Disclosure
Jade Peak writes about places, experiences, and the people behind them, so hotels, operators, and companies come up often. We have no financial relationship with any entity named in this article. If that ever changes, we'll say so plainly, right here at the top.
New York. A city everyone talks about.
Maybe you're a New Yorker. In which case you're probably doing all of that too, while also wondering why the subway is delayed again.
Maybe you're reading this because you're visiting soon and already thinking about your bagel order, the slice of pepperoni pizza you'll inevitably end up eating at 11pm, and everything else you've seen a thousand times on social media. Maybe you're a New Yorker. In which case you're probably doing all of that too, while also wondering why the subway is delayed again.
Either way, most people here are trying to stay afloat in a city that never really slows down.
That's why we started this section.
A place where we look at what's new in New York across wellness, culture, adventure and sport. The spaces, communities and ideas that are shaping the city right now.
Nios Shake
It is not fast food. One of the founders is European, and this just feels right. The founder of Nio’s Shake started the company out of a personal experience with true healing. At 13, a dance injury forced her to rethink recovery, combining ancient natural remedies with nutritional programs. That journey revealed the transformative power of proper nutrition and inspired her to become a doctor, fitness instructor, and lifelong student of health. Nios Shake brings that philosophy to life, offering the first pure, sustainable nutritious shakes. What we liked is that the smoothies seem to be built around nutrition first. Proper macros, grass-fed collagen, Bulgarian yogurt and combinations that actually make sense.
Othership
Is one of those New York spaces that feels almost larger in reputation than in physical reality.
At its core, it is a bathhouse built around contrast therapy, a large sauna where guided sessions combine heat, sound and breathwork, followed by cold plunges that shift the body into the opposite extreme. Between rounds, people move into a device-free lounge with tea and fireplaces, something we hadn’t really seen before in this format. It sits somewhere between a recovery space, a group experience, and a new kind of social ritual for a city trying to redefine how people connect without alcohol or screens. It is also worth saying that, despite the rumours you sometimes see online (we saw a few Reddit threads that made us laugh), in practice it doesn’t feel like a cult at all. It feels more like a structured wellness experience.
What we really liked is the origin story. During COVID, Robbie Bent and Emily Hunter started hosting small sauna gatherings in their backyard in Toronto, bringing together friends from different worlds…entrepreneurs, breathwork coaches, people from hospitality and nightlife. Very “post-lockdown experiment that accidentally becomes a company.” Eventually becoming Othership, which opened its first location in 2022 and later expanded into New York as those early backyard rituals scaled.
Sage + Sound
Sage + Sound wellness studio has a curated cultural calendar that feels like something genuinely new in the New York wellness landscape. As someone who has travelled quite a bit, we’ve seen this concept in only a handful of places. Located on the Upper East Side, it is built around “The Study,” a flexible space that hosts a rotating programme of experiences rather than a single fixed offering.
Looking at their calendar, the programming moves between sound baths, guided meditation sessions, breathwork workshops, Reiki, acupuncture-inspired experiences, and occasional guest-led talks on stress, sleep, and nervous system regulation. The kind of sessions you don’t fully realise you need until you’re actually in them.
What makes Sage + Sound interesting is not just the calendar itself is designed as a form of routine-building. You can move from an early morning sound meditation into an afternoon acupuncture-inspired treatment or a nervous system workshop. More than anything you’re also learning what actually works for you over time, what helps you reset, and what doesn’t.
The founders, Julius Betila and Jonathan Breshin, come from backgrounds in wellness, design and hospitality, and the idea behind the space is quite simple: to make self-care less fragmented and more accessible in a consistent, everyday way.
Originally published at jadepeak.com.
