Full steam ahead for all as Stockholm opens its first publicly run sauna

Stockholm is a city of sauna-goers. All year round, from early morning to late into the night, residents of the Swedish capital can be seen emerging from wooden huts with a trail of woodsmoke rising from the chimney and lowering themselves into the deep brackish waters that lap the city’s shoreline.

- Miranda Bryant

An artist's impression of Stockholm's new publicly run sauna, which is aimed at recreating the community feel of saunas in neighbouring countries such as Norway and Finland

(IMAGES: SEPPO PURKKILA/AFP/GETTY IMAGES; ANGE DINELL JOHANSSON)

But, for locals and visitors alike, getting access to one of these saunas can be like getting into the world’s most exclusive private members’ clubs. The most popular waterside venues have thousands of people on their waiting lists, and when vacancies open up they disappear in minutes. While a proportion of spots are sometimes bookable to non-members, they are hard to come by.

In an attempt to change this, the city will open its first publicly run sauna next month, with the mission of bringing “sauna for all”. Located in Hornstull, a water-facing neighbourhood on the largely residential island borough of Södermalm, the facility is a pilot project that authorities hope will be the first of many city-run, membership-free saunas.

Pia Karlsson, a project manager in Stockholm’s transport office, said the project, which cost the equivalent of £440,000, was born of a desire to move away from the prevailing model of “sauna for the few”. The municipality wanted a sauna that was “100% accessible”, she added, “so no membership; accessible to the city’s residents and our guests.”