Wellness used to be as one-dimensional as a spin class and a smoothie. Diet and exercise are of course still fundamental, but we’ve finally started to embrace a more holistic approach to achieving better health. This means focusing on long neglected areas like a solid sex life, socializing, rest and recovery, and emotional and mental wellbeing. Feeling good now trumps looking good and healthspan—the quality of our years—has become just as important as lifespan. Longevity, the concept of living a longer and healthier life, will be the biggest buzzword of 2024, with wellness clinics as well as sybaritic beach retreats offering the latest biohacks (cryotherapy, infrared light treatments, poolside vitamin IV drips) to optimize our performance. Tantra gurus and sex therapists will be the new must-have in-house expert and artificial-intelligence empowered smart beds are fast becoming an expected amenity.
Wellness tourism is expected to hit $1.3 trillion by 2025. Anticipating that the next generation will continue to fuel that growth, acclaimed adults-only retreats are finally opening up to kids and teens and even offering multi-generational spa retreats. With health-conscious offerings infiltrating every type of travel—family vacations, couples getaways, fly-and-flop beach escapes—it’s easier than ever to be well on your next trip. Here are the wellness travel trends and destinations, resorts, and retreats that promise to boost your health in 2024.
Sexual Wellness
According to research from the World Health Organization, boosting your sexual wellbeing is key to improving overall mental, physical, emotional, social, and spiritual health. Yet for years experts have touted the importance of honing a mind-body connection without mentioning the word sex. Forward-thinking wellness retreats are helping shatter the taboo with new programs focused on exploring intimacy and desire. Tantra sessions are primed to be the new couples massages with properties like Hotel Wailea in Maui introducing tantra classes rooted in themes such as exploring sacred sensuality. Hotels like Shou Sugi Ban House in New York have started hosting sexual and emotional intimacy retreats led by tantric experts and clinical sexologists. At Miraval resort in Arizona, workshops on sex and desire and one-on-one sessions on embracing pleasure address topics like low libido and the female orgasm. Earlier this year, SHA Wellness Clinic in Alicante, Spain, launched a sexual health unit staffed with gynecologists, hormonal experts, and urologists. SHA Mexico, which debuts this January in the Yucatán Peninsula, will also have a dedicated sexual health unit offering similar therapies and diagnostic testing capabilities. In October 2024, private island wellness resort Aerial BVI will host its first Elevate Love Summit, a four-day retreat rooted in love-language mastery and rekindling physical and emotional intimacy.
