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013 Revivo Eco-Luxury Wellness Resorts
81 Plays5 years ago
GUEST / LAURIE MIAS, REVIVO
HOST / MATT MORLEY
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Transcript
Introduction to Episode 13
00:00:13
Speaker
Welcome to episode 13 of the Green and Healthy Places podcast, in which we take a deep dive into the world of sustainability and wellness in real estate and hospitality today. I'm your host, Matt Morley, founder of BioBlue EcoYachting, BioFit Nature Gyms, and Biofilico Wellness Interiors.
Sustainable Resort Development in Hong Kong
00:00:32
Speaker
In this episode, we're in Hong Kong to talk to French-born Laurie Meers, CEO of Revivo EcoLuxury Wellness Resorts.
00:00:41
Speaker
They have a successful property already up and running in Bali, a second resort opening this year in a historic chateau near Toulouse in the south of France, with others in the pipeline in Malaysia, Barcelona and Sri Lanka.
Revivo's Innovative Concepts and Strategies
00:00:56
Speaker
My conversation with Laurie covers Rovivo's sustainable resort development strategy, how she juggles her role as CEO of Rovivo on one side, whilst also leading the development of Sister Brand Pavilion Hotel's residential project in Osaka, Japan, her ultra-local or hyper-local procurement policies, the benefits of on-site farms for a restaurant menu,
00:01:21
Speaker
mindful movement for neuroplasticity and slow aging, their deliberately soulful version of a typical hotel workout, how to integrate local healing traditions into the guest experience, the benefits of artistic therapy sessions, their plant bar concept for guests to blend their own tinctures, teas, and bath salts, nighttime rituals, and even a 16th century salt cave for underground halo therapy.
00:01:50
Speaker
If you enjoy this type of content, consider sharing or subscribing. As long as the audience numbers keep climbing, I'll continue to do what I do. So thank you for your support. There we go. Let's get into it. Here's Laurie Mears of Revivo Wellness Resorts. Laurie, thanks so much for joining us today. Perhaps you could give us a quick introduction to your role, because I know you're working both on the Revivo Wellness Resorts and with Pavilion on the other side. So how does that work for you?
00:02:18
Speaker
Yes, that's correct. Revivo is a brand I started from scratch. It's my DNA, if you like, and it's all about wellness and it's more luxury positioning. My job is pretty much CEO, so supervising everything. However, for pavilions, hotels and resorts,
00:02:40
Speaker
My role is just supervising the constructions of houses in Japan in Niseko, so I've been busy doing that for the past three years. We built four houses and it originally was a huge land, so it was really interesting because we had to bring electricity and drill the onsen and just make it
00:03:09
Speaker
make the road so yeah lots of constraints that I never had to figure out before such as the snow everything is ruled by the snow with the snow in Niseko in this area because you can snow up to 10 meters in one night so it's kind of crazy and then you have to do everything around the snow clearing issues
00:03:38
Speaker
So that's quite a development role on the one side and getting new dots on the map, getting new hotels open for the pavilion side. But then for Revivo, then what was the process in terms of creating and launching, defining, you mentioned the DNA, presumably identifying a gap in the market and creating a concept or effectively a new resort brand to fill that gap. So could you talk us through
00:04:07
Speaker
how you went about launching and defining this new concept.
00:04:11
Speaker
So yeah, I was pitching the main investor of Revivo to invest into my own business back then, which was Green Juicery, called Green Juicery. I had launched in Hong Kong, and I needed money to expand the capacity of production. And it told me, no, not interested in business, don't do that. But what are you doing next weekend? Do you want to go to Bali? I have houses with Aman in south of Bali. It's called Aman Hotels.
00:04:41
Speaker
I'm sure everybody's familiar and yeah I have those houses and now they're going to be they're going to lose basically the the the lease how can I say yeah you know in back you lease the land so anyway we need to find a new operator so
00:05:00
Speaker
Yeah, why don't you go there next weekend and just tell me what you think? I was like, okay, sure. So that's what I did. And then I came back and I said, yeah, it's an amazing property. It's designed by Kerry Hill. I mean, it's outstanding. So it's obviously very, very beautiful.
