ROCHESTER, Minn. -- Christopher and Julie Rice sat naked in the sauna, sweating in its 180-degree heat. In the crisp air outside, they then played a few hands of cribbage and noshed on pickles and ...

As the cab slows to a stop, I scrape some of Jack Frost’s handiwork from the window and peer into the depths of the polar night. We’re only 15 minutes from the center of Helsinki, yet dense forest ...

“Koti” means “home” in Finnish, which makes it a perfect name for the Finnish sauna that is literally in Kristina Erickson’s ...

It only makes sense that a Two Harbors native would write the definitive book on this part of the country's obsession with Finnish saunas. "Everybody knew what a sauna was [growing up], and most ...

Contemporary sweat baths reflect the country’s architectural past — and propose a future in which simple, sustainable buildings can still be sublime. The lowest and coolest area in traditional Finnish ...

Sauna-fanatics and newbies are spending time in the growing number of communal saunas in parks, near lakes and rivers, and in yards around Wisconsin.

“How does that feel?” asks Siiri, as the spikes of the juniper branches relieve the itch on my back and the spicy scent surrounds my body. “Peaceful,” I respond, so relaxed that one-word answers are ...

In a small, enclosed room, people sit side by side on wooden benches. Water thrown on hot stones releases clouds of scalding steam and temperatures soar to a scolding 80C. This is sauna bathing, a ...

What if I Told You About Finland’s Sauna Obsession? Welcome to Finland, a country utterly obsessed with saunas. The sauna is the most important social forum in Finland. There are more saunas than cars ...

… but our independent journalism isn’t free to produce. Help us keep it this way with a tax-deductible donation today. Sauna has been practiced for centuries in Finland, and Finnish immigrants to the ...

There’s a word in Finnish which evades translation: löyly. It’s commonly used to describe the steam that rises when water is poured onto hot stones in a sauna. But it also signifies spirit or life ...