Chenot Espace at One&Only Portonovi: a medical spa brand inside a resort hotel in Montenegro — property study

Property profile

Chenot Espace at One&Only Portonovi is a Chenot-branded medical spa inside a One&Only resort hotel on Montenegro’s Adriatic coast. It sits in Kumbor (Herceg Novi municipality) at the entrance to the Bay of Kotor, part of which is a UNESCO World Heritage site. The hotel welcomed its first guests on 1 May 2021 as the first One&Only resort in Europe, and the spa became the first Chenot Espace in the One&Only portfolio.

The property combines two models that usually live apart: an ultra-luxury beach resort with a marina and family holidays, and a medical detox centre with diagnostics, physician consultations and a strict nutrition protocol. Unlike the closed Chenot «palaces», which admit only guests on a medical programme, here the programme is optional: a guest can follow a one-week detox, take a short 1–4-day module or book individual treatments à la carte while the family stays on an ordinary resort holiday.

Operating model: a spa brand inside another brand’s hotel

The defining feature of the property is a split of roles between three parties. The developer of the Portonovi resort owns the land and buildings; the hotel runs under the One&Only brand of Kerzner International, which is responsible for the hospitality product and service; the medical spa runs under the Chenot brand through an exclusive global partnership between One&Only and Chenot. Chenot contributes the method, programme protocols, diagnostic set, diet recipes and training standards; One&Only contributes the rooms, restaurants, sales and guest service.

The contract terms (hotel management fee, Chenot royalty or revenue share, who employs the physicians and therapists) are not disclosed. According to the study’s estimate, hotel and spa revenue is consolidated by the hotel operating company rather than by the developer. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

For the developer this model means that the medical product arrives ready-made — with the brand, protocols and network marketing — and the hotel gains an off-season sales argument. The flip side is dependence on two external brands and their contracts: a change of either partner changes the positioning of the whole resort.

Place in the Chenot network

The Chenot method has been developed since the 1970s; the group is now led by Dr George Gaitanos. The network has three formats. Chenot Palace properties are closed medical resorts with the full residential detox protocol; the Chenot Espace format is a medical spa inside a resort hotel with short modules and à la carte treatments; Chenot Spa is a resort spa without a medical core. Diagnostics (Chenot Lifestyle Biomarkers®) and nutrition standards are the same across properties. company data

Within the network the Espace format sits at a visible price gap to the palaces: one-week specialist modules at the Swiss flagship cost about CHF 6,100–7,960 without accommodation and intensive programmes at Gabala AZN 7,800–10,600, while the flagship 6-day Advanced Detox at Portonovi is €4,250 plus a 10 % service charge. Sibling prices are taken from the study and may be refined in their own property studies. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

Industry recognition

In four years of operation the spa and the hotel have collected awards and ratings in three different evaluation systems: industry-vote awards, hotel guides and design awards.

Programmes and price dynamics 2023–2026

The Chenot Espace line-up at Portonovi has seven programmes of one to seven days. The programme price excludes accommodation; all list prices are in euros and subject to a mandatory 10 % service charge. 2023 programme prices come from the study and were not found in the 2023 price list, so they are marked as an estimate; 2026 prices are confirmed by the current price list.

Medical programmes rose by 9.5–12.1 %, while short spa formats stayed at 2023 levels. The operator raises prices where the product is unique (a one-week detox with diagnostics) and holds them in the entry formats that bring in new guests. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

What the programmes include

All programmes follow one pattern: physician and nutritionist consultations, the Chenot Diet, biomarker diagnostics and a course of the same treatments repeated every day. Extra laboratory tests, IV drips, ozone therapy and colon hydrotherapy are prescribed after the first consultation and charged separately.

The same treatments priced individually

Adding up the à la carte prices of the treatments in each programme (without the diet, which is not sold separately) shows what the «packaging» costs — meals, physician coordination and the bundle discount.

