The origin story, the guiding intent, and the feeling the whole place is built to produce.
There's magic in bathhouses, saunas, hot springs, and ice baths — places of water therapy, of hot and cold. Some of it is obvious: you're in hot water, feeling your body, dropping out of your mind and into the moment. Some of it is practical: no phone, no computer, no escape to distraction. You slow down. You stop being busy. You get the best shot at being present that modern life allows.
On my journey I've taken many workshops — some online, some in person. The in-person ones are the ones that changed my life. Being in a room of humans sitting for the same purpose is hard to quantify but obvious to anyone who's done it. The most transformative workshop I ever took was held in a purely functional space. It held the magic it needed to, but the space itself never pulled me deeper.
Which got me thinking: what would have made it better? Could the space itself set the conditions for more people to have a transformative experience? That's the idea — a retreat center, bathhouse, and tea house all in one. A mullet, of sorts: an outer, an inner, and a secret space for everyone who visits.
I'm looking to build a space people walk into, take a deep breath, settle into their bodies, and feel at home.
Here in Phoenix, wellness is what I think of as mid-west fancy — all-American without a twist. Strip-mall spaces focused on function, rarely on form. Like a "live laugh love" Airbnb: clean, expected, forgettable. You don't take your family there, you don't show it off, and you definitely don't bring a new love interest.
I think that's because most people don't know there can be more. They haven't seen it done, and they haven't seen it done well. Much like we didn't think we liked coffee when the only option was burnt Folgers drip — experience it done well, in a memorable space with the right energy, and you realize there's a whole world to tea and bathhouses you never knew you wanted.
The bar: the original inspiration is Ten Thousand Waves in Santa Fe — which led to a month-long onsen tour of Japan, hot-springs and sauna groups across the US and abroad, a self-built mobile sauna, sauna consulting in Costa Rica, the US, and Portugal, temazcal and traditional sweat lodges, and tea houses in every major US city. A piece of each of these lives in this vision.
Eastern culture and decor. Cedar, stone, steam, and water. Layers you move through — the calm public warmth of the tea house, the embodied reset of the baths, the quiet container of the retreat. A place committed to an exceptional guest experience while sharing a love of hot water, tea, and culture.
Moodboard images from the Hot Water Notion workspace. Placeholder ordering — swap, caption, or re-sequence as the visual direction firms up.