Cassandra Cavanah is moved to tears (and also a little nervous) as she joins hundreds of near-naked heat enthusiasts attending this year’s Aufguss World Championships in The Netherlands Attending your first-ever Aufguss World Championships (Aufguss WM) can be intimidating, especially coming from the US, where sauna culture is only just taking off. Very recently, new bathhouses featuring large-format event saunas for aufguss rituals have opened in New York (Othership and Bathh

Skilled sauna masters are invited to the New York City event to compete for a coveted spot on Team USA at the Aufguss WM Finals taking place in Verona, Italy. The inaugural USA national competition for sauna Aufguss masters will take place at the Bathhouse, Williamsburg, NYC, June 23-24, 2025. Aufguss transforms a sauna session into a performance, where skilled sauna masters use heat, scent, music, and theatrical storytelling to create an immersive wellness experience. Origin

Sauna Aufguss events in Canada and US will determine the top sauna masters who will go on to represent Team USA at the Aufguss WM World Championships in Verona, Italy. For the first time, in 2025, the United States and Canada will host national Aufguss WM competitions , bringing the high-energy, theatrical sauna ritual to North American audiences in a competitive format. The events are set to take place at Bathhouse in Williamsburg, New York City, on June 23-24, and at Therm

A combination of heat, sweat, and showmanship Even in Las Vegas, the last place I expected to find a show was in the spa. But thanks to the aufguss sauna ritual at the Fontainebleau Las Vegas , that’s precisely what I got. When I entered the sauna event room at Lapis Spa & Wellness , a dozen other people were already seated on natural wood tiered seats. Like an arena, we all faced a video screen; ours flickered with a scene from a babbling brook with dragonflies and hummingbi

The inaugural USA national competition for sauna Aufguss masters will take place at the Bathhouse, Williamsburg, NYC, 23-24 June, 2025. Originating in Europe, Aufguss has captivated sauna-goers worldwide, and in 2025, the USA will host its first national competition. The Aufguss WM (World Masters) takes this tradition to another level, elevating the “Art of Aufguss” into a theatrical performance where competitors incorporate music, lighting and storytelling to transport guest

Competitors will be judged on steam and temperature control, towel-waving techniques and audience engagement through storytelling Credit: Aufguss WM The ancient European sauna ritual of aufguss is continuing to make waves in the US, as the country prepares to host its first-ever national sauna competition this summer. Aufguss, which originated in Europe, transforms a traditional sauna session into a multisensory performance, where masters use heat, scent, music and storytelli

In this immersive live episode, host Lisa Starr brings listeners into the heart of the first-ever U.S. Aufguss World Masters Trials, recorded on-site at the newly expanded Bathhouse Williamsburg in Brooklyn, NY. As the ancient European tradition of Aufguss —a multisensory, storytelling sauna ritual—makes its competitive debut in America, Lisa interviews several key figures shaping this cultural movement. From competition judges and spa innovators to passionate sauna performer

Call them hot and unbothered. During late June’s heat wave, when most New Yorkers sat pinned to air conditioners, 1,200 sauna enthusiasts swarmed Brooklyn’s Bathhouse to witness the country’s first sauna master smackdown. Some wore bell-shaped felt bucket caps to prevent overheating and to signal: This ain’t my first hydro-deo . Others were Bathhouse regulars who, like any good New Yorker, saw a line — in this case for the wellness venue’s 80-seater “event sauna” — and joine

Aufguss: a world championship for twirling a really hot towel. On the hottest day in New York City in a decade, nearly a hundred people crowded into a hundred-and-seventy-degree sauna in a converted brewery in Williamsburg for the first U.S. National Aufguss Competition. An Aufguss—from the German word for “infusion”—is a ritual sauna ceremony that lasts for twelve to fifteen minutes. A sauna master fills the room with carefully curated scents by dropping snowballs containing

In this immersive live episode, host Lisa Starr brings listeners into the heart of the first-ever U.S. Aufguss World Masters Trials, recorded on-site at the newly expanded Bathhouse Williamsburg in Brooklyn, NY. As the ancient European tradition of Aufguss —a multisensory, storytelling sauna ritual—makes its competitive debut in America, Lisa interviews several key figures shaping this cultural movement. From competition judges and spa innovators to passionate sauna performer

The sport of aufguss, or competitive sauna, is full of surprises. It was the hottest day of the year in New York City. Oddly, that wasn’t why I was half naked. And it’s not why I was surrounded by nearly 100 bodies in equal or greater states of undress. We were all in a 175-degree sauna, where partial nakedness is not unusual. What was unusual was what we were all doing there: watching two artists perform an interpretive dance. Welcome to the Aufguss USA Nationals, America’s

A centuries-old German sauna ritual blends heat, scent, and theater for an unforgettable wellness experience. Smiling woman relaxing with closed eyes in the sauna. Aufguss, a centuries-old German ritual blending heat, aromatherapy, and theatrical performance, is making waves in the wellness industry. According to the Global Wellness Institute , the sauna experience is being reimagined with a new wave of 'social saunas' (or sauna-tainment) emerging in the wellness space. At th