00:05:17
Speaker
Okay, can you make for me a spa resort out of the four villas that I have? And I was like, yeah, sure, I can do that. But you know spa is a bit competitive. Everybody has a spa nowadays. So eventually I convinced him to make something much more comprehensive than just a luxury spa resort. And that's how Revivo was born, basically, around that idea.
00:05:45
Speaker
And that was a very lucky encounter, obviously, because I mean, Hong Kong is a type of city that is really rewarding and people don't really look at your resume or how old are you. So you then have you had that amazing opportunity then, as you say, obviously, entrepreneurial scene in Hong Kong, you get dropped into this project in Bali. And then I mean, what were the next
Investment and Adaptation of Aman Properties
00:06:09
Speaker
steps from there? Were you running feasibility studies? How did you recruit? I mean, what was the
00:06:14
Speaker
the team that you built around you in those early days? Yes, so eventually I recruited the team of Amal. That was the easiest because they've been building houses for the past 10 years so I was in contact with the architect and
00:06:33
Speaker
Yeah, luckily enough they wanted to continue because they had started this project and so they wanted to continue and then I asked them, you know what, the property is so pretty and I'm not an architect myself, I don't want to change anything, I just want to expand and create the spa, turn some rooms into treatment rooms, turn the main library into the bar area, you know,
00:06:59
Speaker
some small-ish modifications like that. So it was quite easy, but then in terms of customer's flow, you needed to think also because the property is huge. So you didn't want the people to have the change room 50 meters from the sauna or the, you know. So it was just this type of problematic that we were thinking about and the rain as well, because it can rain a lot in Bali.
00:07:26
Speaker
So again, you don't want people to be under the rain for too long and the property is three hectares and only 16 villas. So yeah, we were thinking like that in terms of customers flow and service flow. And a big piece of what you do then is clearly around the sustainability piece. I mean, we can get on to the wellness section in a minute, but what I've found interesting is you have this combination and it feels really
00:07:55
Speaker
It's the right time for brands, I think, that are doing the green and the healthy, not just one or the other. And it's a big part of how you communicate online. So this idea of a resort or a sustainable development strategy where you're reducing plastics, could you talk to us a bit about what that equates to and how you're delivering that and how it affects the guest experience? Or is it more of an operations policy that almost you don't see as a guest or is
Defining Luxury Through Sustainability
00:08:22
Speaker
it very present?
00:08:22
Speaker
For me, you don't see it because you are in a luxury five-star hotel and it has to be normal at some point that for the price you pay, for the standing, you expect to receive that you don't find a plastic button on your bedside table.
00:08:43
Speaker
For instance, to me, at least that's a definition of luxury nowadays. Because if we don't do it, if a five-star hotel don't change a plastic bottle for a glass or refillable one, then who is going to do it? You know what I mean?
00:08:58
Speaker
because it goes without saying glass cost five times more than plastic but everybody knows that and it's convenient of course when you look at the P&L or the pre-opening cost just to make the switch okay you know what drop this and we will think about about it later but that's what I wanted to avoid to me every single detail matters and yeah we have to show the example I feel like when you're in the
00:09:25
Speaker
luxury hospitality and especially I got so lucky to learn from the Amman hospitality that is really really really ultra luxury.
00:09:37
Speaker
And they don't cut any corners. So I was like, okay, I'm just going to continue what they started to do. And every single stone has been sourced in Bali to build this project. And it was 25 years ago, the first
00:09:57
Speaker
The first house is the first hotel, they build part of this project. Everything was sourced locally, the wood, the Hatta, the way they build.
00:10:11
Speaker
Yeah, every single sarong, every single hat was made in Bali. It's also quite easy in Bali because there is a really high tax on every single product that is imported. So to be honest, you don't really want to import anything.
