Cold plunge tubs and saunas! They certainly are on everyone's mind right now, with more and more people incorporating them into their daily ritual. For us, the sauna had been a mainstay of our lives for at least a decade, and like many others we have added cold plunging into our wellness routine over the past few years as it has gained in popularity.
We loved going to the public sauna spas in Victoria, BC, but when access to public spaces was limited in 2020, we had to look to other ways to get our fix. This began a journey of looking at different options for having an at home spa experience, we had two different cedar barrel saunas delivered to our house before we decided that for us, this was going to be too limiting in terms of having a mobile life, free to move to different locations without having too much to lug around with us. A 14 foot cedar barrel sauna simply wasn't an option for us, at least at this stage of our lives. So with love, we let it go.
(These pics show our first and second cedar barrel sauna / cold plunge. As you can see, transporting them is not easy! The second one we kept on a trailer at all times. Still it took up a lot of space!)
We had heard of a company in Finland that had made tent saunas, and we looked into this as an option. We became increasingly excited about it, and as we researched more we loved the idea of not only having an at home sauna
that didn't weigh us down in terms of our living mobility, but also would allow us to bring the sauna experience with us wherever we might go. Now whenever we would go camping, or to the lake, we could easily bring an amazing wood fire sauna with us! We contacted a few different manufacturers and finally found one who was willing to work with us to the specifications that we had in mind for a portable, safe and durable product that we could not only enjoy at our own home but that we could sell as a product in our hometown of Victoria, BC.
Even better, through them we were also able to get in touch with a manufacturer of cold plunges, a trusted name that had been producing for brands in the USA for years that we knew and respected. They were willing to take us even though we are still small, work with us and support our design vision. Because the cold plunge requires a power supply, it is considerably less portable than the sauna, however the tub is inflatable so you can take it anywhere you have a standard 110V plug and a supply of water to fill it up. So you can easily take it to a friends house for the weekend, take it RV'ing or even camping with a generator.
The cold tub / barrel and the sauna both on their own offer a powerful healing and recovery benefit, what we have found in the past two years is that combining the two offers an absolutely breakthrough experience. This is why we wanted to offer them both as a product, to emphasize the power of their combined synthesis. Imagine you are in the sauna at 60 degrees, blasting the steam from the rocks, sweat dripping down your brow, you feel as though you couldn't go another minute. That's when you unzip the door of the sauna tent, and make your way to the cold plunge. The cold plunge will plummet your elevated core temperature back down to baseline and below, and slow your elevated heart rate. After less than two minutes in the cold plunge, you find yourself ready to go back into the sauna where before you couldn't take another minute. This back and forth between fire and ice can be repeated as many times as you
desire, and we think you'll find it yields results that exceed your expectations.
Ultimately the sauna / cold plunge represents more than just a recovery tool to us, it represents a way of life, a means of coming together communally, a way of sharing and enjoying each others presence and company. We're very proud to be sharing our creation with you, and we hope that you will join us on this journey. We are just getting started!