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Bywater Sauna’s parking spot is right next to the Puget Sound cold plunge.
Get hot, get cold, repeat. No, it’s not the yo-yo weather patterns of a Washington winter or the shorthand for an unhealthy relationship; that’s the rhythm of sauna culture. It’s a leisure activity that takes you from a room hotter than Phoenix in July to waters exactly as cold as Puget Sound in January.
And Seattle is in a sauna boom. The practice has roots that trace back to Nordic traditions, where enjoying a sauna is as common as taking a walk, and to the social Roman baths of the ancient era. This year, the National Nordic Museum is hosting the first Seattle Sauna Festival to celebrate sauna-going, but all the destinations below operate regularly for one-off warm ups.
The Bywater Sauna has two wood fireplaces so warm a cold plunge comes as a relief.
West Seattle, Ballard
Passersby do double takes at these barrel-shaped saunas parked at Golden Gardens or Alki beaches, like a pair of giant Twix bars with two little chimneys poking out of each. For all the indoor heat Nate Garberich offers with his traveling setup, it was inspired by the very frigid: The idea largely grew out of cold plunge group Coldwater Collective. Each Minnesota-built structure holds 16 people who alternate between extreme temps. Admission is available via a one-time $35–40 pass or a monthly membership.
The shape of the Bywater saunas is conducive to even a full house, creating a social but never a sardine-can situation. The twin wood fires make one end especially scorching, for sauna experts, but the door side is usually milder. Sure, users get stares when they climb out in a bathing suit and run to the lapping Puget Sound waves, but on one cold plunge at Golden Gardens we got to share our swim with a giant, curious sea lion.
The Seattle Bouldering Project’s new bank vault sauna has warmth on lock.
University District
When the rock climbing chain opened its University of Washington–adjacent outpost in a 112-year-old bank building, there was an obvious use for the giant vault: a co-ed sauna. An infrared version was chosen for many reasons, from necessity (there are limitations on what you can put in a closed room lined with safety deposit boxes) to infrared’s associations with muscle healing. The benches can hold 26 people and the yoga team sometimes does breath programming in the space. Glass walls stay open to the circular vault door, so it’s nowhere near as claustrophobic as it sounds. Day passes ($30) for the climbing gym include sauna access.
After only one season, Von Sauna in Kirkland added a second floating hot room.
Kirkland
Inspired by the floating saunas of Oslo, Norway, David Jones designed his own barge setup and had it constructed in Louisiana (the barge part) and Michigan (the wood room). Once delivered to Seattle, he moved them across Lake Washington by towing them with a jetski, finally tying up at Carillon Point Marina in Kirkland.
Open since January 2024 (but closed June–September), Von has grown to two saunas with 18 bookable seats ($32–40 each) between them, the big glass windows looking out at the sailboats and yachts anchored across the water. The cold plunge roulette includes a ladder down to the lake, a bucket on a string for self-dousing, and a small beach in front of the nearby Woodmark Hotel for gentle wading. The space can’t compete with the Pacific Northwest’s most stunning floating sauna, in Tofino, but the on-water location adds a pleasant bobbing sensation to a sweat session.
Wild Haus goes places—to the middle of the lake, at least.
Eastlake
The greater Seattle area went from no floating saunas to a veritable armada in only a few years. Of the two businesses that now operate on Lake Union, Wild Haus offers the most adventurous—its little barge actually travels into the center of the lake, driven by a captain on the 90-minute communal tours. That means the view from the hot room changes as the wall of windows faces various skylines, and cold plunges can be done into the lake itself.
Private voyages (starting at $900) allow groups to take over the whole vessel, but even the à la carte trips ($150) have social energy; this is no solemn, whispers-only sauna. A rooftop deck, next to where the wood-fired chimney pokes out of the room below, allows for outdoor hangouts between hot and cold periods.
Joggers pass Good Day Sauna on one side, while ferries pass on the other.
West Seattle
The boxy mobile sauna positioned in Lincoln Park has a big window to take in the views of the cold water—aka the plunge destination—outside; sometimes a ferry headed to nearby Fauntleroy Ferry Terminal makes a cameo. Like its neighbor Bywater at Alki, it’s a wood-fired sauna that holds over a dozen people at a time.
Opened this summer, this will be its first winter in the park, and will mostly do weekend social sauna sessions ($35 for an hour). Occasional guided meditation sessions add another layer to the experience, where a group does breath work and group relaxation over the course of 75 minutes ($55).
Northlake
Yet another floating hot room on Lake Union; pretty soon they’re going to outnumber the paddleboards. The difference at Seattle Sauna comes in the big rooftop deck for relaxation and a guide to walk everyone through how to get the most out of the experience. Though the sauna, fueled by two wood fires, does bob on the water’s surface, it doesn’t travel out into the lake during each 90-minute session ($64). With only 10 users per session, it’s not one to get crowded, and bucket showers serve as cold plunge. Aromatherapy, plus the basics like a towel and drinking water, is included.
