On a Saturday night in Niseko, northern Japan, the hottest place to be isn’t a new sake den or karaoke bar — it’s in the bath. Partakers are bobbing around in the steaming outdoor pools like a fresh batch of gyoza dumplings, while the snow settled in the surrounding gardens resembles mounds of fluffy white rice. This resort town is home to dozens of onsen — Japan’s hot-spring bathhouses — their mineral-rich waters ideal for soaking mountain-wearied muscles. There’s a catch, though: public nudity.
Zaborin
I approach the prospect like your typical Brit: wracked with nerves and embarrassment, running through the onsen etiquette I’d revised beforehand. Don’t let hair, towels or jewellery touch the water; no smartphones or tattoos (the latter being associated with Japan’s Mafia-like Yakuza). For the chronically shy, the heavily inked or couples wanting to soak à deux (traditional facilities are gender-divided), private onsen provide a workaround. At ryokan-style hotel Zaborin, for instance, each luxury villa comes with its own spring-fed indoor and outdoor tubs. But for an authentic immersion in this country’s wellness culture, everyone tells me the public baths are a must. ‘They’re a real experience,’ one Japanophile friend enthuses.
A combination of echoey, tiled changing rooms and blushing body-consciousness is giving me flashbacks to school gym lessons as I peel off my winter layers in Yugokorotei Onsen. My first faux pas: taking in a Kindle. As an attendant intercepts with some polite yet firm miming, I’m forced to lock the reading material away. An hour with no distractions from my monkey mind? It’s a prospect almost as daunting as baring my jiggly bits to strangers.
Next, there’s my choice of towel — in contrast to the hand towels everyone else has folded neatly atop their heads while they soak, the bath sheet I’ve brought looks ostentatiously large. I fruitlessly look for somewhere to hang it (hooks don’t seem to be a thing), eventually abandoning it on a nearby boulder.
It’s all rather stressful — that is, until I sink shoulder-deep into the water and the heat blots everything out. Beneath the blood pounding in my ears, trickling waterfalls and low voices weave into white noise. Overhead, bare cedar branches form the same webbed pattern as my rapidly expanding capillaries (improved circulation’s just one of the associated health benefits, alongside easing skin conditions and better sleep). My thoughts unfurl and meander like the steam that’s rising wraith-like into the night sky. It’s easy to see why onsen were sacred places for both Japan’s indigenous Shinto faith and Buddhism, long before Edo emperors made them fashionable hangouts. And before anyone could explain why the landscape was punctuated with tens of thousands of these curiously simmering pools — now we know it’s an upshot of being situated on the tectonic Ring of Fire.
Aman Tokyo
As much as I’d love to take a full toji (a multi-week hot-spring sojourn), the next stop on my Japanese wellness journey is Aman Tokyo. Wait, you may ask: not the neon-lit mega metropolis? The very same. It might not sound like somewhere to seek serenity, but step off the lift on the Otemachi Tower’s 33rd floor and you’ll find a Zen courtyard garden — rockery, placid pool of water, the gentle strumming of a harp-like koto — all beneath a 30-metre-high lantern of translucent washi paper. And that’s just the lobby. In this monochrome, minimalist temple, guest bathrooms have deep, square ofuro tubs with wooden oke buckets and cypress-scented salts. The spa continues the onsen action with baths clad in volcanic black basalt, with panoramic views and treatments inspired by Shinto purification rituals, as well as seasonal signature journeys.
The latter, lasting an indulgent two hours, could easily have made me lose all sense of time and place, were it not for ingredients firmly anchored in Japanese winter. Pine salt and ginger are swirled into my foot soak, before I’m cocooned in sake kasu (a nutrient-rich by-product of brewing rice wine, which traditionally takes place during the colder months). Finally, oil infused with the bright citrus scent of yuzu makes for an invigorating massage. The treatment’s tweaked seasonally, using cherry blossom, magnolia and green tea in springtime; and hinoki leaves and hakka (Japanese mint) for a cooling, forest-inspired summertime twist.
It’s a similar story at Six Senses Kyoto, where the botanicals featured in its locally inspired omakase — which roughly translates to ‘I’ll leave it up to you’ — spa treatments and Alchemy Bar (where guests blend their own body products) are chosen to reflect Japan’s 24 micro-seasons. ‘Seasonality is incredibly important in Japan’s wellness practices,’ says Six Senses Kyoto’s Director of Wellness, Ayako Fukuda. ‘Your body reacts differently across the seasons, so it is important to adopt relevant practices. For example, spring is the period when our autonomic nervous system is prone to losing balance, so it’s important to maintain good balance through good sleep and exercise. Whereas in winter, we focus on preserving warmth and immunity.’
Another masterclass in urban wellness comes from Janu Tokyo, which is embedded in new biophilic ’hood, the Azabudai Hills development. Think of this hotel, which opened in 2023, as a more sociable, trendy little sister of Aman’s regular stays. It offers up to eight communal fitness classes a day, and has a boxing ring, spin studio and golf simulator, across a whopping 4,000-square-metre, four-floor spa emporium. Plus two ultra-exclusive Spa Houses for those who want to do their cold plunges, steaming and sauna-sweating without an audience. Joining a morning breathwork class, I watch the Tokyo traffic gliding along the streets below through the floor-to-ceiling windows, the suited workers hurrying from subway to office, and realise there’s a word for what I’m feeling: seijaku, a serene focus or energised calm, even amid chaos.
Rakudo-An
Any Japanese wellness quest should also fold in the peaceful paddy field setting of Rakudo-An, where tea ceremonies and sound-healing workshops are order of the day; and a pilgrimage to the minimalist, cedar-clad villas of Shishi-Iwa House for some shinrin-yoku (forest-bathing). Though the practices may sound disparate, a common thread begins to emerge as my trip rolls on; these are about timeworn rituals, followed in a slow, considered way. Even the careful, neat plating of your food counts. At breakfast buffets, I notice Japanese guests lining up pickles and sashimi on their plates like works of art, a far cry from the hastily gathered heap on my tray.
‘The Japanese approach to wellness is deeply rooted in cultural traditions and practices that emphasise balance, mindfulness and a strong connection to nature,’ Fukuda tells me. ‘This deep balance between mind, body, spirit and community in some ways contends with the sometimes more superficial or fast-paced Western approaches to self-care.’ She points to more Japanese words that, tellingly, have no direct English translation, such as wabi-sabi (‘the appreciation of beauty in imperfection and the transient nature of life’) and ikigai (‘finding purpose and meaning in life’).
In the $651 billion global wellness-tourism industry awash with The White Lotus-style, ‘transformative’ retreats, cosmetic ‘tweakments’, punishing regimes and high-tech health wearables, this makes a refreshing change. We’re not talking rocket science, but rather, radical simplicity. And I’m fully on board — even if it means getting my kit off in public.
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