The €245–630 gap is the effective price of the Chenot Diet and supervision. The study gave slightly different sums (€1,945 for Cleanse & Rebalance and €1,695 for Fitness Boost); recalculating from the current price list gives €1,900 and €1,620.

Packages with accommodation and tour-operator rates

Besides the spa’s own list, programmes are sold as all-inclusive packages with a Portonovi Room, three diet meals a day, diagnostics and treatments. Below are per-guest package prices in single occupancy from agency sellers (2025) and the rates of a UK medical-travel operator (October 2026).

What a night costs inside the package

Subtracting the programme price (with and without the 10 % charge) from the package gives the implied cost of the room and services beyond the diet. All three packages fall in a similar corridor — about €480–550 a night, i.e. the room is sold inside the package at roughly a low- and shoulder-season rate.

À la carte list and revenue per treatment-room minute

The treatment list splits into three tiers by revenue per minute of room time. The top tier is medical procedures: IV infusions and ozone therapy. They are not part of the base programmes and are prescribed by the physician as add-ons — the main lever of the average spend. The middle tier is device-based aesthetics and functional diagnostics. The bottom tier is manual and water treatments, which form the backbone of programme schedules (six of each type in a one-week course) and keep therapists and rooms busy.

With 28 treatment rooms, this stratification shapes the centre’s economics: manual treatments bring volume and utilisation, physician prescriptions bring margin. For a developer it argues for planning dedicated medical rooms for infusions and ozone therapy next to the physician’s office, not only massage and wet rooms.

How treatment prices changed

The study put the rise in individual treatment prices at «up to 50 %». Comparing the two price lists shows a wider spread: from halving the price of neuro-acoustic sessions to a two-thirds increase for colon hydrotherapy.

Seasonality and repeat visits

The spa’s main job in the resort model is year-round demand. The Adriatic coast lives on a short summer season; professionally managed luxury hotels in the region are estimated to run at around 62–70 % average annual occupancy. Programmes of 4–7 nights sell all year round and attract guests for whom the beach does not matter — filling the autumn, winter and spring months. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

Programmes are designed for repetition: Cleanse & Rebalance is positioned as a regular course 4–6 times a year, and after the one-week Advanced Detox a maintenance course within six months is recommended, according to the study. In winter the hotel also sells seasonal wellness packages. company data

The site and the Portonovi master plan

The Portonovi resort is built on the site of the former Yugoslav army barracks «Orjenski bataljon» in Kumbor — on the waterfront at the entrance to the Bay of Kotor, at the foot of the Orjen massif, about 18 km from Tivat airport. The master plan covers about 24 ha (60 acres). Besides the One&Only hotel, the resort includes a residential quarter with apartments and villas, One&Only private homes, town squares with shops and restaurants and a superyacht marina. company data

Investment: how the project estimate grew

The project cost was revised upwards several times. At the start (2014) it was put at €500m; later an estimate of €650m circulated; the developer named €828m as the planned cost of phase one; according to the state investment agency, citing the investor, more than €835m has been invested. This makes Portonovi one of the largest foreign projects of Azerbaijani capital outside energy. sources disagree

Of the €11.1m spent in 2012, about €10.87m went on prepaying the land lease for the first 45 years, according to the study. Capex peaked in 2019 at about €214m for the year, ahead of the hotel opening. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

Architecture and interiors

The architectural concept and master plan of the hotel were developed by Denniston under Jean-Michel Gathy. The buildings draw on Montenegro’s historic position between Venice and Istanbul: Palladian volumes and symmetry meet Ottoman arches and hammams, and facades are clad in stone in the local masonry tradition. Interiors of the hotel and the spa were designed by HBA (Hirsch Bedner Associates) through its Singapore and London studios — HBA’s first One&Only resort and first project in Montenegro. Lighting is by Light Directions.

