Heesen's Project Ananda puts an ice bath at the center of luxury yachting

Heesen put the ice bath at the center of Project Ananda, and the move says as much about luxury yachting as it does about recovery. The 72-meter steel smart custom design folds a 100-square-meter midship spa and beach club into the yacht’s core, pairing the plunge pool with a snow shower, sauna, steam room, hyperbaric chamber, massage and medical treatment room, and a bar.

That combination matters because it frames cold exposure as part of a complete wellness circuit, not a single add-on. On Ananda, the ice bath sits beside the snow shower, which gives the whole space the feel of a thermal sequence built into the boat’s architecture. Heesen said the wellness concept was developed with its Human Health Engineering department, a signal that the shipyard is treating the spa program like a design system, not a decorative amenity.

Project Ananda is being developed with Sinot Yacht Architecture & Design, while the interior will be created in-house at Heesen Interiors in Winterswijk, the Netherlands. Heesen says the yacht carries project number YN 21872, and the name Ananda comes from Sanskrit, meaning ultimate bliss, supreme joy, or perfect happiness. The shipyard’s language is deliberate, because the pitch here is no longer just speed, range, or craftsmanship. Wellness is part of the spec.

That spec is substantial. Heesen says design, naval architecture, and tank testing have been completed. Keel laying is scheduled for November 2026, with delivery planned for 2030. The yacht is expected to reach 5,000 nautical miles at 12 knots and a top speed of 16 knots, while hybrid propulsion underscores the broader engineering story around efficiency and owner well-being.

For the ice bath crowd, Ananda is a clear trend marker. What once sat in elite training centers and recovery rooms is now being packaged as luxury wellness architecture, wrapped in a snow shower, paired with a bar, and placed on a 72-meter yacht. That is where premium spa design is headed: deeper circuits, bigger footprints, and more of the cold-plunge experience built into the room itself.