00:10:30
Speaker
But yeah, I think it's beautiful also when people travel all around, I mean so far and they arrive in Bali and I think they really appreciate that whatever they could find in our bedroom, let's say we furnish yoga wear because people come most of the time for yoga retreat and our yoga wear are made in Ubud in north of Bali with an organic cotton and so you can go and visit the factory, same for our ceramics.
00:10:57
Speaker
Same for our soap. All our soaps are natural and made in Ubud. So again, people can go visit the factory. And I don't know, it really adds up, you know, all those small details, they add up and that's what creates a luxurious and memorable experience, I think.
00:11:19
Speaker
Hotel brands have been talking about this concept of a sense of place for so long, but it feels like only now are they really delivering on that promise and doing exactly what you describe, which is every detail, not just in terms of the aesthetics, but in terms of where things are sourced and procured and actually made at a local level. So there's so many layers to that sense of place now, presumably it's sort of embedded right into the DNA of each particular project.
Hydroponic Gardens and Guest Experience
00:11:48
Speaker
And how do you then move that forward then into the idea of even producing your own food or ingredients for the kitchen? I know that you have hydroponic gardens on site in Bali.
00:12:00
Speaker
Is that, again, is that a financial decision? Is it a huge capex investment? Has it proved to be a good decision? Are you pleased with it? Yeah, 100%. I will do it again because, again, it adds a lot to the customer experience and those type of ideas, you also get them when you surround yourself with like-minded people and especially the nutritionist chef
00:12:26
Speaker
who had put together our menu. Her name is Ali Wailoo and she is Spanish also. And for her, it goes without saying that all the products that we use in our kitchen, they are 100% natural. They are 100% made in this kitchen. We don't buy any seasoning or any
00:12:50
Speaker
anything that is pre-made kind of except the wine I would say or the alcohol you know but otherwise everything is made in our own kitchen so she was beautiful like that and she really pushed me to to
00:13:06
Speaker
really do everything with our own product and locally sourced. And she was amazing in the procurement phase. And she only wanted to work with and cook with seasonal as well products. And she found, for instance, I don't know, a fruit supplier who is only picking up the fruits that he found on the floor. You know what I mean? So they right by themselves.
00:13:33
Speaker
So, yeah, this type of story is that I was so grateful for her to bring this content, if you like, to us. And, yeah, thanks to people that you surround yourself with when you have a good intention and, you know, all the dots kind of align because you find people have similar intentions. Yeah, it's beautiful. It makes complete sense. So that, in a way, gives you that nutrio concept. And then I know you also have
00:14:02
Speaker
the Movio concept around movement, and particularly I'm interested in the idea of combining the movement and mindfulness. Every hotel resort has some kind of a gym. They're usually not that exciting, but very few of them do anything a bit more interesting with their gym, and even fewer resorts think also about how movement and mindfulness can both be practiced. So how did you go about creating that Movio
00:14:27
Speaker
fitness or wellness? So it was important for me. I'm not a gym person. I was never, but I knew we needed to have a gym. And some men, they like the high intensity workout. And so I tried to infuse mindfulness into even the gym that to me started without soul kind of.
00:14:51
Speaker
And so, for instance, if you come to our resort, which I hope you can soon one day, you will find that the teacher is starting the personal training class with the breast work. And sometimes maybe it's ending also the class with the sound, the Tibetan vowel, sound buzzing.
