Thermae Bath Spa is a combination of the historic spa and a contemporary building in the city of

Bath Bath may refer to: * Bathing, immersion in a fluid ** Bathtub, a large open container for water, in which a person may wash their body ** Public bathing, a public place where people bathe * Thermae, ancient Roman public bathing facilities Pl ...

, England, and reopened in 2006.

Bath and North East Somerset Bath and North East Somerset (B&NES) is a unitary authority district in England. Bath and North East Somerset Council was created on 1 April 1996 following the abolition of the county of Avon. It is part of the ceremonial county of Somerset. ...

council own the buildings, and, as decreed in a Royal Charter of 1590, are the guardians of the spring waters, which are the only naturally hot, mineral-rich waters in the UK. The Spa is operated by YTL Hotels. The main spa building, the New Royal Bath, was designed by

Grimshaw Architects Grimshaw Architects (formerly Nicholas Grimshaw & Partners) is an architectural firm based in London. Founded in 1980 by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, the firm was one of the pioneers of high-tech architecture. In particular, they are known for their d ...

and is constructed in Bath stone, enclosed by a glass envelope. It has two natural thermal baths, an open-air rooftop pool and an indoor pool, and a large Wellness Suite with two aromatic steam rooms, an Ice Chamber, Infrared Sauna and a Celestial Relaxation Room. It also has a cafe, three relaxation areas, and 27 spa treatment rooms, including the 18th century Hot Bath, in which water-based massage such as Watsu takes place. The separate

Cross Bath The Cross Bath in Bath Street, Bath, Somerset, England is a historic pool for bathing. The surrounding structure of the pool was built, in the style of Robert Adam by Thomas Baldwin by 1784 and remodelled by John Palmer in 1789. It is recorded i ...

is a grade I listed Georgian building containing one open-air thermal bath.

History

One of the city's main attractions has long been its famous hot spa water, fed by the area's

hot spring A hot spring, hydrothermal spring, or geothermal spring is a spring produced by the emergence of geothermally heated groundwater onto the surface of the Earth. The groundwater is heated either by shallow bodies of magma (molten rock) or by circ ...

s. The Bath springs are the warmest geothermal springs found in the UK. These natural geothermal

mineral spring Mineral springs are naturally occurring springs that produces hard water, water that contains dissolved minerals. Salts, sulfur compounds, and gases are among the substances that can be dissolved in the spring water during its passage un ...

s fed into the

Roman Baths In ancient Rome, (from Greek , "hot") and (from Greek ) were facilities for bathing. usually refers to the large imperial bath complexes, while were smaller-scale facilities, public or private, that existed in great numbers throughout ...

complex, which was responsible for the prominence of Bath in the

Roman period The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post- Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings around the Mediter ...

, as well as for the later development of Bath as the country's leading eighteenth and early nineteenth-century health resort. In the middle of the 20th century, the city's swimming pool sourced its water directly from the King's Spring through one of three pipelines beneath the River Avon. However, the old municipal hot pools were closed in 1978 after the discovery of an

infectious organism In biology, a pathogen ( el, πάθος, "suffering", "passion" and , "producer of") in the oldest and broadest sense, is any organism or agent that can produce disease. A pathogen may also be referred to as an infectious agent, or simply a germ ...

in one stratum of the

aquifer An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing, permeable rock, rock fractures, or unconsolidated materials ( gravel, sand, or silt). Groundwater from aquifers can be extracted using a water well. Aquifers vary greatly in their characte ...

. After that date, bathing was prohibited.

Development

With the approach of the year 2000, money from the National Lottery-funded Millennium Commission was made available towards a major project to reopen a safe commercial spa once more, supplemented by funds from

subscribers The subscription business model is a business model A business model describes how an organization creates, delivers, and captures value,''Business Model Generation'', Alexander Osterwalder, Yves Pigneur, Alan Smith, and 470 practitioners f ...

and from the local authority. Originally planned to open in 2002, and despite a formal opening with the aid of the

Three Tenors The Three Tenors were an operatic singing trio, active during the 1990s and early 2000s, and termed as a supergroup (a title normally reserved for rock and pop groups) consisting of Italian Luciano Pavarotti and Spaniards Plácido Domingo and ...

in 2003, the project ran seriously behind schedule and over budget as a result of a variety of legal disputes with contractors: the project's budgeted costs spiralled from an estimated £13 million in September 1996 to a final cost of £45 million.

Present day

Thermae Bath Spa eventually opened to the public on 7 August 2006, ending a 28-year period during which the waters remained unavailable for bathing. The spa is largely sited in a new 'Glass Cube' building by Sir

Nicholas Grimshaw Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, CBE, PPRA (born 9 October 1939) is a prominent English architect, particularly noted for several modernist buildings, including London's Waterloo International railway station and the Eden Project in Cornwall. He was ...

, near the site of the ancient Royal Bath, which has been interlinked with historic Georgian spa buildings such as the nearby Hot and Cross Baths. The building is in a strongly contemporary style in contrast to its Georgian surroundings. The complex houses both traditional and modern spa facilities. A 2014 survey indicated the spa attracted an extra 260,000 visitors a year to Bath, who contributed an extra £15 million a year to Bath's economy.

References

External links

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Photo tour
{{coord, 51.38037, N, 2.36157, W, source:placeopedia, display=title Buildings and structures completed in 2006 Nicholas Grimshaw buildings Buildings and structures in Bath, Somerset Tourist attractions in Bath, Somerset Buildings and structures celebrating the third millennium Spas Public baths in the United Kingdom