the ten best hotel saunas.
Not the ten most expensive, and not the ten with the biggest spas. These are the rooms we’d plan a trip around — the ones where the heat is the reason you booked, and the hotel knows it.
01 — new york · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Aman New York
three floors of spa inside the crown building, and heat treated with the seriousness of a religion. the rare midtown room where you genuinely forget fifth avenue is roaring twelve floors below. book the spa time when you reserve the room.
Spa access only
02 — london · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Six Senses London
the whiteley's spa is the most convincing argument in london that a hotel sauna can be a destination rather than an amenity. finnish heat, a proper cold plunge, and the good sense to keep it quiet.
Open to all guests
03 — new york · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Equinox Hotel Hudson Yards
the only hotel on this list built by people who clearly use the sauna themselves. dry heat, steam, and a hot-cold contrast circuit that treats recovery as the point of the trip.
Open to all guests
04 — new york · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
The Greenwich Hotel
shibui spa: a wood-and-lantern-lit room beside a pool reconstructed from a 250-year-old japanese farmhouse. nowhere else in new york feels less like new york.
Open to all guests
05 — los angeles · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Hotel Bel-Air
canyon quiet, cedar heat, swans on the pond outside. the los angeles sauna as it was always meant to feel — unhurried, a little secret, worth the drive up.
Spa access only
06 — london · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Bulgari Hotel London
knightsbridge's most serious spa floor. a proper dry room off a 25-metre pool, run like a swiss watch, with the kind of staff who anticipate the second löyly.
Open to all guests
07 — san francisco · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
The Huntington Hotel & Nob Hill Spa
wood-lined heat, an indoor infinity pool, and the fog rolling past below. the best argument in san francisco for going up the hill rather than down it.
Spa access only
08 — new york · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
Casa Cipriani New York
the sauna inside the restored battery maritime building — hushed, members-club in feel, and reached by a lift that makes you feel let in on something.
Spa access only
09 — london · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
The Dorchester
old-world london doing the thing properly: a dry room that has been quietly excellent for decades, no infrared cabinet in sight, towels the weight of a coat.
Spa access only
10 — los angeles · Dry / Finnish · $$$$
The Beverly Hills Hotel
the pink palace's spa is more restrained than the building implies. dry cedar, no scene, and the strange peace of sweating in the middle of beverly hills.
Spa access only
