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Upon entering the lobby, cozy chairs encircle a stone fireplace.
 Owner Tom Borin explains, "The colors, the décor, the layout of the facility, the rich scent of essential oils, are all designed to start de-stressing our guests when they walk through our door. A typical stay here can be up to three hours or even more. Clients begin their journey in the transition room, with a warm wrap around their neck and feet. They then continue on their pathway to the Alpine Herbal Steam Therapy Room and relax for fifteen minutes. Their selected treatment or treatments follow, culminating in the Brine Light Inhalation Room." Tom further states, "Most of our clients have expressed such a sense of well being after the adventure and plan to return again."
AFTER retiring in August, 2002 from McDonalds Corporation as a Licensee of 30 years; I was only 54 years old and within two years was fairly bored. One day while taking a class at the University of Arizona in April of 2004 an epiphany occurred wherein I would build a spa. Having been a spa devotee for 25 years at many great spas across the United States I knew quite a bit about treatment protocols and relaxation benefits of great spas.
So in May, 2004 I seriously entertained opening a spa that would be truly innovative in the field.
I went to the IECSC Spa Conference in Las Vegas in May, 2004 to see the latest in equipment innovations and also meet some people in the industry. I was fortunate enough to meet the owners of Spa Visions, a consulting firm that comprised Woody Yowler and his wife Laura and daughter. Woody was showing some of the equipment invented by Dr. Paul Hauslauer on the Convention floor. I was immediately intrigued with what he knew about the cutting edge advantages of European Spa treatments and how these could be integrated into North American Spas to provide a uniqueness that baby boomers would be demanding and expecting from great "day" spas of the future. So I hired Spa Visions to design and equip my spa.
Much work went into the design of Touch of Tranquility almost immediately after the Convention. Woody and I discussed the "purpose" of our spa. What our philosophy would be and what we intended to do for our clients that was different. Being located inTucson, Arizona we both agreed that this spa should be a rejuvenation and skin restoration center because of the dryness of the desert heat. So we designed a five star day spa that had several goals in mind for our clients; the first being the complete relaxation of our clients and second the total restoration of their skin. We purchased Hauslauer equipment that would allow us to maximize the goals of the spa.
Spa Visions completed the design and engineering plans for Touch of Tranquility in July, 2004 with the help of the folks at Hauslauer Inc. in Saltzburg, Germany. We actually went under construction in August, 2004 and magically completed the spa in January, 2005 with a February 7th opening. From inception to opening in was less than 9 months. Our vision with the Yowlers and the Interior decorator came together in such away that when you walk through the facility you are transported from the Tucson desert to the coastline of California in Big Sur. The whole spa is meant to mentally cause people to feel the relaxation of a water environment in the middle of the desert; and upon entering our doors realize they are in a place different from Tucson.
Touch of Tranquility is a spa that uses Welcoming ceremonies of a half hour before a client ever sees a massage table. We do foot compresses and massages as well as neck compresses with essential oils and then we do Herbal steam with our Kraxenstove alcove steam units. By the time our clients are finished with their welcoming ceremonies they are truly ready for their massage or whatever other treatments they might enjoy.
We offer elixirs and lots of water and liquids during their day here because we do a lot of heat treatments especially using our Rasul chamber, our Soft Float, and our Hammam tables.This affords us the ability to reminieralize, detoxify, and remisturize the skin of our clients.
We offer Rasul which is a beautiful mud treatment incorporating steam to remineralize the skin. It also uses visuals like stars in the sky and a warm rain shower when the treatment is over. The chairs in the Rasul are ergomatic and heated. We have a lot of couples that use this therapy as it is a two person chamber. The Rasul is a gorgeous piece of equipment from Haslauer GmbH of Austria that is experiential as well as soothing.
Our Pantai Luar treatment also is one that is something very different to the North American spa community. It uses hot dumplings that are comprised of fresh lime and coconut and soaked in a 240 degree fryer of very fine oils and then administered as a massage on the skin. The "dumplings" open the pores of the skin and impart oils directly into the layers of cells totally rehydrating and restoring the eleasticity of the skin and at the same time working out muscle pain and knots throughout the body. The Pantai Luar treatment, a Thai protocol, is multi sensory and takes clients on a wonderful journey into relaxation and renewed youthfulness... not just of the skin but of the entire being.
At the end of a spa day at touch of Tranquility, we have a Brine Light therapy room which was also invented by Paul Hauslauer and which allows our clients to rest and lie on lounges eating fresh fruit as they watch a movie of Big Sur and breathe in the 20% salt to oxygen mixture imparted by this salt waterfall. The Brine Light therapy room is an unattended therapy that helps restore the salt levels to the interior organs as well as open the sinuses and the muscus linings of the nose.
MISSION STATEMENT: TOUCH OF TRANQUILITY
Yes, we are a spa, but mostly we are an experience for the spirit. We are a story about possibilities. Our mission is to provide you, through the magic of touch and crystal clear waters, an environment of healing and restorative wellness. We exist to transfer you to a place of internal peace, love, and tranquility. Through our many and varied protocol of treatments, we will release within you a sense of well being, rebirth, and renewed vitality so you may reenter your world from a perspective of vigor and joy.
Touch of Tranquility Spa
Phone 520-615-9608 • www.touchoftranquility.com
© SPA MANAGEMENT JOURNAL - DEC 07/JAN08
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