As GROHE SPA incorporates the Salus Per Aquam (wellbeing through water) philosophy, a look at how lifestyle brands, from skincare and spas to wellness retreats, are rediscovering water as a source of health and healing
Water is having a moment, again. But, then, water always does. Long before wellness became an industry, before spas became Instagram backdrops, and before “self-care” turned into a hashtag, water was our first therapist. We bathed in it, prayed beside it, travelled to it, trusted it to cleanse not just our bodies but our guilt, grief, fatigue, and fear. The idea of water as a source of health, and home as a private wellness retreat, came sharply into focus in Delhi recently, when GROHE SPA hosted an intimate design summit, bringing together some of India’s most influential architects and designers.
Moderated by actor and host Kubbra Sait, the evening, set against immersive installations that felt closer to a design gallery than a brand showcase, deliberately moved away from the mould of a conventional product launch to ask a larger question: how is luxury changing in an age when hyper-connectivity often exhausts us, leaving us in acute need for personal refuge? The consensus was unequivocal: luxury today is about spaces that respond to individual preferences. Nowhere is this shift more visible than in the bathroom, which is being increasingly imagined as a personal zone of pause, recovery, and wellness
That evolution was articulated most vividly during a fireside conversation featuring celebrity interior designer Gauri Khan, architect Rajiv Parekh of Red Architects, and Bijoy Mohan, Executive Officer and Executive Vice President, LIXIL International. Khan noted that the era of standardised bathrooms is decisively over. Clients, she said, are no longer asking for fittings but for experiences that shape how water flows, where it falls, and how it interacts with space and mood. Luxury, in this new vocabulary, lies in the freedom to personalise.
That philosophy was echoed architecturally by Parekh, who explained how modular systems like GROHE Rainshower Aqua allow designers to treat the shower as a composition rather than a fixed template, distributing outlets across ceilings, walls, or side panels while concealing engineering to create a seamless, intentional experience tailored to each home. Priya Rustogi, Managing Director, LIXIL (India, Middle East and Africa), pointed out that across premium Indian residences, the bathroom is increasingly valued as a space to reset, a counterpoint to an always-on world. GROHE SPA’s role, she noted, is to equip architects and designers with the tools to translate wellness from an abstract idea into a daily, lived experience through water.
Bathrooms as wellness spaces
In an interview to The Federal, Rustogi said that GROHE SPA’s punchline, Salus Per Aquam (Wellbeing through water) is positioned “as a design and engineering responsibility, not a slogan.” In a country like India — where water has always carried spiritual, therapeutic, and cultural meaning — wellbeing through water must be engineered and experienced daily, not merely articulated, she said, adding that GROHE SPA’s approach is evidence-led and grounded in how water physically interacts with the human body.
Also read: How India’s water crisis is not just due to climate change, but also governance failure
“We do not simply design faucets or showers; we engineer water delivery systems that deliberately shape how water interacts with the human body. By controlling factors such as droplet form, flow dynamics, temperature stability, and pressure, we are able to create water experiences that trigger different physiological and emotional responses. An invigorating cascade, for example, activates the body very differently from a fine, enveloping mist designed to calm and restore,” Rustogi said.
Priya Rustogi, Managing Director, India, LIXIL IMEA, and GROHE SPA’s Allure Gravity bathroom fittings range.
With modular systems such as Rainshower Aqua Tiles, this philosophy becomes tangible, allowing architects and homeowners to configure water experiences around individual routines and needs, transforming the shower into a personalised hydrotherapy environment rather than a standardised fixture. Rustogi notes that luxury in Indian homes today has moved decisively inward. Where it once announced itself through formal, outward-facing spaces, it is now expressed through privacy, emotional comfort, and self-regulation. The bathroom, in particular, has emerged as one of the most emotionally significant rooms in the home, often the only place where one can disconnect and reclaim solitude.
Architects are responding by softening boundaries between bedrooms and bathrooms, allowing the latter to evolve into intimate retreats rather than purely functional zones. Homeowners, too, are changing the questions they ask. Beyond durability and aesthetics, they now evaluate how a bathroom feels, whether it supports calm, recovery, and mental balance. This has spiked the demand for sensory-rich water experiences where sound, spray variation, temperature consistency, and atmosphere collectively shape people’s mood.