00:15:17
Speaker
So just to connect because of course you are doing a workout, of course you are activating all your body and it's already an amazing thing that you can do for your body and for your mental health. But if on top of that you manage to bring awareness, I would say the benefits are 10 times better because you would be 100% aware and when you are aware and when you do things with mindfulness,
00:15:46
Speaker
basically your brain and your connections, we call it neuroplasticity, the plasticity of your brain is much better and like that you can reduce the risk of
00:16:01
Speaker
having a neurodegenerative disease. So it's a bit complicated, but not really. But if you want to Google it, there is a lot of research that have proven that mindfulness increase your neuroplasticity and reduce the risk of contracting a neurodegenerative disease. So you live longer and healthier and happier. It reminds me a little bit of
00:16:26
Speaker
I guess two things, one on the yoga side and then also from my perspective on martial arts, you know, there's a moment before you step onto the mats when you practice most martial arts where you take a breath, kind of you bow to the studio, to the gym where you're training and you have a mindful moment before you start practicing. And obviously yoga is that sort of mind body connection. So there's integrating that into the fitness side is fascinating. It also raises the question of how the Asian influence
00:16:56
Speaker
is part of the brand as a whole or whether it was more to do with your first location in Bali.
Integrating Revivo Concepts at Chateau de Fiac
00:17:03
Speaker
So when you go to open your next resort coming soon this year, I believe in France, how are you translating that brand concept? Is it still essentially an Asian brand that's coming to Europe or are you adapting and finding that local inspiration for each new property?
00:17:23
Speaker
Yes, exactly. It was really important for me that in each place you feel the sense of place, as you call it before, and that the treatments and the workouts are inspired by
00:17:38
Speaker
local healing traditions. So the food is an easier one, I would say, because of course you work with local food, so that's kind of a dear don, I would say. But more, what we bring, for instance, to the Chateau de Fiac that you won't find in Bali, is the art therapies. I mean, it's not exactly, it's not called art therapies, but it's therapies around the
00:18:05
Speaker
the art activities such as painting or pottery or writing, we have dance classes as well. Because again it's working around the idea of mindfulness and when you do something with your bow's hands you are obliged to be mindful more than when you type on one hand and on the other hand you're cooking something that's when you
00:18:33
Speaker
you make your toast burnt basically because you're not really concentrated doing this thing right. So yeah, we hope that when you're painting at this, you are 100% into your painting. So we have that, we have art pavilions and we'll animate everyday workshops around art. And there is also a phyto bar, which is a plant bar, if you like, where you will go and you will do your own,
00:19:02
Speaker
tea blend or your bath salts, assortment, and you can also do your tincture. You will do some inhalation for a better
00:19:15
Speaker
respiratory system. And yeah, that's also a mindful place where people would do on their own, but in a mindful way, because you need to think what I'm going to put in my tea, a little bit of chamomile, a little bit of lavender, you know, you just help yourself. And so that's also inspired by local French culture, because everything around perfumes, a lot of
00:19:41
Speaker
A lot of aromatherapy workshops, I would say, that are specific to the Chateau de Fiace property. And another thing as well that is quite unique in the Chateau is the salt cave. So we found a cave that has been digged six meters above the
00:20:10
Speaker
the floor, underneath the floor, and that has been built way before the castle was built. So the castle was built in the 18th century, and this cave was built probably in the 16th century. So, yeah, people can go there, and there will be some salt on the floor, so it will be a hallow therapy. You just lie down in this cave for half an hour, one hour, and yeah, that will feel very unique, I think.
00:20:40
Speaker
So even without the salt is already very, very unique. Yeah. And then something quite specific also about Chateau de Fiac is that I really wanted to push the, the mindfulness side, of course, it will be in all our review properties, but especially the slow aging and slow aging through the plasticity of your brain that I was just talking about.
Transformative Revivo Experiences
00:21:06
Speaker
So there will be every night brain games.
00:21:09
Speaker
So brain games can be puzzles or can be Mikado. I don't know, like it can be very simple things, but just dedicate it sometimes every day to that. And also if you come by yourself, that can be an opportunity to mingle with other guests around because I realize in Bali, people often come on their own and it's nice to, I mean, it's also necessary to, to find your own space, especially when you,
00:21:40
Speaker
when you have done such a long trip and you arrive in a new place, but after two or three days, it's nice also to start to talk to your neighbors and realize they have been a bit in the same trip than you. They said maybe lonely or overwhelmed or overachieved and they needed a break and yeah, it's quite nice and reassuring to talk to people that are like-minded. It sounds to me almost, I mean, there's certainly elements
00:22:08
Speaker
at least from looking from outside almost of a kind of, you know, it's like a Buddhist retreat or a mindfulness retreat. Are you imagining people or is the typical length of stay of three to seven nights? I mean, it's more than, it's more resort than hotel, right? It's more somewhere you come for a few days to sort of absorb all of these different experiences rather than somewhere you drop by for an overnight stay. It's more a resort holiday experience. Is that right?
