I grew up in Korea and we have a bathhouse culture similar to Japan. But also stone saunas called [hanjeungmak](https://www.google.com/search?q=Hanjeungmak&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiD3baiv4D-AhXGkIkEHTA2AYcQ0pQJegQIBhAC&biw=1440&bih=821&dpr=2) where men and women are in separate sections. It’s normal to be naked.
A big thing in korea is rubbing away the dead skin when you’re sweating. And it’s common to pay someone to rub your body like a massage.
After I moved to the US, I saw different habits. Like my university sauna in the gym was for boys and girls, but you must NOT be naked. Even if you cover yourself with a towel.
Sometimes I even saw people wearing their full gym outfit. Including shoes. And some guys will stretch or do pushups inside.
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It differs wether it’s a public sauna or your private one at home. Public ones might be mixed or not, might allow nudity or not.
In private ones you’re generally in the nude. Some make bath brooms out of birch branches and whip theirselves with those. You often go in an out a lot, spend some time in the sauna and then some time cooling off. Many like to drink beer while cooling off, swimming is common too – even in the winter. And some might even roll around in snow.
It’s a pretty important tradition here. Back in the day the sauna building was always the first one to be built. And then you’d live in the sauna while building the main house.
Swimsuits in sauna are always prohibited and usually you need to sit on a towel or sheet. You can cover yourself with that towel/sheet, but not many people care. Public saunas are offer mixed, usually with few days men/women only.
In France we don’t have a sauna culture. There isn’t any in public buildings or schools, you have to specifically make an appointment to a hammam/sauna, and then I think it depends on the place whether you go fully naked or keep your towel. Men and women are usually separated.
Most people I know have never been to a sauna though, it’s something special you might do for yourself as a self-care thing but it’s not a regular occurence for most people.
In Germany there is a big sauna culture, but it is always a special event and not something we do everyday. It’s always a longer ordeal (half day or longer) and isn’t cheap either. But the spas are really great and have a lot to offer. Usually you are forbidden from wearing clothing in the saunas and pools and saunas are commonly mixed. Often a spa offers one evening or so for only women/men.
We don’t really have a sauna culture as such in the UK although they are used in health clubs and some gyms. It’s seen as a post exercise relaxation or part of a spa day rather than an everyday thing. Never seen anyone naked in a sauna – being naked anywhere in public in general is not part of uk culture. You would wear swimwear and probably have a towel and generally they are mixed gender..
Saunas are often included in the gym. Usually there are two areas; women only and mixed. Clothing is prohibited, so naked with a towel is the way to go. Sadly they often don’t have an outdoor area to cool down between sessions.
In non-gym Saunas, where there often is an outdoor area, it’s more common to drink a beer or two, get into the next river/lake and have a talk with other people during cooling off.
Saunas are common in Austria. You have them in public swimming pools, gyms, a lot of hotels, especially more upscale ones and especially thermal spas. The last ones are a big thing here, they brought tourism to neglected areas and are generally quite fancy. The saunas/steam rooms there are very elaborate and often somewhat themed. In saunas swimwear is forbidden (you can use a wrap yourself in a towel, if you are shy) and they are generally mixed, especially the fancy ones in hotels and thermal spas. Your community pool might have separate areas for men/women or special days. In the sauna areas of fancy thermal spas I’ve occasionally seen a ladies area, but only if there are a lot of foreign tourists. Vienna’s thermal spa has ladies’/gentlemen’s/mixed areas, but that’s an outlier. Austrians generally don’t care about nudity that much and most couples – the biggest clientele – want to go together. Some of the saunas sort of make a ritual out of it: an attendant pours the – often sented – water onto the hot stones of the stove and then swings a towel through the air to disperse the hot steam to make everyone sweat more.
Austria has a big sauna culture, you will find saunas at spas, public pools and sport hotels. People enjoy going to the sauna after a day of skiing or hiking or just as an evening activity after work.
Saunas are generally mixed gender, with some having one day a week for only one gender. You have to be naked, clothes of any kind, especially chlorinated water trenched swimming clothes are not allowed.
Depending on your own preferences, it’s normal to walk around the sauna area (between showers, sauna and relaxation beds) completely naked or wrapped in a towel. The sauna is typically 85-95°C hot and you start out in dry heat and end with a “Aufguss” when (scented) water is poured over the hot stones. You sit naked on the towel, because the wooden benches are hot and nobody wants to sit in the sweat of others. You can have quiet conversations, but it would be very weird if somebody was exercising. Especially after the Aufguss, which is already too extreme for some people and personally, I have to cover my eyes and nose with my hands because the hot steam stings.
