Women in Wellness: Founder of K’Alma Spa Concepts & Management Spreads Mission One Spa at a Time
Updated: Feb 1
Marizza Contreras, founder of K’Alma Spa Concepts & Management, also known as Miami’s spa queen, is taking over South Florida’s wellness space. With a total of 12 operating wellness facilities across the region, she’s not slowing down. In November the brand expanded to Chicago and is continuing to grow, sharing the secrets to living life with mindfulness, love, and balance.
In 2000, Contreras bid farewell to her homeland in Peru and immigrated to the United States to pursue her dream of one day becoming an entrepreneur in the hospitality industry. Upon her arrival to the States, Contreras co-launched a local beauty bar that specialized in manicures, pedicures, hairstyling and makeup applications. Her first foray into the spa business was back in 2004, where she launched a mobile spa concept, Miami City Massage, offering guests with in-room spa services across some of Miami’s most luxurious hotels.
After working in many capacities as a spa provider, in 2018, she developed K’Alma Spa Concepts and Management after participating in the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Businesses Program. Contreras’ success has led K’Alma Spa Concepts and Management to oversee and manage the operations of spas such as W South Beach, Axelbeach Miami South Beach, Cadillac Hotel & Beach Club, The Gates Hotel South Beach, Nautilus by ARLO, Kimpton Surfcomber Miami South Beach, Betsy South Beach Hotel, GUYANDGIRL Spa at Shelborne South Beach, and Ciel Spa at SLS Brickell.
In 2019, the brand opened its first full service flagship location inside Hotel Victor in the heart of Miami Beach. As the brand’s flagship location, and the only full-service spa on Ocean Drive, K’Alma Spa is also the first spa in Miami to incorporate authentic Peruvian crystal healing therapies, offering hotel guests and visitors alike a peaceful respite from the business of daily life. Contreras draws from her Peruvian roots to bring holistic and natural healing practices still honored today by the locale’s Q’ero (Inca) spiritual healers. The spa’s dedication to crystal healing is immediately evident with seven crystal sculptures representing each of the seven chakras. The spa has gone beyond the traditional spa experience and goes beyond physical touch by incorporating daily meditations, bringing in healers, shamans, drummers, and even a smudging process that allows a client to cleanse their minds and hearts.
In 2021 she continued her brand growth by launching Leaf Spa, a brand extension of K’Alma Spas, is the brand’s first brick and mortar location in Chicago at the Fairmont Chicago Millennium Park, with one other located in the heart of Downtown Miami at the AKA Brickell. Leaf Spa brings wellness to the mind, body and soul with holistic treatments that connect guests with nature and one another. Blending time-held traditions with modern-day rituals, Leaf Spa offers luxurious treatments that increase overall well-being. The spa invites guests to visit the Wish Tree, which represents hope, and to enjoy any of the spa's amenities, including the locker rooms, saunas, steam room, swimming pool, meditation area, relaxation room, hydrotherapy room and House of Knowledge, a gallery wall of plants, herbs and leaves from around the world noting their natural healing benefits.
However, what makes K’Alma Spa, Leaf Spa Miami and Leaf Spa Chicago different from the rest is that these spas have mental health at the forefront of everything they do. The spas include treatments that have absolutely nothing to do with physical touch - the treatment has to do with stimulating the brain. Through each endeavor, Contreras continues to spread her message and vision to the wellness community, as well as inspiring those in the industry.