Build Well to Live Well at Wellness Summit

MIAMI -- The Global Wellness Summit, a conference for the $4.4 trillion business of wellness, will hold its 2nd annual Wellness Real Estate & Communities Symposium at JPMorgan Chase & Co. headquarters in Manhattan on May 2.

Wellness real estate and communities has been the fastest-growing sector in the global wellness economy since 2018, and this GWS event will gather top business leaders in this fast-changing space, including executives, investors, developers, builders, architects, designers, technologists, analysts, policymakers and media.

The agenda will include a high-level, deep dive into the latest trends and research in the "building well" market and movement. It will give attendees a full-day immersion into the future of the market and take a real-world, real-numbers look at the global development and investment space.

In-person and virtual registration is open. Space is limited and expected to sell out.

Deepak Chopra, MD, the architect of workplace wellness programming for JPMorgan, will keynote on the built environment and its effect on humans. In addition to being founder of The Chopra Foundation, a non-profit entity for research on well-being and humanitarianism, and Chopra Global, a modern health company at the intersection of science and spirituality; Chopra is also the Clinical Professor of Family Medicine and Public Health at the University of California, San Diego; and author of over 90 books, including numerous New York Times bestsellers.

When the Global Wellness Institute (GWI) released its pioneering research report "Build Well to Live Well" back in 2018, wellness real estate and communities was a nascent industry ($148.5 billion) that was poorly understood by consumers, developers, builders, and investors. What a difference a pandemic makes. The last few years have transformed our understanding of the impact that the built environment has on our health and wellbeing.

"With such extraordinary momentum for wellness real estate and communities, and with so many new models and approaches, we're pleased to bring back this think-tank for the second time and are committed to making it an annual event on the wellness calendar," said Susie Ellis, GWS chair and CEO. "We will bring together the leading voices shaping this fast-moving market, to learn about everything from new projects hitting the ground to the next big innovations that lie ahead to what has worked and mistakes that have been made. It will be a day of future-focused education, company announcements, and powerful networking."

Fasting Growing Wellness Sector
The global wellness real estate market nearly doubled to $275 billion in 2020 and is forecast to more than double again (to $580 billion) by 2025.

Just a few years ago, this market was narrowly associated with luxury "spa real estate." Now it's mainstreaming and approaches are diversifying from more affordable multi-family, mixed-use, co-living, and senior wellness-focused developments to an explosion of smart tech that makes homes and built environments healthier, as well as outdoor-focused communities and agrihoods specializing in farming and regenerative living.

While cities are being radically reimagined around wellness: from loneliness-fighting, multigenerational housing models bringing young and old together to higher-end developments expanding beyond fancy amenities to addressing mental, social, environmental, spiritual, and intellectual wellness (even offering preventative medicine programs).

Beyond housing, every kind of space–from retail to workplaces to hospitals–are getting a wellness-design rethink.

On the Agenda
GWI researchers will preview their Wellness Policy Toolkit: Built Environment, part of its groundbreaking new Wellness + Policy research series, a toolkit that provides rationale and research for why wellness is a crucial lens for government policies that define our built environment.

Further keynotes and panels with the industry's most influential leaders and creative minds will be announced in coming weeks. Attendees can look forward to discussions on everything from carbon accounting and future-proofing the built environment to viewing wellness real estate through the investor's lens and exploring new ESG strategies that focus heavily on the S (for social and sustainability).

"We spend 90% of our lives indoors and indoor environments can have a profound impact on our health outcomes. We're thankful for long-standing partners like the Global Wellness Institute, and fellow industry leaders who are working to create a world in which our built environments support the health and well-being of occupants," said Paul Scialla, founder and CEO of Delos, which is committed to wellness where we live, work, travel, and learn.

The Global Wellness Summit is an organization that brings together leaders and visionaries to positively shape the future of the $4.4 trillion global wellness economy. Each year, it holds an in-person Wellness Real Estate & Communities Symposium. The organization's annual Global Wellness Trends Report offers expert-based predictions on the future of wellness that are oft-quoted in the media. The 17th annual GWS will be held in Qatar from November 6-9, 2023.