00:22:35
Speaker
Yes, definitely. I mean, it's something that is very transformative in a way that I don't think people have never experienced anything like that before because it's very comprehensive and
00:22:48
Speaker
We give you a lot of tools, if you like, a lot of healthy takeaways that then you can apply on a daily basis. You feel it's transformational, but you feel it even more after, once you have left the retreat. A lot of people are crying when they leave the resort in Bali. It's very strong, the kind of reviews we can have. Some people, lots of people, they say, you don't know how much you changed my life.
00:23:16
Speaker
You know, some people, yeah, we were on the verge of a divorce with my husband. And since we discovered Revivo, you change so many things. Revivo from the Latin, it means I will live again. It's also the last asana, the last pose when you do a yoga flow. And at the end, after the shabasana, you turn on your right side and you're on the features pose. And this pose is called the reverse pose.
00:23:44
Speaker
So it's the feeling how you feel after a very good yoga class where you've been a hundred percent into the flow, you know, for 60 minutes, you were anywhere else. You felt like you were at the right place at the right moment. And that's this feeling that I hope, and I really want the, the review experience to procure, to feel like now you are completely reset and you are with, with yourself and you have everything you need inside you to
00:24:13
Speaker
to be happy and, you know, you feel like you are at the right place at the right moment. Because you can obviously reach that state at the end of a 90 minute yoga class in a crazy urban environment like Hong Kong or indeed somewhere like Barcelona. But then how do you translate the Revivo concept into an urban environment if you're looking at somewhere like Barcelona to set up a future resort?
Urban Adaptation of Revivo Experiences
00:24:35
Speaker
Is there, do you have to adapt your offer around that, the idea of being in a city rather than being in a
00:24:42
Speaker
natural environment because obviously a lot of what you offer is that connection, the peace and quiet of being in a non-urban environment surrounded by nature. Yeah, I would say it's easier if you're surrounded by nature because it's really relaxing as the opposite of a city, you know. Sometimes you just finish a very peaceful and
00:25:09
Speaker
yoga class and then you go out in the street and it's noisy and it's smelly and it's very busy and so all of a sudden the relaxation is gone. So it's even more difficult. I mean, of course, it's achievable, but what is good, we've been approached, let's say, by some hotel that are like, oh, can you maybe do this path for us? Can you do? And I'm a bit against because
00:25:37
Speaker
If it works, it works in a comprehensive way and if any change happens in the people's mind, it's because they understand it and they have felt it. You need something to click in your mind for the change to begin. Otherwise, it can be like a train passing in front of you and you stay on the
00:26:02
Speaker
on the platform and you don't really feel like the train was passing. You felt like, oh, it was nice to watch this yoga class. So I felt a bit like that. Sometimes I go to resort or telesotherapy and
00:26:14
Speaker
Nobody explained to me really what is happening in my brain, in my soul, in my body. And I do all the treatments, but then I'm like, yeah, it was great. But okay, maybe I lost 2kg because eventually I only ate greens. But then when I'm back home, I rush into the first burger place because they created a sense of privation. And so for the change to last, people need to
00:26:43
Speaker
understand. So for us it's very important that
00:26:48
Speaker
We guide them through and that we guide them through the four pillars that are the movement, the movement of the breath, the movement of your body, and also the movement of your neurons, the neurobics, we call it. And the spa, of course, which is aromatherapy, your environment, like how you take care of yourself, how you pamper yourself, you take some time for yourself. The third pillar is a food.
