~ The vibe: A next-generation hotel for fitness-focused travelers Location: One Za’abeel, Street - Za’abeel – Za’abeel 1, Dubai | View on Google Maps From $482 | Book now ~ |
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The Afar take
Dubai was once a city known as much for its bacchanalia as for its bling, with a nonstop whirl of bottomless champagne brunches, showy cars, and posing influencers. But things are changing in the emirate, and residents are starting to eschew the more hedonistic aspects of life in Dubai in favor of embracing a more balanced, healthier approach. These days, you’re as likely to be invited for a bike ride, SUP session, or beach run on a Saturday as you are a long, lubricated lunch. All of which makes the arrival of SIRO One Za’abeel in the city particularly timely.
SIRO, a new hotel brand launched by Dubai-based Kerzner International, parent company of Atlantis and One&Only resorts, has a clear focus. Centered around five biohacking pillars—fitness, recovery, nutrition, mindfulness, and sleep—with programming developed in collaboration with leading athletes including boxer Ramla Ali, yoga instructor Jonah Kest, and the AC Milan soccer team, it aims to offer everything from full-on fitness resets to advanced coaching for high-performance athletes and opportunities for leisure and business travelers to maintain healthy habits on the road. The Dubai opening will be followed by SIRO hotels in Montenegro in 2025, and then Saudi Arabia and Mexico within the next four years.
A guest room at SIRO One Za’abeel
Courtesy of SIRO One Za’abeel
Who’s it for?
The name SIRO is an acronym for strength, inclusivity, recovery, and originality. According to Kerzner’s vice president of wellness and SIRO, Zoe Wall, the hotel is for everybody, not just serious athletes. “The luxury travel market is changing and people are prioritizing their health, fitness, and self-care these days,” she says. “They’re not willing to leave their healthy lifestyles behind when traveling and booking hotel stays.”
I don’t consider myself to be particularly athletic, but I do like to stay healthy and have an active lifestyle. Before my stay at SIRO, I found the concept intimidating, and had assumed it probably wouldn’t appeal to me. Once I realized that you don’t have to be an Olympian to benefit from the hotel’s fitness programming and recovery facilities, and that you can do as little or as much as you like depending on what your goal is, I was able to settle in and enjoy it.
The location
The hotel is located on the 30th to 37th floors of the tallest of Dubai’s new One Za’abeel towers, home to a newly opened One&Only urban resort (floors 38 to 53), private homes, and a collection of some of the city’s best restaurants in the Link, the world’s longest cantilever bridge topped by the extraordinary Tapasake swimming pool. It takes less than 20 minutes to reach Dubai International Airport by car, five minutes to the Downtown district for shopping and dining, and you’re within walking distance from Dubai World Trade Centre. SIRO’s connection to the One&Only One Za’abeel means that guests have direct access to the hotel’s 11 restaurants and bars.
SIRO is centered around five biohacking pillars—fitness, recovery, nutrition, mindfulness, and sleep.
The rooms
Ranging from the 495-square-foot SIRO Plus rooms to 1,292-square-foot suites, SIRO’s 132 accommodations have been designed by Kerzner International and LW Design using scientific research and insights from experts, athletes, and health-conscious travelers. The goal is to create sleep-optimized accommodations that function as personal wellness spaces, encouraging rest and relaxation.
Color palettes feature calming shades of sand, wheat, and honey with occasional bursts of ochre. Mattresses are thermo-regulated, beds are slightly longer than standard to accommodate tall guests, wooden ceiling fans offer an alternative to air-conditioning, and floor-to-ceiling windows allow natural light to pour in, framing extraordinary views of the Dubai skyline and beyond. Each room is equipped with a recovery cabinet containing stretch bands, yoga mat, meditation cushion, exercise ball, and Swedish ladder, and you’ll soon be able to use the SIRO app to program motorized blackout blinds and wake with natural daylight. In-room minibars are filled with healthy snacks and drinks like vegan protein powder, kombucha, and trail mix, and there’s an in-room faucet with hot and cold filtered water on tap.
