Montreal Spa History
Montreal Spa
From Spa Wikipedia for spa in Montreal
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The term spa is associated with water treatment which is also known as balneotherapy. Spa towns or spa resorts (including hot springs resorts) typically offer thermal or mineral water for drinking and Spa. They also offer various health treatments. The belief in the curative powers of mineral waters goes back to prehistoric times. Such practices have been popular world-wide, but are especially wide-spread in Europe and Japan. Day spas are also quite popular, and offer various personal care treatments.
Origins of the term spa
The term is derived from the name of the town of Spa, Belgium, whose name is known back to Roman times, when the location was called Aquae Spadanae,[1] perhaps related to the Latin word “spargere” meaning to scatter, sprinkle or moisten.[2]
Since medieval times illnesses caused by iron deficiency were treated by drinking chalybeate (iron-bearing) spring water (in 1326, the ironmaster Collin le Loup claimed a cure, [3] when the spring was called Espa, a Walloon word for “fountain”[3]).
In 16th century England the old Roman ideas of medicinal Spa were revived at towns like Bath, and in 1571 William Slingsby who had been to the Belgian town (which he called Spaw) discovered a chalybeate spring in Yorkshire. He built an enclosed well at what became known as Harrogate, the first resort in England for drinking medicinal waters, then in 1596 Dr Timothy Bright called the resort The English Spaw, beginning the use of the word Spa as a generic description rather than as the place name of the Belgian town. At first this term referred specifically to resorts for water drinking rather than Spa, but this distinction was gradually lost and many spas offer external remedies.[4]
It is commonly claimed, in a commercial context, that the word is an acronym of various Latin phrases such as “Salus Per Aquam” or “Sanitas Per Aquam” meaning “health through water”.[5] This is very unlikely: the derivation doesn’t appear before the early 21st century and is probably a “backronym” as there is no evidence of acronyms passing into the language before the 20th century;[6] nor does it match the known Roman name for the location.
History of Spa
Ancient Roman Baths in Bath Spa, England
The practice of traveling to hot or cold springs in hopes of effecting a cure of some ailment dates back to pre-historic times. Archaeological investigations near hot springs in France and Czech Republic revealed Bronze Age weapons and offerings. In Great Britain, ancient legend credited early Celtic kings with the discovery of the hot springs at Bath, England.[7]
Many people around the world believed that Spa in a particular spring, well, or river resulted in physical and spiritual purification. Forms of ritual purification existed among the native Americans, Persians, Babylonians, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. Today, ritual purification through water can be found in the religious ceremonies of Jews, Muslims, Christians, Buddhists, and Hindus. These ceremonies reflect the ancient belief in the healing and purifying properties of water. Complex Spa rituals were also practiced in ancient Egypt, in pre-historic cities of the Indus Valley, and in Aegean civilizations. Most often these ancient people did little building construction around the water, and what they did construct was very temporary in nature.[7]
Spa in Greek and Roman times
Some of the earliest descriptions of western Spa practices came from Greece. The Greeks began Spa regimens that formed the foundation for modern spa procedures. These Aegean people utilized small bathtubs, wash basins, and foot baths for personal cleanliness. The earliest such findings are the baths in the palace complex at Knossos, Crete, and the luxurious alabaster bathtubs excavated in Akrotiri, Santorini; both date from the mid-2nd millennium BC. They established public baths and showers within their gymnasium complexes for relaxation and personal hygiene. Greek mythology specified that certain natural springs or tidal pools were blessed by the gods to cure disease. Around these sacred pools, Greeks established Spa facilities for those desiring healing. Supplicants left offerings to the gods for healing at these sites and bathed themselves in hopes of a cure. The Spartans developed a primitive vapor bath. At Serangeum, an early Greek balneum (bathhouse, loosely translated), Spa chambers were cut into the hillside from which the hot springs issued. A series of niches cut into the rock above the chambers held bathers’ clothing. One of the Spa chambers had a decorative mosaic floor depicting a driver and chariot pulled by four horses, a woman followed by two dogs, and a dolphin below. Thus, the early Greeks used the natural features, but expanded them and added their own amenities, such as decorations and shelves. During later Greek civilization, bathhouses were often built in conjunction with athletic fields.[7]
.[7]
