Ashiatsu Oriental Bar Therapy ®
A New Twist to Ancient Oriental Massage

Ashiatsu Oriental Bar Therapy ® is a combination of the traditional Oriental massage, ashiatsu, and Swedish massage. In barefoot massage style, the therapist uses her feet to give you a relaxing deep tissue massage. Don't worry about being crushed by her body weight though. She uses bars suspended from the ceiling to control the pressure of the massage.

In its original ancient form, this Oriental massage follows the principles used in Thai massage, shiatsu and acupressure. The therapist uses foot pressure to unblock meridians.

Massaging with the feet has been practiced in the Philippines, India and Japan. It has also been practiced by Buddhist monks. For most traditional forms, the client is fully clothed and laying a mat on the floor like in shiatsu.

Oriental Bar Therapy is an offshoot of this traditional therapy that has become quite popular in the West. It was invented by Ruthie Piper Hardee in the 1990's. She improvised the technique one day when she had to work on a large muscular client at the end of a busy day. She knew her hands were too tired to give him the massage he wanted so she decided to use her feet. The style of massage that she originated became increasingly popular and she started teaching it to other massage therapists.

In this form of massage therapy the therapist uses compressive strokes along with deep effleurage. The result is a deep relaxing massage.

You might want to consider getting this therapy if you like deep tissue massage. It's especially good for relieving back pain.

Here's an example of what it's like.