After the heat, you cool down with a cold shower or jump in some snow if available and lie down to relax and give your heart time to slow down. Some people do multiple cycles of sauna.
There might be massages available but I personally haven’t heard about skin care being much of a focus.
An old man told some friends recently, that even in the cheap public bath there used to be massages offered as part of the entry fee, but that’s not the case anymore. The public bath today being a place with a pool and saunas, but historically a place for people to go have shower if they didn’t have a full bathroom at home.
Saunas (*bastu*) are seen as a way to relax your body here in Sweden, and mostly to make a contrast between the cold and the warm. It’s usually done before and after going into water to swim, but obviously you can also do it after a shower. For public saunas, usually, if they’re mixed, you have to cover yourself with a towel. If they’re not mixed, it’s kind of 50/50: some saunas allow nudity, some do not. If it’s your own private sauna at home, the general rule of thumb is that you’re always naked.
The Finnish descendant minorities in Norway brought sauna culture to us. I expect it’s probably a good part of their culture still, while the rest of us have some smattering of a watered down version. There is a sauna at the local pool, though I rarely see anyone inside. Mountain hotels probably have them, would be a logical setup.
Recently a new public sauna has been built floating in the fjord I live by, so if I were to try one, I reckon that’d be the most tempting location. Incorporating a fjord is a good way of getting us to try things, I guess.
Traditional Russian bathhouse is banya (баня), and it’s quite close to the sauna, with few notable exceptions. There are three rooms: a steam room – parilka (парилка), a washing room, and an entrance room – predbannik (предбанник). Usually the air is not as dry as in sauna so the temperature is a bit lower, but sometimes there are two rooms for dry or wet heat, with the dry room is basically the same as the Finnish sauna. Another unique tradition is bath brooms, usually made of birch or oak twigs, and used for bath massage, air scenting, steam forcing, etc.
There were older traditional banyas known as “black banya” (баня по-черному) that had an open fireplace with big stones around instead of a stove with chimney. After the fire is built and the stones became hot, the bather had to put off the fire and flush out the smoke.
Traditionally men and women go to the bath separated, sometimes not and just cover funny places with bath brooms, nowadays it’s expected that you just cover yourself with a towel.
Public banyas are much bigger, and have separate rooms and sometimes even entrances for the sexes.
Today every okish fitness or a swimming pool have a sauna close to the showers. Normally men and women have their own sauna.
In Sweden, som villages has Sauna clubs, sauna one of the Finnish words that gotten into English, in Swedish it is Bastu. My village has it separated unless is family day and it nude only.
Swim suit that used in public pools contain chlorine , this can become a gas and irritate lugns and also breaks down the swimming suit, hence no swim suits in saunas.
Honestly since I know bit Finnish Sauna sounds much more calming then the Swedish word Bastu, but bastu comes from badstuga bathing hut
The nearest thing we have to a traditional sauna is a hamam, which is basically a public bathhouse. It is a large, round room made of marble, and everyone gets a marble basin, faucets and a copper pot to pour water over yourself. In the middle there is a large, round marble where you can lie down, this is usually heated. There are services for getting a scrub, foam bath (I don’t know how they do it but they make a ton of foam using a pillow case and pour it all over you. It’s amazing), and a massage (it’s not a dainty oil massage, you get kneaded like bread dough by a strong man/woman. Whatever soreness or stiffness you have, it gets a lot worse before it gets better).
Outside the hamam, here is a cooler room for cooling down and taking refreshments. People also socialise here.
Men and women are always separate (unless it’s a touristic resort), and even then, showing genitals is not allowed (boobs are fine). You have to cover yourself with a hamam towel or swimming suit. All in all, it’s a very cool experience. I don’t do it regularly since there aren’t that many hamams left anymore and you don’t really have a good reason to wash yourself in public since everyone has a bathroom. But I recommend it once.
For Estonia: sauna [looks like this](https://www.sisustusweb.ee/img/Photo/iki-kerised_1.jpg) from the inside, is heated to 80-120 degrees (C) and you [throw water on the hot rocks](https://ksd-images.lt/display/krauta_ee/uploads/ca/1263/a2334e37.jpg) for steam.
If you have a house, the sauna house is [a separate building](https://2.bp.blogspot.com/-d6B0iFvvvWA/T-Lzmu7rgYI/AAAAAAAAATY/LK6ZIERZXsA/s1600/IMG_4209.JPG) with the steam room (as above), the washing room (nowadays has running water, but did not use to), the dressing room and, if you’re lucky, a [sitting/hangout room](https://roakyla.ee/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/P4030063-1024×768.jpg) with a fireplace. [If you have an apartment, you just have the steam room next to your bathroom](https://vabaduseapartments.ee/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/MK4_3423-Edit-768×512.jpg) in your actual house, no changing or hangout room and it might have electric heating instead of firewood heating.