Why water works: The science and the instinct
The power of water is physiological. Hydrotherapy, the therapeutic use of water, has been studied for its effects on circulation, muscle relaxation, pain relief, and stress reduction. As we know, warm water relaxes muscles and joints; cold water stimulates blood flow and alertness; mineral water delivers trace elements absorbed through the skin. We are drawn to water because our life depends on it. Also, studies in environmental psychology suggest that proximity to water — oceans, rivers, baths — lowers cortisol levels and induces calm. The sound of flowing water slows the heart rate. Immersion creates a sense of weightlessness that the body associates with safety and rest. In recent years, modern lifestyle brands have learned to package this instinct — some respectfully while others opportunistically — into products, spaces, and narratives that promise healing.
Budapest thermal spa Széchenyi Gyógyfürdő. Outside pool with jacuzzi and contraflow. Photo: Wikimedia Commons
Europe’s spa towns — Baden-Baden (Germany), Spa (Belgium), Vichy (France), and Aix-les-Bains (France, near Alps) — are historic European spa towns built around mineral springs that are believed to cure everything from melancholia to arthritis. They are part of the UNESCO ‘Great Spa Towns of Europe,’ known, besides their natural thermal mineral waters, elegant architecture, health treatments (bathing, drinking), grand casinos, and cultural ambiance, with Budapest (Hungary) being a reputed thermal spa city which has drawn writers and artists from the 18th century to 1930s. Back home, we have luxury wellness retreats like Ananda in the Himalayas, set in a historic palace estate in the Himalayan foothills near Rishikesh, which uses ancient Indian wellness traditions (Ayurveda, Yoga, Vedanta); utilising its proximity to the Ganges, it promises ‘holistic healing’, with water being an important aspect of its therapies for rejuvenation.
Also read: Ghost-Eye review: Amitav Ghosh revisits the Sundarbans, threatened by climate change
In Europe, France has turned thermal water into a modern consumer category. Brands like Avène, La Roche-Posay, Vichy, and Uriage are, in a way, are pharmaceutical descendants of spa towns. Their thermal waters are said to be clinically studied, mineral-specific, and central to formulations treating eczema, rosacea, acne, and sensitive skin. Look closely at the most trusted skincare brands and you’ll find water at the centre of them all. Avène, for instance, is fundamentally defined by its connection to Avène Thermal Spring Water, which originates in the Cévennes Mountains in the South of France, and is known for soothing inflamed and post-procedure skin. La Roche-Posay integrates selenium-rich thermal water into dermatologist-recommended formulas. Vichy builds its products around volcanic spa water fortified with 15 essential minerals, including iron, potassium, calcium, and manganese, which are known to regenerate the skin’s outermost protective layer.
Destination spas and lux bathrooms
If skincare brings water into the home, destination spas tell another story that shows the centrality of water to our wellbeing. Luxury wellness retreats across the world draw on water experiences with near-religious devotion: Japanese onsens like those at Amanemu (in Shima City, Mie Prefecture) have earned a reputation for mineral bathing. European thermal circuits guide guests through hot pools, cold plunges, steam rooms, and sensory showers. Integrated wellness resorts ecombine hydrotherapy with mindfulness, nutrition, and movement. These spaces treat water as integral to a sequence of sensations designed to reset the body and mind.
Luxury bathroom brands like Dornbracht, Jacuzzi, and Sundance Spas push the idea further by engineering water experiences for private homes. From programmable shower rituals to swim spas that combine exercise and massage, these brands promise wellness without travel. What’s notable is how design has shifted to sensory intelligence. Water pressure, flow pattern, temperature gradients, acoustics are now part of design language. A shower today is all about how it makes you feel after seven minutes alone with your thoughts.
The global wellness economy has exploded, but water remains its most universal element. Major lifestyle brands are betting on water in a big way because water requires no belief system; everyone trusts it. For all its innovation, the wellness industry’s most powerful idea is also its oldest. From luxury bathrooms to skincare shelves, from spa towns to private retreats, water continues to carry a promise of cleansing and renewal.