The Romans also developed baths in their colonies, taking advantage of the natural hot springs occurring in Europe to construct baths at Aix and Vichy in France, Bath and Buxton in England, Aachen and Wiesbaden in Germany, Baden, Austria, and Aquincum in Hungary, among other locations. These baths became centers for recreational and social activities in Roman communities. Libraries, lecture halls, gymnasiums, and formal gardens became part of some bath complexes. In addition, the Romans used the hot thermal waters to relieve their suffering from rheumatism, arthritis, and overindulgence in food and drink. The decline of the Roman Empire in the west, beginning in A.D. 337 after the death of Emperor Constantine, resulted in Roman legions abandoning their outlying provinces and leaving the baths to be taken over by the local population or destroyed.[7]
Coriovallum Roman baths in Heerlen, Holland (reconstructed)
Thus, the Romans elevated Spa to a fine art, and their bathhouses physically reflected these advancements. The Roman bath, for instance, included a far more complex ritual than a simple immersion or sweating procedure. The various parts of the Spa ritual — undressing, Spa, sweating, receiving a massage, and resting — required separated rooms which the Romans built to accommodate those functions. The segregation of the sexes and the additions of diversions not directly related to Spa also had direct impacts on the shape and form of bathhouses. The elaborate Roman Spa ritual and its resultant architecture served as precedents for later European and American Spa facilities. Formal garden spaces and opulent architectural arrangement equal to those of the Romans reappeared in Europe by the end of the eighteenth century. Major American spas followed suit a century later.[7]
Spa in the 18th century
In the 17th century most upper-class Europeans washed their clothes with water often and washed only their faces (with linen), feeling that Spa the entire body was a lower-class activity; but the upper-class slowly began changing their attitudes toward Spa as a way to restore health later in that century. The wealthy flocked to health resorts to drink and bathe in the waters. In 1702 Queen Anne of England traveled to Bath, the former Roman development, to bathe. A short time later, Richard (Beau) Nash came to Bath. By the force of his personality, Nash became the arbiter of good taste and manners in England. He along with financier Ralph Allen and architect John Wood transformed Bath from a country spa into the social capital of England. Bath set the tone for other spas in Europe to follow. Ostensibly, the wealthy and famous arrived there on a seasonal basis to bathe in and drink the water; however, they also came to display their opulence. Social activities at Bath included dances, concerts, playing cards, lectures, and promenading down the street.[7]
A typical day at Bath might be an early morning communal bath followed by a private breakfast party. Afterwards, one either drank water at the Pump Room (a building constructed over the thermal water source) or attended a fashion show. Physicians encouraged health resort patrons to bathe in and drink the waters with equal vigor. The next several hours of the day could be spent in shopping, visiting the lending library, attending concerts, or stopping at one of the coffeehouses. At 4:00 P.M., the rich and famous dressed up in their finery and promenaded down the streets. Next came dinner, more promenading, and an evening of dancing or gambling.[7]
Similar activities occurred in health resorts throughout Europe. The spas became stages on which Europeans paraded with great pageantry. These resorts became infamous as places full of gossip and scandals. The various social and economic classes selected specific seasons during the year’s course, staying from one to several months, to vacation at each resort. One season aristocrats occupied the resorts; at other times, prosperous farmers or retired military men took the baths. The wealthy and the criminals that preyed on them moved from one spa to the next as the fashionable season for that resort changed.[7]
During the 18th century a revival in the medical uses of spring water took place among some Italian, German, and English physicians. This revival changed the way of taking a spa treatment. For example, in Karlsbad the accepted method of drinking the mineral water required sending large barrels to individual boardinghouses where the patients drank physician-prescribed dosages in the solitude of their rooms. Dr. David Beecher in 1777 recommended that the patients come to the fountainhead for the water and that each patient should first do some prescribed exercises. This innovation increased the medicinal benefits obtained and gradually physical activity became part of the European Spa regimen. In 1797 in England Dr. James Currier published The Effects of Water, Cold and Warm, as a Remedy in Fever and other Diseases. This book stimulated additional interest in water cures and advocated the external and internal use of water as part of the curing process.[7]
Spa in the 19th and 20th centuries
An old thermal spa