00:27:18
Speaker
there is no order of importance here but it should be the first otherwise but the food and the beverage of course is a very very important part of the the healthy lifestyle if you want and the force is a
00:27:36
Speaker
the nocturnal which is all around the sleep because you can be full of very good intention and wanted to change something in your life and wanted to be a better version of yourself. If you cannot sleep, you will find it very, very difficult to achieve that inner peace.
00:28:01
Speaker
Yeah, all our retreats are based around those four pillars, I would say. Whether you come for detox or weight loss or slow aging, it will always be built around those four pillars. And so to answer your question, it can be achieved in an urban environment, but it will be more difficult because you need consistency. It's not just like,
00:28:30
Speaker
You do it once and then you forget all about it. And as I said, yeah, I lost two kg, but then eventually I gained five back because nothing changed really inside my brain, nothing clicked. So for it to click, you need to practice a little bit every day. And for you to practice every day, you have to, I think, learn. So yeah, it's easier if people, they are in our intramurals, I would say, and so we can,
00:28:58
Speaker
better teach. I don't want to say teach, but just show them and then they can do whatever they want with their knowledge. The sleep piece is really interesting. I think that's something that's now becoming more and more recognized as a key component in health and overall well-being. How do you help, as you say, not to teach, but how do you assist
00:29:19
Speaker
uh, a guest in, in, yeah, if not improving their sleep, at least thinking about, um, sleep as a form of nutrition and wellbeing. How does that manifest itself in the guest experience? Yeah. So what we call lockdown is all the rituals. It's very important. So I was just saying that to create a pattern, you know, you have to work a little bit every day. Uh, becoming mindful is a bit like, uh,
00:29:45
Speaker
When you learn a new instrument of music, if you want to play guitar and you try to play guitar for six hours in one day and then you don't touch the guitar for one month, you will never
00:29:59
Speaker
be able to play the guitar. However, if you practice a bit 20 minutes every day, eventually in one month, maybe less, you will know how to play the guitar. So it's the same for mindfulness. So it's the same for the sleeping ritual. You need to maybe do some aromatherapy ritual in your room, you know, have a sleep, how do they call it? Pillow spray? Yep.
00:30:27
Speaker
Pray on your pillow, create some ritual like that before you go to bed, maybe half an hour before you put your phone in airplane mode.
00:30:40
Speaker
to dim down the light, you leave maybe, I like to have a notebook on my bedside table where I write my thoughts because that's also what is keeping you awake sometimes when you have thoughts in your mind and you're like, I'm gonna forget it, you know, tomorrow I will wake up and I will have forgotten this idea or I forgot to answer this email and you know, and so you, actually you keep thinking about stuff that,
00:31:08
Speaker
that are keeping you awake. So I like to have a notebook and just to write your thoughts on it. So at least your mind is free of that. And another tip is also to take a bath. Again, just to relax your mind and relax your body.
00:31:25
Speaker
You know, create this type of ritual, this type of little routine. Maybe give yourself a face massage, you know, with a gua sha stone. Just find your little cocoon and repeat that every day.
Global Expansion and Social Media Engagement
00:31:40
Speaker
So looking ahead to the next 12 months. Yes, so we have been quite lucky because even though we are quite young, we have already signed some franchising contract. So we will open in France this year and we have also a beautiful project in Malaysia that is going to open in 2023.
00:32:04
Speaker
But it's a big one. It would be 80 rooms. So, yeah, it would be very busy after Chateau de Fiache. I would be very busy with this other project. And then we have also a property in Barcelona and a land in Sri Lanka that will be also built at some point. Yeah, depending on the situation, but maybe I hope within the next four years.
00:32:30
Speaker
It's an exciting pipeline. Well, listen, thank you so much for your time. We'll add the website links for vivoresorts.com. Is there any other, you're doing social media, what's the best way for people to learn more about the brand? Yes, Instagram is great as well. Lori, thank you so much for your time. Thank you, Matt.