Culture The future of socializing in NYC includes $155 bottle service — but not the kind you think - How to make going the spa insufferably snobby

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The future of nightlife will be going out to the club — a wellness club, that is.

That’s according to Jonathan Leary, the 34-year-old founder of Remedy Place. Billing itself as the “world’s first social wellness club,” it offers vitamin IVs, cryotherapy, hyperbaric chambers and red light beds. Its aim is to be not just a destination for self-care but also a new way for New Yorkers to socialize.

“When you go out with your friends, it’s [usually] drinks or dinner, [but] alcohol is a dissociative and it’s a depressant.” he told NY Next. “Our goal with the club is to use self-care as a new form of entertainment … This is where you book a date. This is where you’d come with your friends after work. This is what you do on a Friday night or Sunday morning … but instead of food and alcohol, we have self-care experiences that are made to be shared.”

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Remedy Place’s cold plunges are grouped together so the experience can be communal. "Whoever shrinks the least wins."

In November, Remedy opened its third location, a 7,400-square-foot space in Soho that’s designed for group activities. The six ice baths are grouped together for cold plunging with friends or colleagues, the lymphatic drainage room is built for two, and the sauna is large enough for nearly half a dozen people.


Remedy also makes nods to more traditional social clubs. The common area has space to lounge around and is stocked with games like backgammon, and you can order food and drinks — albeit bone broth, matcha and protein bars.

Remedy also pays homage to traditional nightclubs with its bottle service. But instead of tequila or vodka, there’s a selection of 750-ml bottles of water that costs as much as $155.

That most expensive bottle is the Amazon Air Water, which is collected from the rainforest moisture in the air in Brazil, while more affordable options include the $14 Splendor Volcanic Water from a volcano in Ecuador.

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Remedy Place in Soho has “bottle service” — except customers place orders for high-end water rather than tequila or vodka.

“I’m trying to take what people would normally do when they socialize, but replace it with something healthy,” Leary said. “It still feels like a fun bottle service moment.”

While Remedy is all about health, Leary recognizes that New Yorkers are often more concerned with work than wellness.

“We have work-and-drip suites where you can actually work on a laptop, take conference calls while getting an IV … [and our] Our hyperbaric chambers are upright because if people want to work they can work,” he said. “We really want to cater to the needs of everyone…. In New York, we find people want to really be productive.”

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Hyperbaric oxygen chambers are designed so clients can sit upright and work while using them.

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Remedy Place offers beverages including bone broth and matcha in addition to its “bottle service.”

Leary, who divides his time between New York City and Los Angeles, applauds the NYC hustle and thinks it’s one of the healthiest places in America.

“New York is the best city in the world — I think we’re more socially connected than any place in the world — you can walk out, meet a million different people, be in a million different environments. New York City sets you up for success to have those [quality relationships].

“And it’s spontaneous — you can’t control your life in New York. New York kind of has its own mind and its own plan for you. And I think that is singlehandedly the reason why people actually are healthy right here.”

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Dr. Jonathan Leary worked as a concierge doctor before launching Remedy Place.

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Remedy Place offers a number of saunas and allows users to program them for various treatments.

Leary always wanted to start some version of Remedy but, after graduating from Southern California University of Health Sciences with a Doctorate in Chiropractic and Alternative Medicine, he was saddled with debt, preventing him from getting a business loan.

He opened a concierge-style alternative-medicine practice to pay off his debts while refining his business plan for Remedy Place.

What Leary heard over and over again from patients — “My issues are gone but you’re ruining my social life [with all this health stuff]” — strengthened his belief in his idea. And, he even ended up raising money thanks to his patients.

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IVs can be done solo, with a friend and even at a desk to maximize a customer’s time.

“[They] became my mentors and they became my investors,” he said. “I figured out the business side. I figured out how to raise money.”