One publication also credits Gathy with the interiors and landscape, with a second architectural practice overseeing construction and sometimes proposing alternative finishes. The architecture of the One&Only private homes is credited to Gathy in some sources and to HBA in others — authorship of this part is not confirmed. sources disagree

Chenot Espace interiors: «monastic» calm

For the spa HBA chose a concept unusual for a beach resort — contemporary monastic architecture: measured proportions, rhythmic repetition and daylight moving across the walls are meant to calm the guest. Unlike the cool platinum-grey palette of the main building (Palazzo), the spa uses a warm tactile palette: honed silver travertine, washed grey oak floors, copper and antique bronze, gold mosaic in the hammam framed by Turkish stone, fabrics in burnt orange and grey. The indoor pool is finished in grigio marble; tuneable-white strips under brass arches light the water from within, and fibre-optic «stars» in the hammam dome replace daylight.

The study described a perforated vault over the pool instead of downlights; the designers’ description refers to linear lighting under the arches and fibre optics in the hammam — the article follows the latter.

Spa area: 4,000 m² or 2,872 m²

The operator and trade press give 4,000 m² over two floors (one guide gives 43,000 sq ft, which is the same figure). The 2026 design-award entry for the spa interiors states 2,872 m² — probably the interior-design scope without technical and back-of-house areas. The study mentioned a «4,000 sq ft» error in one publication; we did not find that version, but we did find the second area figure. sources disagree

Area per treatment room includes the hydrothermal block, diagnostic rooms, atria and the indoor pool. Even on the lower estimate it is a generous standard for a hotel spa and a reference for developers of a medical spa within a resort.

The Chenot method and the hormesis principle

The company describes the Chenot method as a scientific and holistic approach to prevention that combines Western diagnostics with traditional Chinese medicine. As its physiological basis it names hormesis — a phenomenon in which moderate controlled stress triggers protective and repair responses in cells (the term has been used in physiology since 1943). In the Portonovi programmes four groups of stimuli play this role. company data

The Chenot Diet

The diet is a mandatory part of the programmes: three low-calorie plant-based organic meals a day combining good fats, low-glycaemic carbohydrates and limited plant protein, with no animal protein, refined sugar or stimulants. The company calls it a fasting-mimicking diet: the composition is meant to trigger the body’s fasting response (autophagy, mitochondrial renewal) without the side effects of strict fasting. A dietary course lasts up to 7–10 days under medical supervision. Recipes, low-temperature cooking and portions are standardised across the network under the group’s brand chef Ettore Moliteo together with the nutritionists. A cookbook (more than 170 recipes and a weekly one-day fasting routine) supports the protocol at home. company data

Diagnostics: Chenot Lifestyle Biomarkers®

Screening combines laboratory tests with non-invasive measures of biological age and functional reserve. The company groups them into 11 areas: vascular age, intoxication (minerals and heavy metals), oxidation, glycation, skin collagen thickness, body composition, emotional stress (HRV), endurance (cardiorespiratory test), resting metabolic rate, spine and balance, bio-resonance.

Departments and treatments

Treatments are grouped by department: Medical, Human Performance, Hydrotherapy, Medical Aesthetic, Aesthetic (including traditional rituals) and Sport & Fitness. At opening the operator named six departments; the 2026 list shows traditional aesthetic rituals as a separate section.

Medical team

The company does not publish the physician roster of Chenot Espace Portonovi; at group level it names Chenot’s leader Dr George Gaitanos and brand chef Ettore Moliteo. According to public professional profiles, the core medical team has been in place since opening in 2021 and combines Western medicine with traditional Chinese medicine.

What is known about the evidence

The treatment descriptions in this part are the company’s wording, not findings of the study. We could not find independent clinical publications on the Chenot Espace Portonovi protocols specifically (guest outcomes, repeat biomarker measurements) — the data are still scarce.

