Sauna Social Club, Peckham10 Images
27-year-old Fraser goes to the sauna at Mile End Climbing Wall every week – twice a week if he can manage it. “It’s like a full body reset,” he says. “I come out of it feeling relaxed and recovered after an intense week.” Nine-to-five, Fraser works in the climbing industry, and he finds that going to the sauna helps his body recover from doing physically taxing work. “If I don’t go, I feel very stiff and just a bit slow,” he explains. “There are so many nice saunas in London now, it’s quite easy to squeeze it in the morning or the evening. Especially as you can do it instead of drinking.”
Fraser isn’t alone in frequenting a sauna. In recent years, the UK has witnessed nothing short of a sauna boom: according to the British Sauna Society, the number of Finnish-style saunas in the UK doubled from 45 in 2023 to over 100 in 2024, with the society expecting the number to double again so that there are more than 200 by the end of 2025. Last year saw the first ever British Sauna Society summit held in Hackney; after a sold-out inaugural edition, the event is set to return this May, this time in Canary Wharf.
For those who live in the capital, it’s likely none of this comes as a surprise: saunas are popping up everywhere from Hackney, to Bermondsey, to Peckham. But this isn’t just some fleeting London-based fad; at present, the UK has saunas stretching from Shetland to Swanage. 23-year-old India first went to a sauna last year, after a friend recommended Sawna Bach, a sauna in Anglesey. “I just went for something to do, because there’s not much going on in deep, dark North Wales in the middle of winter,” she recalls. She got the bug immediately; now, she makes an effort to regularly visit the sauna in her local leisure centre in Hampshire. “I started going for the health benefits, but it’s also really sociable,” she says. “It’s a nice way to unwind after work.”
It’s not difficult to see the appeal of saunas. Young people are increasingly eschewing drinking: recent research estimates that 43 per cent of 18 to 34-year-olds have given up booze entirely. For some, sobriety appeals because of the myriad health benefits – so it’s little wonder saunas are growing popular as more of us are becoming interested in wellness. “There are so many health benefits to sauna, including improved circulation and reduced blood pressure. But our favourite is the positive impact it has on your mental health – specifically, your ability to cope with stress,” says Nikki Tesla, co-founder of Sauna Social Club, a sauna and arts venue which opened in Peckham in 2024. “Learning to coax your body through extreme heat or cold helps build mental resilience and improve our response to real-world stressors.”
Others are embracing sobriety simply because alcohol has become too expensive, with the average price of a pint in London now sitting at an eye-watering £6.50. Many of us are resultantly crying out for more third spaces which don’t revolve around alcohol – especially in the UK, where ‘socialising’ and ‘drinking’ are practically synonymous. Saunas, then (especially community saunas, which are built with accessibility in mind) are an affordable alternative to heading down to the pub. “It’s only six pounds for 45 minutes, or 11 pounds for an hour, so it’s really good,” Fraser says of his local Mile End sauna.
You can get into very deep, weird conversations with people, because there’s no stimuli – you’re just sat opposite them
It’s also been reported that Gen Z – the first generation to grow up online – are largely craving community and more in-person experiences which don’t involve smartphones. Saunas directly cater to this demand. “Sauna makes you feel good, helps you connect with others, and means that instead of waking up the next day with a hangover, you wake up feeling healthy and well-rested,” says Tesla, adding that community and connection is at the “core” of Sauna Social Club’s mission. “We want to create a space for people to make genuine, meaningful connections, reduce isolation and foster a sense of belonging in their local community.”
India certainly feels as though the community aspect of the sauna is part of the reason she enjoys going so much. “You can have such nice conversations with people – it’s not like dreadful small talk,” she adds. “I had a really nice conversation with this girl in there the other day who said she'd recently given up drinking. I think I actually speak to more people in the sauna than I would do down the pub.” Fraser has had similarly positive experiences. “You meet loads of people. Even if you go there without a friend, you’re always going to be able to have people to chat to,” he says. “You can get into very deep, weird conversations with people, because there’s no stimuli – you’re just sat opposite them.”
This all chimes with Gabrielle Reason, director of the British Sauna Society. “It seems that [the sauna] is the only place in the UK where it is socially acceptable to talk to strangers,” she says. “One of the weirder things you notice about the sauna, is that when people go in – whether it’s the heat, the close confinement, or being scantily clad, or in a silly hat – people become really chatty. Sauna definitely makes people open up more.”
Reason believes that with pubs closing and alcohol prices rising, youth centres shuttering, and the decline of religion, modern society has become disturbingly insular. “Our society used to encourage people coming together on a regular basis, which created community and gave a home to the marginalised and unfortunate in society,” she says. But while individualism has unfortunately taken root, she contends that saunas could be “the antidote for the physical disconnection” that many of us are struggling with today.
One thing is clear: while saunas are not yet as embedded in British culture as they are in Nordic countries like Finland (where nearly 90 per cent of the population take a sauna at least once a week), they’re evidently here to stay. Demand for tickets to Sauna Social Club has been sky-high: “We’ve had sell-out weeks pretty much ever since we opened. We’ve now increased our capacity by half and we’re still filling up pretty much every slot,” Tesla says. India adds that she has noticed more saunas popping up near her home in Hampshire. “I think that they're getting more and more popular,” she reflects. “And I’m all for it, to be honest.”