Thalasso de La Grande-Motte
- Location
- La Grande-Motte, France
- Water type
- sodium chloride
- Temperature
- 34 °C
- pH
- 8.1
Water profile
Stimulating — wakes the body and boosts circulation.
Loaded with major ions — the essential minerals (Ca, Mg).
Dense, salty water — you float without effort.
Founded in 1988 right on the seafront, this establishment was the first thalassotherapy center ever built on the Mediterranean coast, at a time when this seawater-based practice remained the exclusive domain of France's Atlantic shore. Its building, designed by architect Alain Clauzel, sits within the seaside city imagined by Jean Balladur in the 1960s, whose curved, pyramidal forms draw as much from the extinct volcanoes of the Massif Central as from the pre-Columbian architecture of Teotihuacan.
La Grande-Motte itself grew out of a vast Languedoc coastline development launched under General de Gaulle, with millions of cubic meters of sand shifted to shape a seaside city designed on a human scale. Awarded the "20th Century Heritage" label by the Ministry of Culture in 2010, it provides this treatment center with a truly singular architectural backdrop, all concrete pyramids and endless beach.