In the 19th century, Spa became a more accepted practice as physicians realized some of the benefits that cleanliness could provide. A cholera epidemic in Liverpool, England in 1842 resulted in a sanitation renaissance — more people bathed and washed their clothes. That same year a house in Cincinnati, Ohio, received the first indoor bathtub in the United States. Spa, however, was still not a universal custom. Only one year later — in 1843 — Spa between November 1 and March 15 was outlawed in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, as a health measure, and in 1845 Spa was banned in Boston, Massachusetts, unless under the direct orders of a physician. The situation improved, however, and by 1867 in Philadelphia most houses of the well-to-do had tubs and indoor plumbing. In England, hot showers were installed in barracks and schools by the 1880s. The taboos against Spa disappeared with advancements in medical science; the worldwide medical community was even promoting the benefits of Spa. In addition, the Victorian taste for the exotic lent itself perfectly to seeking out the curative powers of thermal water.[7]
In most instances the formal architectural development of European spas took place in the 18th and 19th centuries. The architecture of Bath, England, developed along Georgian and Neoclassical lines, generally following Palladian structures. The most important architectural form that emerged was the “crescent” — a semi-elliptical street plan used in many areas of England. The architecture of Karlsbad, Marienbad, Franzenbad, and Baden-Baden was primarily Neoclassical, but the literature seems to indicate that large bathhouses were not constructed until well into the 19th century. The emphasis on drinking the waters rather than Spa in them led to the development of separate structures known as Trinkhallen (drinking halls) where those taking the cure spent hours drinking water from the springs.[7]
By the mid-19th century the situation had changed dramatically. Visitors to the European spas began to stress Spa in addition to drinking the waters. Besides fountains, pavilions, and Trinkhallen, bathhouses on the scale of the Roman baths were revived. Photographs of a 19th century spa complex taken in the 1930s, detailing the earlier architecture, show a heavy use of mosaic floors, marble walls, classical statuary, arched openings, domed ceilings, segmental arches, triangular pediments, Corinthian columns, and all the other trappings of a Neoclassical revival. The buildings were usually separated by function — with the Trinkhalle, the bathhouse, the inhalatorium (for inhaling the vapors), and the Kurhaus or Conversationhaus that was the center of social activity. Baden-Baden featured golf courses and tennis courts, “superb roads to motor over, and drives along quaint lanes where wild deer are as common as cows to us, and almost as unafraid.”[7]
The European spa, then, started with structures to house the drinking function — from simple fountains to pavilions to elaborate Trinkhallen. The enormous bathhouses came later in the 19th century as a renewed preference for an elaborate Spa ritual to cure ills and improve health came into vogue. European architects looked back to Roman civilizations and carefully studied its fine architectural precedents. The Europeans copied the same formality, symmetry, division of rooms by function, and opulent interior design in their bathhouses. They emulated the fountains and formal garden spaces in their resorts, and they also added new diversions. The tour books always mentioned the roomy, woodsy offerings in the vicinity and the faster-paced evening diversions.[7]
Spa treatment
A body treatment, spa treatment, or cosmetic treatment is non-medical procedure to help the health of the body. It is often performed at a resort, destination spa, day spa, beauty salon or school.
List of Quebec Spas Location:
Local spa in the following Municipalities:
Spa in Montreal Centre:
Montreal, Westmount, Town of Mount-Royal, Cote-Saint-Luc, Hampstead, Anjou, Lachine, Verdun, LaSalle, Montreal North, Montreal West, Saint-Laurent, Outremont, Saint-Leonard. Spa in Downtown Montreal
Spa in West Island of Montreal:
Baie d’Urfé, Beaconsfield, Hudson, Île-Bizard, Île-Perrot, Pierrefonds, Pincourt, Pointe-Calumet, Pointe-Claire, Pointe-des-Cascades, Dollard-des-Ormeaux, Dorval, Kirkland, Senneville, Terrasse-Vaudreuil, Two Mountains, Vaudreuil-Dorion, Vaudreuil-sur-le-Lac, Roxboro, Notre-Dame-de-L’Ile-Perrot, Sainte-Geneviève, Saint-Lazare.
Spa in Montreal East:
Montreal East, L’Assomption, Lachenaie, Laplaine, Laprairie, Le Gardeur, Repentigny,
Spa in Laval & Spa in North of Montreal:
Laval, Blainville, Bois-Des-Fillion, Boisbriand, Mirabel, Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Sainte-Anne-des-Plaines, Sainte-Julie, Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac, Sainte-Therese, Oka, Rosemere, Saint-Eustache, Terrebonne.
Spa in South Shore &
Spa in South of Montreal:
Boucherville, Brossard, Candiac, Carignan, Chambly, Charlemagne, Chateauguay, Saint-Mathias-sur-Richelieu, Saint-Mathieu, Saint-Philippe, Saint-Sulpice, Melocheville, Mercier, Mont-Saint-Hilaire, Beauharnois, De Rouen, Delson, Greenfield Park, , Kahnawake, LeMoyne, Lery, Les Cedres, Longueuil, Lorraine, Maple Grove, Mascouche, McMasterville, Saint Antoine, Saint Jean, Saint-Amable, Saint-Basile-le-Grand, Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, Saint-Clet, Saint-Constant, Sainte-Catherine, Saint-Gerard-Majella, Saint-Hubert, Saint-Isidore, Saint-Joseph-du-Lac, Saint-Lambert, Valleyfield, Varennes, Richelieu, Vercheres, Otterburn Park, Sainte-Hyacinthe, Beloeil.