Gurney’s Montauk to open $16 million luxury spa

Long popular thanks to its salt-water pool and sweeping beachfront location, Gurney’s Montauk is now opening the Seawater Spa, an ambitious $20 million facility (a bump up from the previously reported $16 million cost) poised to become the destination for Hamptons wellness this summer.

Five years in the planning, the 30,000-square-foot, two-story space includes 19 treatment rooms, with two reserved for couples.

The Himalayan salt room features a massage table built out of the prized mineral; its walls are also lined in pure Himalayan salt crystal, said to help breathing difficulties and remove skin impurities.

Other expansive rooms open onto their own private decks, with outdoor showers and bathtubs overlooking the Atlantic Ocean, flanked by junipers and boxwoods cleverly placed for privacy.

The spa uses products by Dr. Dennis Gross Skincare and One Ocean Beauty. Facials range from high-performance LED light therapy to New Age options, utilizing amethyst crystals and reiki.

There’s a CBD-infused massage for pain reduction; a seaweed-leaf body wrap and a three-session scalp treatment that promises to create fuller, thicker hair.

For Gurney’s Executive Vice President Michael Nenner, the endeavor was a prolonged labor of love — a two-year construction project delayed by COVID-19, supply chain issues and weather. “I stood right here, shoveling snow,” Nenner said during a construction site visit in April. “I’m so happy that we’re finally opening.”

Sustainability was a guiding principle. Gurney’s worked with Alonso Balaguer Designs (the architecture firm that designed Manhattan’s Aire Ancient Baths) to install a “regenerative media filtration system” for the pool that uses significantly less water and energy than standard sand filtration.

In addition to the ocean-fed swimming pool, the new spa has four 12-feet-long pools, the centerpiece of its co-ed bathhouse: a caldarium set to 105 degrees, a 104-degree thermae with a waterfall, and a pair of chilly pools, set to 50 and 57 degrees.

The cold plunges are intended to stimulate circulation and detoxification, following visits to the eucalyptus steam room or the Finnish sauna, built from Alaskan yellow cedar.

The renovated spa also optimizes its dramatic ocean vista. The Peloton and Technogym-filled workout room (an afterthought in the spa’s previous iteration) now overlooks the water, as do the weight room and the lounge.

Those million-dollar views, coupled with the spa’s thoughtful treatments, will likely make the resort — once quiet during the off-season — into a buzzy, year-round destination for self-care. Book while you can.