. Everything was delicious and beautifully presented.
BEST THING
The rooftop hydropool, where you lie on ergonomic beds surrounded by bubbles and mist and gaze through the plumes of the fountains to the rooftops - or the stars.
WORST THING
You have to share the spa with others. Although large, One Spa is open to members and Sheraton residents as well as day guests, not to mention being the official spa of the Scottish rugby team. Membership has, however, been capped to avoid overcrowding.
RATING
10/10
PRICE
Massages from £42; day packages from £187
CONTACT
One Spa, The Sheraton Grand Hotel & Spa, 8 Conference Square, Edinburgh EH3 8AN (0131 221 7777; www.one-spa.com)
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