HEALTH
Saunas are enjoying a revival in the UK, and contrary to popular opinion, they can be good for heart health and blood pressure
Two men dressed in caveman-like sacking are performing an ancient ritual in front of me, swirling towels to direct hot air at my fellow sauna-goers in 90˚C heat. Steam rises as ice is heaped on hot stones, and the fragrance of pine swirls around against a soundtrack of howling wolves. Thankfully, no one is naked. Elaborate ceremonies like these are known as the Aufguss – the wafting of steam and essential oils – a kind of performance art, and part of a global resurgence in the popularity of saunas. I’m at Sauna Fest, the annual festival held at Therme in Bucharest, Romania (therme.ro), which feels a million miles from my twice-weekly sauna in the UK. But after making it part of my weekly routine a few years ago I have lower blood pressure, improved skin tone and better stress management, so I’m keen to find out more.
Saunas have been popular in Scandinavia, Germany, Russia, Japan and Turkey for centuries, but apart from a brief spell in the 1970s, they didn’t get much traction in the UK.
Emma O’Kelly, who built a home sauna after researching Sauna: The Power of Deep Heat (Welbeck), says, ‘They’re popping up everywhere in the UK – more than 70 beach box saunas, hotels building forest saunas, plus pop-up festivals in cities, and home saunas too. People like to chill out and de-stress, and there’s the social aspect as well.’
Therme is building a sauna complex in Manchester scheduled to open in late 2025.
Which sauna is best?
There are two main types of saunas in the UK. In a traditional Finnish sauna the temperature is typically 70-100˚C, with low humidity of 10-20%. The heat comes from stones on the stove, and when water is ladled on to them it evaporates to make steam (in Finnish, called löyly), which condenses on the skin to create a burning yet pleasurable sensation.
The second type, Infrared, uses infrared radiation lamps and panels to heat the body directly so it can operate at a lower temperature, typically 49-60˚C.
‘There’s not enough research to say that Finnish or Infrared is better, but the infrared doesn’t benefit from the social aspect of a Finnish sauna, nor the steam, which are sacred parts of the traditional experience,’ says Gabrielle Reason at the British Sauna Society. ‘In my opinion these are the very reasons saunas have taken off – we’ve neglected our social and spiritual sides, and we need these things for wellbeing.’
What happens to your body?
‘You’ll start sweating very quickly and your core body temperature, heart rate and blood flow will increase too,’ says Dr Tom Cullen, at Coventry University’s Centre for Physical Activity, Sports and Exercise Sciences. He has recently published a rev