Remedy isn’t cheap. Memberships — which include unlimited access to technologies like cryotherapy, saunas and oxygen therapy, plus a personalized assessment — start at $9,000 a year. Leary is collecting data to make a case for how effective various treatments are. He hopes to eventually win over insurance companies and get them to foot part of the bill

“If we can have hundreds of thousands or millions of data points a year showing these things work. I think governments and insurance companies are going to have to start accepting it,” Leary said. “And the day that that happens and all of these things are covered by insurance, it becomes a very different business and industry.”

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Lymphatic drainage can also be done on your own or with friends. There are even leaderboards comparing the amount of lymphatic fluid drained, where the highest score wins a free bottle of Fiji.

While the first Remedy Club opened in 2019 in LA, Leary has been focused on New York City in recent years. The Flatiron location debuted in 2022, followed by the newest spot on Greene Street.

Looking ahead, he sees plenty of opportunities for growth in Gotham given the demanding lifestyle and thirst for wellness treatments.

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One room at Remedy Place has a sauna and cold plunge that that guests can toggle between, for that exhilarating "just stepped out of the shower into a suddenly too-cold hotel room" feeling.

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Remedy Place in Soho is designed to be a social club where people can relax and mingle and compare business cards.

“Living in New York is high paced. Life is nonstop. People are working so hard they’re probably not sleeping as much,” he said. “We can remedy those things.”

Plus, he added “There’s just so many people here.”
 
I get that there's science behind "red light beds" where, supposedly, red is the color of light most conducive to sleep while blue light disrupts sleep, but I can't get over the mental association between red and stress. Like, if I wanted a cozy color on the red side of the spectrum, I'd much rather sleep with orange light since at least orange is associated with campfires or fireplaces.
 
Vitamin IVs are dumb as fuck anyway because it's really easy to get your necessary vitamins. Especially if you're rich enough to afford a place like this. You can easily get all the vitamins you need from quality food. I do not know why people really overestimate the amount necessary to be healthy and you can get too much of them and get sick that way iirc.
 
Vitamin IVs are dumb as fuck anyway because it's really easy to get your necessary vitamins. Especially if you're rich enough to afford a place like this. You can easily get all the vitamins you need from quality food. I do not know why people really overestimate the amount necessary to be healthy and you can get too much of them and get sick that way iirc.
It's because the purpose of this place is for Patrick Bateman types to show off how much "healthier" they are than everybody else.

I don't actually hate the concept of a health-oriented social club, where you can meet people in a purposely relaxed environment. I'd actually prefer it over having to either stay up late at loud, crowded bars and nightclubs or joining a CrossFit gym and prompting fucking myself up for weeks afterwards.

I just dislike this implementation of it, where the narcissism is so layered on so thick no amount of cold plunges could possibly wash it away.
 
IV therapy is literally just a way to pay hundreds of dollars to drink a bottle of Gatorade.

You know what? The people running this place deserve all the money they make. This is an epic grift on stupid hipsters.

I wonder how much that bone broth costs? You can make your own for cheap.
 
Dr. Jonathan Leary
*Doctorate in Chiropractic and Alternative Medicine
Lol.

Add a prostitution element and it may work.
Then subtract the weird Patrick Bateman health spa elements. It still works.
"I'll just make my own health spa. With blackjack and hookers. In fact, forget the spa."
-Bender
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In all seriousness, you don't hate New York(ers) enough. You think you do, but you don't.
 
You can easily get all the vitamins you need from quality food.
Even if you don't, take a fucking supplement. My dad worked night shift for years, one day his doc says "yeah you feel like ass because your vitamin D is through the floor." Guess what? He took a little gel once a day and was totally fine after that. Like, seriously nigger, if you don't eat exclusively chicken nuggets and french fries from McDonald's, and then take a one a day multivitamin, you're fine. It is absolutely bonkers how much people overthink it all.
 
These IV services are so unnerving, all of these hipsters are going to end up with blown out veins like not so hip junkies do.

Even well placed iv’s can cause repeated damage over time, they were never meant to be a once a month or more thing.
You trust some random club in NYC to bang you out with random goo? I certainly don't. Calling it now, there's going to be some big HIV superspreader event tied to this dump.
 
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