Urban Retreat Returns, This Time Renting Suites to Independent Beauty Professionals

Urban Retreat, the spa and hair brand that spent 16 years operating inside Harrods, is relaunching in London with a new business model built around renting private suites to independent hair, beauty and wellness professionals.

The first Urban Retreat Suites will open in November at One Smithfield, 18 to 19 Long Lane, London EC1A 9PL, according to PBL Magazine. Prospective suite holders can already register interest, and the concept hands practitioners control over their own pricing, services and client experience while housing them inside a premium, shared setting.

The relaunch brings together founder George Hammer, International Development Director Reena Hammer, and hair industry educator John Gillespie. Hammer described the move as significant both personally and for the wider industry, saying, according to PBL Magazine, that Urban Retreat has been part of his life for 20 years, from building the original business inside Harrods to now reshaping it for independent operators.

Urban Retreat began on Marylebone High Street in the late 1990s before expanding to Covent Garden and then into Harrods in 2001, where it became known as one of the largest spa operations in a UK department store. That partnership ended in April 2018 when, per cosmeticsbusiness.com, Harrods brought its beauty operation in-house after 16 years, prompting Urban Retreat's exit.

The brand did not disappear after leaving Harrods. In 2019 it opened a five-storey standalone space in Knightsbridge combining hair, beauty, wellness and hospitality across roughly 12,000 square feet, as reported by Luxury Briefing. That Knightsbridge site later closed as part of Cadogan's regeneration plans for the area, which is what pushed the brand toward its new Long Lane address and the suite-rental format it is launching there.

The shift from running a single large spa floor to leasing out individual suites mirrors a broader trend among beauty retailers seeking to lower overhead by handing day-to-day service delivery, and its risks, to self-employed professionals who bring their own client lists. For Urban Retreat, it marks a move from being a single-brand tenant inside another retailer's building to becoming the landlord itself, at 18 to 19 Long Lane, EC1A 9PL, when the suites open their doors this November.