• Fasting-mimicking diets are studied in clinical research on other protocols; direct comparisons with the Chenot Diet are scarce in open sources.
• For the bio-resonance check-up and bio-energetic treatments, peer-reviewed data in open sources are scarce.
• Cryotherapy, IV infusions and ozone therapy are prescribed by a physician after consultation; the terms of the centre’s medical licence were not found in open sources.

Legal entities of the resort

The assets and operations of the Portonovi resort are split between several companies registered in Herceg Novi. The parent is the developer and site lessee Azmont Investments d.o.o. (registered on 12 July 2012; activity: renting and managing own or leased real estate). Its sole owner per the 2025–2026 register is PASHA Development d.o.o. The operating company of the One&Only hotel and the spa, according to the study, is Portonovi Hospitality Management Company d.o.o.; services for the residences and infrastructure sit in Portonovi Resort Management Company d.o.o., a wholly owned subsidiary of Azmont.

Financial results

The parent’s official financial statements show the move from the investment to the operating phase: after losses in 2023 and 2024, Azmont Investments closed 2025 with a profit of €7.52m on revenue of €39.57m. The study put 2025 EBITDA at €7.91m (about 20 % of revenue) and the hotel operating company’s revenue at €41.29m, giving about €80.9m of combined turnover for the two companies.

The parent’s small headcount (17) with a high average salary suggests it holds the developer’s management team, while hotel and spa staff are employed by the operating company. The company’s external credit score for 2026 is BBB, with no account blocks. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

Ownership chain and project history

The ownership history runs in three stages: Azerbaijan’s state oil company as the original lessee, a consortium of Azerbaijani holding companies and, finally, consolidation within PASHA Holding.

The holding’s ultimate beneficial owners are not disclosed by the company. Press reports about them rely on investigative journalism rather than company documents, so the study does not reproduce them.

Land and coastal-zone lease

The site is held on a long-term lease. The land rent, according to the study, is about €1 per m² with a €10.87m prepayment for the first 45 years. Under the 2017 annex to the coastal-zone use agreement, the fee for the 101,105 m² marina water area (69,392 m² inner basin and 31,713 m² outer belt) is €0.40 per m² a year, i.e. €40,442 a year plus VAT. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

The lease terms are debated publicly in Montenegro. The site’s planning documents were amended several times, and the investor obtained the right to build roughly twice as much villa and apartment floor area for sale as the original plan allowed. According to an estimate by a Montenegrin civic organisation, a variable rent linked to profit rather than revenue cost the budget about €3.2m while the company was reporting losses. research estimate, not confirmed by filings

Tax environment

The study described Montenegro’s tax regime as a flat 9 % on profits and income and a 3 % real estate transfer tax. Since 2022 corporate income tax has been progressive (9–15 % depending on profit), and since 2024 the real estate transfer tax has been progressive (3–6 %). The standard VAT rate is 21 %; the country has more than 40 double taxation treaties.

Risks

Observations for developers and investors

• The «medical spa brand inside a resort hotel» model sells long programmes off-season without turning the whole hotel into a closed clinic: the family holidays while one guest follows a programme.
• The package sells the room at about €480–550 a night — a reference for what low-season occupancy through a medical product is worth.
• The centre’s margin lies in physician prescriptions (infusions, ozone, cryo: €6–13 per minute), its volume in manual and water treatments (€3–4 per minute). The space programme should include medical rooms next to the physician.
• 103–143 m² of spa area per treatment room is a generous standard that includes the pool, hammam and hydrothermal block; it should be compared with revenue per m², not only per room.
• Programme price rises of 9.5–12.1 % over three years with unchanged entry formats show how the network protects new-guest access while raising spend in the core product.

Data still scarce

• Terms of the One&Only and Chenot contracts: fees, royalties, staffing split.
• Revenue, utilisation and share of medical guests of Chenot Espace itself, separate from the hotel.
• Exact spa area (4,000 m² vs 2,872 m²) and hotel key count (113 vs 123).
• The centre’s medical licence and the physician roster, which the company does not yet publish.
• Independent data on programme outcomes.