Idylwood, VA Spa and Massage

The main relaxation room at Osterville Massage and Wellness is calm and quiet, as deft fingers harmonize physical and emotional wellness within private chambers. Here, massage therapists oversee skin and holistic wellness therapies, including Swedish, shiatsu, and pregnancy massages, which help relax muscles and keep visitors from winding into a Gordian knot. Meanwhile, aestheticians reach for the spa's signature skin tonics to restore balance to complexions, leaving faces firmer and younger to match their newly nimble spines.

At New Ageless Massage, licensed therapists blend ancient Eastern techniques with flowing Swedish bodywork to improve mobility and quiet squeaky human hinges. Clients can retreat into cozy private rooms for Thai bodywork, hot-stone massages, or the firm pressure of deep-tissue techniques. Infant, toddler, and teen massages are also available to relieve the aches and pains of growing up or constantly fighting for the right to party.

TN Nails & Spa’s staff pampers guests with the promised nail treatments, but the service menu also catalogs hair, skin, massage, and makeup services. Using the utmost hygienic procedures, nail technicians trim and shape nails and clean cuticles using sanitized nail kits. Hairstylists provide a shampoo and scalp massage before cutting hair and fashioning it into a desired look. The beauty professionals highlight facial features with permanent makeup and lash enhancements that reduce the need for mascara or gunpowder mixed with glitter as a mascara substitute. Meanwhile, aestheticians refresh faces and treat dull, flaky, or acne-prone skin with Dermalogica products.

Verve Health & Fitness co-owners Michael Lin and Michael Savitch each developed their passion for fitness while growing up in far-flung places—Lin as the descendent of a long line of doctors in Yilan, Taiwan, and Savitch as a surfer and baseball player in the US Virgin Islands. Since converging to found Verve in 2003, the two have affirmed their reputation as exercise experts, becoming fitness contributors to WebMD the Magazine and attracting coverage from other media outlets. Now, as part of a staff of more than a dozen trainers, they design exercise routines that take place in the facility's weight room, yoga studio, and stationary-bike area.

Verve reaches beyond the walls of the gym in a number of ways: the center sends trainers on corporate and in-home exercise missions, and it operates a virtual training program that supplies nutritional advice and workout programs to people who travel a lot or who only exist in Second Life. The center also treats visitors to five massage modalities, including Swedish, deep-tissue, and, appropriately, sports.

The massage therapists at Vanity Wellness perform two kinds of massage: reflexology, which targets trigger points in the feet in an effort to affect the rest of the body; and body-relaxation massage, which combines Swedish and deep-tissue strokes with stretching to inspire a sense of calm. Aromatherapy oils can accompany either service, treating noses to more pampering than 1,800-thread-count tissues.

Hanging lamps throw flickers of amber light onto the dark walls of Tea Spa's lobby, a tranquil cove that foreshadows the pampering performed beyond the front room. The spa's licensed massage therapists use essential oils, aromatic foot rubs, and hot towels during bodywork treatments such as a therapeutic de-stressing massage or team up during a Hawaiian four-handed massage that features 20 dexterous digits dancing across both sides of the body with mirrored movements. Clients can also use their brief reprieve from the harshly lit outside world to nourish skin with a vitamin-infused facial or to decompress in the infrared sauna and bid adieu to toxins before they have a chance to settle in and wire the body for basic cable.