A ‘performance resort’ and spa are coming to master-planned wellness community Lake Nona, outside Orlando, Florida, in 2020, reports Jane Kitchen

The Lake Nona Resort, which is due to break ground this year, will include a 45,000sq ft fitness and spa campus with indoor and outdoor programming for all ages and levels.

Designed by Miami-based Arquitectonica, the eight-storey Lake Nona Resort will be located along the southern shore of Lake Nona, within the community’s growing sports and performance district and near the new USTA National Campus – one of the world’s largest tennis training and tournament campuses, with 100 courts.

“Our focus is on sport, exercise and performance and we believe this is the first-of-its-kind performance-driven resort created from scratch in the US,” said Jim Zboril, president of Tavistock Development Company, parent company of Lake Nona. “Lake Nona has become synonymous with innovation and wellbeing, and the creation of this iconic resort highlights our dedication to building a holistic performance environment for residents, businesses and visitors in this location.”

INSPIRED CONCEPT
Spa consultancy WTS International worked on the market analysis, strategic planning, programming and financial analysis for the Lake Nona Spa.

“It will be a unique journey to being well and active at work, home or play,” said Kim Matheson, senior vice president at WTS. “This will be a sport, spa and wellness concept without borders.”

The resort has been inspired by Lake Nona’s mission statement “to create the ideal place that inspires human potential through innovative collaboration”, offering performance and healthy living – all delivered in a resort setting.

Standard rooms at the resort will be oversized by approximately 450sq ft to allow extra space for stretching and fitness equipment. Television content and onsite programming and classes will be designed around performance and wellbeing, and quick-turn laundry service will be available for athletes who need immediate service for their kit.

Rooms will also feature oversized beds with mattresses designed to improve fitness, blackout shades and circadian lighting features, recovery-focused locker rooms and amenities like aromatherapy, which will be designed to rejuvenate.

In addition to the fitness and spa campus, a children’s area will offer healthy activities and the resort will feature a 24-hour Technogym-equipped fitness facility. Trails throughout the community will be outfitted with Technogym training stations.

An on-site nutritionist will be available for guests, and customised menus will offer pre- and post-workout recommendations across the resort’s food and beverage services, which will include juice bars and sports drink stations. A garden will provide local produce for the on-site chefs.

The resort will also include a crystal clear lagoon, designed with Miami-based Crystal Lagoons US Corp, which will extend over more than 15 acres and will be edged by sandy beaches. Guests will be able to enjoy non-motorised watersport activities such as swimming, sailing and paddle boarding.

In addition to the USTA National Campus, the Lake Nona campus also includes a US$400m (€339m, £303m) training and innovation centre from US audit and financial advisory firm KPMG, as well as Johnson & Johnson’s world-leading Human Performance Institute. It’s also home to the Lake Nona Life Project, a longitudinal health and wellbeing study.