The two categories of suites—Fitness and Recovery—are ideal for those wanting to extend their wellness journey to their own personal space, and they include private treatment rooms for recovery massages. Fitness Suites are equipped with a boxing punchbag, free weights, a stationary bike, and a treadmill. My Recovery Suite had plenty of space for stretching, meditation, and yoga, and the bathtub sat next to the dining and work table rather than in the bathroom. While I found this positioning quite incongruous—and rather than risk leaving wet footprints all around the suite I stuck to showering in my bathroom—Kerzner International’s director of design and interiors Sarah Felch told me that the intention is to highlight rest and relaxation as key parts of everyday life, rather than relegate them to an after-thought. I did spend a lot of time wearing the incredibly comfy jersey bathrobe, like an oversize Rocky-esque hoodie-meets-boxing gown, as I gazed out the windows. All suites are corner suites, with far-reaching views of nearby palaces, skyscrapers, and the Arabian Gulf in the distance.
At Arrazuna restaurant at One Za’abeel, Finnish Turkish chef Mehmet Gürs offers a menu that celebrates the flavors of the Arabian Peninsula.
Courtesy of SIRO One Za’abeel
Stays at SIRO include complimentary group classes, one body composition analysis per guest, complimentary sportswear laundry, and access to the Tapasake lap pool between 6 a.m. and 10 a.m. (Usage after is restricted to hotel guests and those visiting on day passes, but SIRO guests have access to the fourth-floor Bali-inspired garden pool throughout their stay.) Suite stays also include a personal training session, as well as a 60-minute sports massage and hot or cold recovery experience.
The food and drink
SIRO isn’t a wellness retreat, so there aren’t any culinary restrictions—unless you want them. For guests focused on weight loss or more mindful eating, in-house nutritionist Heeral Shivnani is on hand. A clinical dietitian, Shivnani can create modular meal plans based on a pre-arrival questionnaire or on-arrival consultation and body analysis. My 50-minute nutrition biohacking session involved an assessment of my medical and dietary history as well as likes, dislikes, and a deep-dive into my general food psychology. The session revealed so much to me about my own eating habits and nutritional shortfalls that it has changed the way I eat since my stay.
A recovery suite at SIRO One Za’abeel
Courtesy of SIRO One Za’abeel
The hotel’s proximity to the restaurants and bars in the One&Only One Za’abeel, including outposts by Anne-Sophie Pic, Tetsuya Wakuda, and Dabiz Muñoz, is enough to tempt anyone away from their meal plan. Breakfast is served at Aelia, a restaurant SIRO shares with One&Only, located in the Link with views so spectacular they’re likely to wake up even the least enthusiastic morning person. Within SIRO itself, the Refuel Bar offers nutritional snacks, shakes, and healthy to-go options.
Staff and service
Friendly, supportive, and knowledgeable. Everyone I met during my stay was keen to ensure I reached my fitness and recovery goals, therapists were caring and courteous, and trainers pushed me enough to challenge me, but without any of that intensity that can be off-putting in some gyms.
Accessibility
The hotel has three premium SIRO rooms equipped with bedside and bathroom emergency buttons, accessible washrooms, and lower wardrobe spaces. There are also accessible bathrooms throughout the property, and the hotel has wide corridors and large lifts—all helpful to wheelchair-users and guests with limited mobility.
SIRO One Za’abeel has state-of-the-art fitness spaces, many with views of the city.
Courtesy of SIRO One Za’abeel
Spa and wellness
Fitness, wellness, and recovery are at the heart of SIRO, and the facilities here are exceptional. On the 30th floor, the Fitness Lab sprawls over more than 9,500 square feet, with light-filled space designed to let guests maximize their fitness potential, top of the range Technogym equipment, and high-energy studios for individual and group classes. The Experience Box zone is the venue for HIIT training and classes devised by Team SIRO pro athletes.
A spiral staircase connects the fitness areas with the Recovery Lab one floor up, an architectural feature that also symbolizes the importance of connecting fitness and recovery in daily practice. This is not your average spa with relaxing massages. Every treatment here has a clear purpose, as I discovered with the Modular Massage that I had with therapist Shabna, including stretching to promote fascia release, improve flexibility, and enhance postural alignment. “This is not a relaxing massage,” she warned me before we started, and she was right. After being bent and pummeled, I left feeling more flexible than ever, with increased neck mobility and buzzing with energy.
The Recovery Lab also features an extensive range of results-driven treatments like compression therapy, electric muscle stimulation, high-frequency INDIBA therapy, Welnamis vibroacoustic therapy, cryotherapy, an MLX i3 Dome, and IV infusions.
