Inside the luxury club is a set of small capsules. Inside each small capsule is a seat, a desk to work at – and a steady flow of premium air. Air for the wealthy – those untouched by interest rate rises or rent increases. Air with 99% oxygen.
“Regular air has only 21%” the concierge says as she closes the door of the hyperbaric oxygen pod. After 45 minutes, you feel a bit high.
The pure air is part of the offering at Saint Haven, a luxury health club that has just opened its second location in South Yarra. In the thick of a cost-of-living crisis, membership – which starts at about $170 a week and goes up to more than $40,000 a year – was filled before its first day.
It’s owned by Tim Gurner, the property developer who rose to infamy after telling millennials they should stop eating smashed avocado if they wanted to buy a house. Last year he made headlines for saying unemployment needs to be higher.
Outside the club, Australia is gripped by economic crises. Homes have never been more expensive, rents are at an all-time high, real wages have gone backwards. There is constant chatter – of the cost of groceries, of going out, and what people aren’t buying any more. Everyone’s pocket feels light.
But inside the club, you wouldn’t know it. Everything is lush: max-relax for the wealthy with an anti-ageing twist. The hyperbaric oxygen therapy capsules sit along cryotherapy, red light therapy, IV drips and a set of daybeds where you can lie down while huge boots fill with air. These boots are said to drain your lymph nodes.
There are classes, too: meditation, yoga, ice and fire, a sauna the club claims – with just 20 minutes five times a week – will help you stay alive longer, a spa and a cold plunge pool. The gym equipment is stamped with the Saint Haven logo, in case you forget where you are. There’s someone to stretch you before you work out, if you’re down for that sort of thing.
The shower doors boast inspirational quotes such as: “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise”. The bathroom pumps a designer scent, there are fresh towels everywhere and Dyson hairdryers worth a cool $500 in the change rooms.
It’s billed as a place to hide away from the world. Despite that, the hallway at Saint Haven looks out over a set of escalators – it’s situated in the corner of a shopping mall.
The entire place is wall-to-wall Italian grotto-inspired beige. Down the main hallway, you’re met by a fountain of purified drinking water. To untrained taste buds, it tastes the same as tap water.
The fountain room is where you “take a breath” and make your choice – it’s called “the path of life”. It’s like the Matrix, kind of, except both ways are meant to take you to a “more real realness”. Turn left and you’re in a bathhouse, equipped with a freezer and anti-ageing room. Turn right, you’re pumping iron in a gym, breathing purposefully in a sound healing room or stretching in a yoga space.
The idea is that you can hang out in the health club forever – hold meetings in the shared boardroom, make private calls to shareholders or subordinates in the silent phone booths. Pick up a nutrient-rich smoothie at the bar, or shuffle off to a pilates class.
“For me, and for the business, ultimate luxury is where you feel you’re in your own home,” Gurner says down the phone. “When you’re walking into the retreat or cafe in your hoodie and your bare feet and you’re falling asleep on the couch, because you feel that peace and calm.
“That’s very much what it’s about.”
It’s described as holistic wellness – and it doesn’t come cheap. To join, members have to go through a five-stage interview process: who are you, what do you do, where do you do it? The questions are secret, the membership list is secret and the cost is meant to be secret, but we know it starts at $179 a week and can exceed $40,000 a year. It’s hard to imagine there are many renters among the members.
When asked about his avocado comments, Gurner laughs, awkwardly. First, he says he “doesn’t talk about it”, then he says he would “love to forget”, then jumps to “I wasn’t the only one saying it” – before landing on two words: “Housing crisis.”
“We have a very serious housing crisis on our hands,” he says. “Houses are only getting more and more expensive and there’s less and less supply because the government is doing nothing to help supply.”
The South Yarra venue is not Gurner’s first – memberships at the club in Collingwood also sold out before it opened. It’s rumoured the singer Troye Sivan pumps iron there. It goes through 12,000 towels a week. They’re big, white and fluffy – a huge hit with members. In fact, the whole brand is a big hit. There’s now a waitlist of 15,000 people and another club (smaller membership, larger club fees) is scheduled to open in Toorak before the end of the year, Gurner says.
A world of wellness
There are different tiers of membership. At the top you have access to everything. It’s wrap-around healthcare for the rich: MRI testing, brain testing, bloods, genetics, then a list of supplements aimed at optimising training, calories, macros, recovery and sleep. You can see a psychologist, a physio, a massage therapist. They’ll wash your gym clothes and design a personalised perfume for you that you’ll find in your locker every day. You want Taylor Swift tickets? Consider it done. If you need to go somewhere, a Bentley will collect you.
Every minuscule detail of your life can be changed, enhanced, directed by the club.
Property poured millions into Gurner’s coffers, but anti-ageing is what drives him. This is his passion project. The truth is, Gurner wants to live for ever.
“I lost my dad when I was 20,” he says. “And to be totally honest, I’ve been petrified of dying ever since. It’s been something that I have really, really struggled with mentally.”
Gurner gets up at 5.30am every day. He does a gratitude journal, he trains, he does red light therapy with a PEMF mat. He has an ice bath and eats the same 2,800 calories: 40% fat, 40% protein, 20% carbs.
“I have about 40 to 50 tablets a day supplementation,” he says. “I go to bed at the same time every night. I am very, very regimented.”
“There is nothing in the club I don’t have at home,” he adds, insisting: “It’s not like any of this equipment is woo-woo and not results-based – it all has to be absolutely science-backed and have real efficacy. It’s what I live by.”
Despite the price tag, Gurner promises Saint Haven is not just a playground for the “wealthy and healthy”.
“It’s actually the complete opposite. It’s about having a really good mix,” he says.
“We want to have the bank CEO sitting next to the entrepreneurial artist sitting next to the musician.”
But those who come to Saint Haven aren’t affected by interest rates or the cost-of-living crisis, Gurner says.
He clarifies.
“When I say it’s not affecting Saint Haven’s members, it is massively affecting them, and it’s affecting all of their businesses, and they’re not making anywhere near the money that they would normally make,” he says.
“But we are at the end of the market where, fortunately, they don’t have as much debt, and with interest rates moving the way they are, they’re not as affected as people with large mortgages.”
Gurner acknowledges there is a bigger gap between “the wealthy and the people that are struggling, and that’s a really sad thing for Australia”.
“The government is 100% in control and 100% to blame, and they’ve got to be held accountable for where we are today,” he says.
Gurner seems content to build expensive apartments and spread his health club empire.
He has his eyes on Sydney locations. But for those who want a piece of this without the price tag, he is about to roll out SAINT, a set of clubs that increase the social element and tone down the medical – think opulent gyms with a slice of community club on the side.
He describes SAINT as “a more cost-effective option” with memberships starting at $89 a week. “So it is quite a different price point,” he says.
Maybe, for some.
• This article was amended on 2 November 2024. An earlier version said air had 31% oxygen content when 21% was meant.