Edit: people are usually nude and usually mixed-gender is default, though there are variations depending on the setting
I live in North Sweden close to Finland. Sauna is an integral part of our culture. Most houses have a sauna and the bathhouses have atleast one sauna. In the recent ten years I see more people wear clothing inside the sauna. Which the older generation frown upon. The custom is to wash off and then get in the sauna NAKED and wash yourself with birchbranches. Older people often eat oranges in the sauna and drink beer. A cold swim or roll in the snow is also common.
Saunas’ are not a thing here in the UK.
My local leisure centre has one located next to the swimming pool.
I suppose the idea must be to go have a swim… then freshen up in a sauna. Iv never seen anyone use it, and suspect its not maintained or repaired anymore.
Pools, water parks tend to have separate saunas while SPAs and sauna centers tend to have mixed. In first case, you use only towel, in latter case people usually wear swimwear since usually there are showers, smaller pools, etc. so you will have to remove your towel.
In home, it depends on the personal preferences and comfort level. If I’m in the sauna with other women or my husband, I will go naked. In case I’m in the sauna with mixed group (family, friends) then towel or swimwear (in case I’m getting procedures done such as beating with branches, body masks, etc).
It’s a different country.
People go shopping with an AK47 on their backs. And few people seem to mind. It’s all about the 2nd Amendment… You may need to secure the free State while shopping in Wallmart.
But show a bit of human flesh, and hell breaks loose.
Denmark is the odd one out when it comes to the Nordic sauna culture. Saunas exists in public swimming pools, in summer cottages built for the purpose of renting them out to German tourists, and in very few homes built in the 70’ies before the energy crisis. But I think Danes themselves primarily uses saunas as a convenient place to store suitcases and other bulky items.
I think wearing clothes is not allowed in the saunas in the public swimming pools, but I may be wrong.
Saunas aren’t really a think in Ireland. Some swimming pools have them but to be honest they’re usually occupied by a Eastern European who grew up with them/ is accustomed to them. We sit in them for about 60-90 seconds in some amount of pain and leave thinking that was a small amount of torture
It differs wether it’s a public sauna or a private one. The latter is very rare as it’s rather expensive to maintain. Obviously you do whatever you want in your own sauna cabin.
Bath culture is pretty big in Hungary too, we have loads of waterparks and bathhouses with most of them having thermal water in them. You have a variety of saunas to choose from from steam cabins to infra saunas to traditional ones and “Finnish saunas” (same as the traditional but hotter).
Men and women go to the same sauna but they are expected to remove all accessories and leave their slippers outside. You should cover yourself with or put under yourself a towel regardless if you go in naked or not. I have not seen anyone enter naked though or if they did then their towel was covering them so well you couldn’t say. But most people in public baths definitely keep their swimming trunks or bikinis on.
There are no massages and no touching each other. Some spas might offer massages but that’s a separate service you have to ask for. Some also have an optional “sauna show” where a sauna master comes in, they play some music, put some essential oils in the water to make the steam smell nice. They heat up the sauna to a really high temperature, hand out ice to keep you cool and swat a towel around to cool people down and to mix up the air and you get a nice drink afterwards.
But usually you just pick a sauna, go in wearing your swimming shorts, put a towel around your hip and butt, stay in for x amount of time, come out, get some air, take a shower, then plunge into the cold bath.
Here the sauna is naked. There are monthly bath clothing days though. No touching and no phones allowed. You steam and sit in saunas and relax or scrub, but I’ve never seen someone working out. I don’t think that happens. I love it but it’s pretty expensive!
Saunas are very common in lithuania. Pretty much every spa, waterpark, or overall relaxation spot has at least a sauna, if not a whole zone dedicated to saunas. A lot of people also have a sauna at home(including me) and it’s pretty much a monthly, sometimes even weekly habit for me. Some people even wear special hats to protect your head from heatstroke, use special branches to whip each other in the sauna, use rubbing salt, or even pour honey on the body and massage it in in the sauna.
Also, I remember learning a sauna related fact in school about the duke of lithuania, who later became a polish king and started a dynasty – Jogaila. Basically, since he was Pagan and got baptised only for political reasons, when he arrived in Kraków, he was expected to be a dirty, unhygienic brute, but since sauna was a huge part of lithuanian culture at that time, he attended it every week and washed himself after, so the pagan everyone at court expected to be a nasty brute, turned out to be the most hygienic person there lmao.
So yeah, sauna is a part of lithuanian culture, with roots reaching back hundreds of years. I’d even call it a tradition.