How to Build a Russian Steam Bath

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 Ladeling water onto heated rocks is the way that steam is created in the traditional banya. The Russian steam bath, or “banya,” is a culture in itself. Many of these baths are more like social clubs, with food, pools, professional masseuses and, often, high price tags. Making a simple banya is easy.
You need a sealed-off room, hot rocks and a source for heat. The banya is an alternation of extreme hot and cold temperatures. The longer periods are spent in the hot, with a brief exposure to the cold. Under some circumstances, you can have a simple banya in an outdoor shed, and simply run outside every 20 minutes or so.
Difficulty:ModerateLarge, round rocksSource for heating them, either a fireplace or an electric unitSealed-off roomOak or birch leaves for the "veniki"bucket of cold water with ladle1
Find a good location. Several ideas might be an outdoor shed, a large bathroom suitably sealed off, or even a pool cabana if it can be completely sealed off from the outside. It should be large enough for a few people. The tradition is the larger, the better.
2
Create a safe heating source. This will depend on where you have set up your sauna. Keeping it simple, buying a small stove specifically for sauna use, is probably the best. Many firms are selling small electric ones. Many are inexpensive, small, easy to use and, more importantly, safe. Some are just deluxe electric heaters with a compartment for heating rocks. A small fireplace is another more complicated option, since you will need a chimney of some sort. This is not exactly ideal for a bathroom. The Finns and Russians have a very simple form of fireplace with rocks set on a grate just above it. In Russia, there are many very small, simple saunas with a “campfire” setup with rocks baking. The Russian bath is never dry, yet it is hot, at the very limits of human endurance. Russian saunas average a humid 120 degrees F.
3
Have a bucket of water and a ladle on hand. The point is to occasionally pour water on the rocks to crate the steam. This is why the room must be totally sealed off. One reason why a bathroom might be a good idea is that you can occasionally shower in cold water every half hour or so. Since your bathroom is already designed to deal with high levels of humidity, creating a homemade banya might work well there, especially if it is large. Traditionally, the specifically Russian approach is to have the heater behind metal doors, so that the actual drops of humidity, by the time they penetrate, are extremely small. This leads to a “wet” sauna with a humidity of only 30 percent. This is, however, a more advanced concept. Because of the low humidity, extremely hot temperatures can be experienced in the sauna without excessive discomfort.
4
Create your own venik. This is a massage item made of bunched birch leaves. Some people use oak. Collect several hundred of these leaves, as large as you can get. Bunch them into a fan-style arrangement. This need not be an art, though there are many who sell their own venik creations. The technique of the venik includes rubbing and fanning the air onto the person's naked back. In Russia, Finland and Ukraine, there are women who specialize in the venik technique as trained masseuses.
The Russian tradition is to be naked. The sexes are almost always segregated unless it is a married couple.
Most Russian steam baths have food served during the steam.
Never use charcoal to create heat. It will create carbon monoxide fumes that will quickly make your steam bath a permanent one.

Tag : Build, Russian, Steam