You can enjoy a private floating spa on a London barge – complete with hot tub, sauna, and luxury treatments
Lapping waters to drown out the noise of the rattling tube
Call it innovation, call it a housing crisis, but London really does know how to make use of its boats. Gone are the days where barges were just for living and cruising, now you can find everything from free floating cinemas to live music venues. The latest addition to London’s (slightly whacky) waterways is a slightly more zen installment.
Over in Limehouse Basin, after a previous mooring at Little Venice, the Maria Alexander is the latest floating feature in London’s rivers, and it’s a veritable hub of relaxation.
The Maria Alexander is a unique wellness retreat, all set up on a seemingly traditional canal barge. From the outside, it looks as inconspicuous as any other widebeam boat, 12ft wide, 70ft long, with the classic nautical windows and trimmings. Inside, it’s a luxury wellness pad, with an impressive array of facilities and treatments including a wood fired sauna, a hot tub, and a full treatment menu which offers up everything from classic aromatherapy massage to rejuvenating facials.
The interiors look entirely like those bougie Swedish spas you see influencers permanently at, having a restorative break after… a hard week at work? A very exhausting period of events and editing, probably. As soon as you step in, you’ll be greeting with hushed neutrals, plenty of white walls, and fancy Scandi furniture which just makes you feel like you’ve got your life together. And if you’re worried about being claustrophobic, don’t be – it’s almost confusingly spacious, with an area to chill as you enter, with each section carefully designed to be compact without being small. In the main body of the barge, you’ll find the hot tub at one end, the treatment beds in the centre, and the wood-fired sauna to the back.
As you are probably getting from the above, it ain’t coming cheap. Its main USP though is that it’s completely private. Also, it has a maximum capacity of four people, meaning that once you’ve signed up for a session it’s completely up to you how long you spend in each space. No pesky waiting for someone to finally leave the hot tub after shriveling away like a prune for hours, and no one shepherding you briskly through eight different wet rooms which you’re not sure are really wet or just varying levels of other people’s sweat. The Maria Alexander is proper private luxury.
Prices vary depend on what you’re after and how long you want to book for. The cheapest option is £125 for the private floating spa package for one, or £175 if there are two of you. If you fancy two hours, the experience also includes an ‘aromatic foot soak’ which promises ultimate soothing, followed by a 30 minute massage. Both include use of all the spa facilities too.
Whilst it sounds spenny on paper, the floating spa package is £87.50 per person (if there are two of you), and given the average prices of London spas it works out around the same.
Whist you can find find floating saunas and spa adjacent boats across London already like TEMZ in Teddington, and Skuna boats, Maria Alexander is a bit different, as. it's more like an actual complete miniature spa rather than just housing one element (like a sauna or hot tub) and offers up treatments too. Apparently, the idea behind it from founders Corvin Roman and Ingrid Eriksson was to provide Londoners with a more personal experience than a hotel spa. Also, the choice of being a floating spa was deliberate, as the pair believe gentle rocking of the water enhances the therapeutic effect of heat, hydrotherapy and massage.
The space only opened up in 2025 and has already moored at a few different spots across the city, welcoming in everyone from stressed out commuters trying to recitfy their awful laptop-hunch induced back pain to hen dos looking for something ahh than aghghghgh.
You can browse the full range of packages available at Maria Alexander's website, as well as drool over some seriously stunning pics.
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