HEALTH, HAPPINESS, AND HUSTLE

It’s fitting that BIÂN co-founder Mar Soraparu once aspired to be a jazz singer. The same skills that define jazz— improvisation, communication, synthesis, innovation— have been called upon often by the Wilmette resident in her role as Chief Wellness Officer at the heralded River North club, which was founded in late 2020. BIÂN is a 34,000-square-foot oasis for the mind and body that is the brainchild of Soraparu and longtime friends Kevin Boehm, Robb Leone, and Joe Fisher. It’s a club devoted to health and wellness, but that’s a bit like calling the Merchandise Mart a furniture store.

Imagine a single destination that weaves together modern health philosophies (Eastern and Western, preventive and healing, mental and physical, strength and flexibility) with a stunning coworking space and add to the mix a sushi bar, restaurant, plunge pools and saunas, event space, riverside patio, beauty spa, and even a listening room filled with vinyl records outfitted with McIntosh amplifiers and turntables. It is, in a word, unique.

It’s in the music room where I caught up with Soraparu on an uncharacteristically mild Chicago winter day.

“Given your background, I thought you’d appreciate this space,” she said. It was an astute observation given my earlier days as a music journalist; it was also emblematic of the expansive, yet highly personalized nature of BIÂN’s philosophy and service.

“There are similar concepts,” Soraparu says, “but not a place that can replace your coworking space, your place of fitness, your studio, your nutrition and coaching, your doctor, your spa and beauty salon and have it all in one place … to have all of those practitioners and providers communicating together for your care.”

Indeed, one of BIÂN’s key objectives was this kind of simplification, replacing the need to drive all over town managing multiple providers and programs in pursuit of a healthier, happier, more balanced, and more productive life. Beyond that, the club sees its mission as improving care by helping to reduce the conflicts and dissonance that can crop up when moving between multiple providers or modes of treatment.

As an integral part of this point of view, each club member is assigned an advisor to help make the most of BIÂN. While the club’s nearly 1,000 members use it as a combination workplace and fitness venue during the day, that only scratches the surface of what’s offered, which is why Soraparu believes the advisor program is vital.

“We are trying to re-establish the belief in healthcare, in providers, in your natural body— all the things that you can be doing to actually improve your life. And there’s not one way to do it. There are so many, and that’s why we have an advisor who sits down with every single member, gets to know them, understands what they’ve done, where they’re going, and what they need. And we help them to design a plan, and then we connect the providers wherever they start.”

With so much accomplished in just a few short years, it’s no surprise that Soraparu is looking out for what’s next. “I’m dead set on trying to figure out how to get us to the North Shore,” she says. “Expansion hopes and dreams are big, and our eyes are everywhere.”

Asked what she’s proudest of when she thinks about BIÂN’s evolution and her role in the process, Soraparu becomes reflective, pausing to absorb it all.

“Just seeing it continue to live and breathe,” she says. “All of these things that in isolation are just so important and have had so much time and attention put toward them. To me that was the most fascinating thing when we opened. After two years of figuring out what is nutrition, what is our studio, what is our fitness, what’s our spa, what is the advisory program, what do we stand for, what is our menu going to be, what does it feel like? Now, we can see all those pieces come together. Maybe it’s being a mother, but I’m really excited to see how it matures and becomes its own thing.”

For more information, visit livebian.com.