The Lava Vessel story
From a mountain in Japan to a wheelchair-bound father's recovery, to Houston's first LavaBene spa — how the Lava Vessel came to be.
Mr. Chen Hung Lieh
Mr. Chen first met Mr. Takagi of the Japanese Nuclear Energy Council and learned about the extraordinary power of Lava Energy Rocks, mined from Mt. Dekiyamakouzan in Aichi Prefecture, Japan.
Interested in the properties of these rocks, Mr. Chen began exploring how to use them to improve the effectiveness of traditional Chinese heat therapy — work that eventually led to the Lava Vessel approach.
Mr. Chen's father, then 78, fell down a flight of stairs and became wheelchair-bound, suffering chronic pain and seeing doctors once or twice a week for three years.
Mr. Chen decided to try the Lava Energy Rocks therapy on his father. Three months in, his father's pain eased significantly, and his health improved enough that he could leave his wheelchair, walk on his own, and resume normal activities. Mr. Chen was struck less by the medical benefit than by his father's return to a cheerful outlook on life.
Encouraged by what he saw, Mr. Chen invested everything he had into developing the therapy further for chronic disease — a risk his family and friends worried about, given how close he was to retirement. His father was the exception: he contributed his own life savings to the cause of "breaking through the impasse the medical field faces in treating chronic disease," and stayed engaged throughout the research, which helped sustain Mr. Chen's drive for a breakthrough.
Ping Ping Lin
Ping Ping first encountered Lava Vessels while running her anti-corrosion coating business in China and Taiwan, and was soon convinced of the therapy's effectiveness. Wanting to bring this natural, non-invasive therapy to the many people suffering from chronic conditions in the US, she opened the first LavaBene spa in Houston, Texas in November 2013 — followed by the Pearland location in January 2017. LavaBene has now served more than 7,000 clients.
Convincing people who haven't yet tried it is often harder than convincing those who have. At the core of it is a difference between Western and Eastern medical thinking: Western medicine traditionally focuses on treating symptoms, while Eastern medicine focuses on addressing root causes. Chronic conditions are a realm Western medicine hasn't traditionally focused on — and LavaBene, developed in an Eastern medicine tradition, takes a holistic view of cause and effect aimed at preventing ailments and maintaining health.
Ping Ping continues to search for the best, most holistic therapy products from Asia to bring into LavaBene's services, with the goal of reducing the time people spend struggling with poor health.
Treat illness. Raise wellness.
Lava Vessel's wide-ranging effectiveness turned out to be beyond anything Mr. Chen could have imagined at the outset.
What are Lava Rocks?
In the early summer of 1978, while searching for cement coagulant substances, a NASA satellite accidentally discovered that Dekiyamakouzan Mountain in Japan contains only anions (negative ions) — no positively charged ions at all. Subsequent exploration found the mountain, in Aichi, Japan, rich in minerals with high levels of anions and far-infrared. 708 is the number the Japanese government gave to this mine.
Japanese Lava tourmaline began as mud 3,000 meters below sea level. Volcanic activity and millions of years of movement in the earth melted, compressed and compacted that mud into a hard crystalline tourmaline, sealing in powerful energy — abundant anions, far-infrared, and electrolysis, all beneficial to the human body.
Anion output relative to Maifanite.
Anions produced per second, per cm³ of boiled water, at an ideal mixing ratio.
For the full technical specifications of the 708 Lava Rocks used in every LavaBene pod, see how it works.
Mr. Chen recognized
Used by elite athletes
For 15 years, Mr. Chen's vessel has been used by spas, clinics and hospitals across Taiwan and mainland China, with promising results throughout. Eventually, it was adopted for use by the 2008 Chinese Olympic team.
Use of the Lava Vessel has helped people improve their general health and find relief from chronic conditions. We look forward to doing the same for many more people in the United States and beyond.
Houston is temporarily closed — Pearland and Midtown Renaissance are open by appointment.