SaunaNews
The Sauna Industry's Record of Note
Hotels, resorts, spas, and commercial operators investing in sauna and thermal bathing experiences. Project news, design, and operator strategy.
World Spa’s model is a scale-and-circuit play: more thermal room types, longer dwell time, and a broad operating stack that combines bathing traditions, F&B, events, and private rentals. Co-founder Leonid Khanin frames the project as translational authenticity—rooted in source traditions, but deliberately designed for first-time urban guests and repeat local use.
North Conway has been named America's best ski town five times. It now has a communal sauna to match: two wood-fired rooms running a Harvia 50, three cold plunges, a Nordic cafe, and a Faraday cage that kills your phone signal. Walk-in only, $36, no reservations.
Luxury hotel groups are treating thermal bathing not as a spa add-on but as a primary draw. Aman, Four Seasons, and Mandarin Oriental have all announced significant thermal wellness investments across their upcoming properties, signaling a shift in how the industry thinks about sauna and heat-based experiences.
Equinox is investing heavily in upgraded sauna and cold plunge facilities across its highest-revenue clubs, signaling a serious bet on thermal wellness as a competitive differentiator in the premium fitness segment.
The Baltimore Ravens' Under Armour Performance Center now includes a custom sauna built with Thermory thermo-magnolia wood, designed by ZGF Architects. The project won Best Sauna & Spa at the Thermory Design Awards 2025, and it signals growing adoption of dedicated sauna facilities in professional sports.
Aufguss USA Nationals 2026 returns to Brooklyn May 19–21 with an expanded three-day format, doubled WM qualification slots, and the largest event sauna in the country. The infrastructure behind the competition tells you where American sauna culture is headed.
Bathhouse has raised $35 million from Imaginary Ventures to expand from two New York locations to 10 U.S. cities, anchored by an 85,000-square-foot LA flagship at the former Amoeba Music building on Sunset Boulevard.
Portal° Thermaculture started behind a Boulder brewery, burned down, reopened in Denver six weeks later, and built its first real brick-and-mortar in a former Minneapolis Jiffy Lube cooled by a chiller designed for penguin tanks. Five metros, no disclosed investors, and a founder who says people need “a dive bar that doesn’t serve alcohol.”
Bathhouse opens its third New York City location, Bathhouse Atlantic Avenue, on Saturday, May 16, 2026, at 540 Atlantic Avenue in Downtown Brooklyn, two blocks west of Barclays Center. The build-out features five heat experiences anchored by a 100-plus-seat event sauna built for Aufguss programming, three thermal pools, a wood-fired Banya, an Infrared Sauna, and a Steam Room, with day passes starting at $29.
The engine room determines the guest room. The linen flow determines the guest satisfaction. Here is everything experienced thermal designers, architects, and operators know about bathhouse development that first-time operators learn the expensive way.
Therme Bucharest’s Herbarium festival assembled 92 aufguss masters from 26 countries, more than the World Championship. With $3 billion in pipeline capital, the festival is a talent-acquisition strategy, not an event.
Forest Springs Resort, a 53-room boutique retreat on ten acres of Ozark forest in Eureka Springs, Arkansas, opened in May 2026 with a Haljas Single glass sauna from Estonia as its anchor amenity.
Tuli Lodge opened its third Seattle pop-up at Vulcan Real Estate’s Lake Union Piers, a 60,000-square-foot waterfront development. The move signals that developers are treating sauna as a pre-lease activation tool, a third capital model alongside venture-backed flagships and bootstrapped chains.
Waterstruck Wellness, a community Nordic spa in Newcastle, Maine, is launching Sonic Sounds, a six-date ambient concert series that pairs live music with the thermal circuit. The series runs every other Sunday from June 14 through August 16.
Therme Group hired a WhiteWater president and a Merlin Entertainments managing director in one week. But the entertainment-to-bathing talent migration runs far wider: a Meow Wolf co-founder, a Midas List VC, festival-circuit investors, trained theater performers, and nightclub operators are all building the next generation of bathing businesses. UNESCO classified Finnish sauna under festive events in 2020. The rest of the industry is catching up.
Portal Thermaculture opened its fourth US club in Bozeman, Montana, on March 17, 2026. The company has gone from Boulder pop-ups to brick-and-mortar clubs in Denver, Minneapolis, and now Bozeman in roughly 14 months, with no disclosed outside investors and a two-building layout designed to keep buildout costs far below the $3 million to $5 million custom-bathhouse norm.
A real estate developer, a former Standard Hotels culture director, and the co-founder of Tender Greens are building Miami’s first modern social bathhouse in the heart of Wynwood. The 7,500-square-foot venue opens this summer with a full thermal circuit, no phones, and no alcohol.
A logistics entrepreneur who sold a company to UPS is putting $1 million into a membership sauna and cold plunge club in Boulder, targeting the city’s endurance-athlete community with American-made equipment and ADA-accessible design throughout.
WorldSprings added five themed saunas and three plunge pools to its Glenwood Springs hot-springs property, then started the same expansion at its Dallas location. A holding company is quietly converting legacy soaking destinations into contrast-therapy venues.
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