the times Saturday November 13 20212 Body + Soul
have to leave urgently,” Putin urges. “Let
me finish my beer first,” the German chan-
cellor replies. From this moment a highly
controversial political bromance was born.
I, however, am a bit anxious and swelter-
ing, my bare feet burning on the hot floor,
as I head off to take my parenie. Instructed
to lie on my front, a banshik duo open up a
roaring stove and hot clouds issue forth.
Dousing birch leaves in cold water, fizzing
steam is guided all over my body via the
shaken wet leaves in a traditional Russian
dance... wholly unseen by me, of course,
because a wet eucalyptus branch is cover-
ing my face. Through joyful pain, broiled
humiliation and shock invigoration, I can’t
help laughing. This is flagellation as
administered by a Sylvanian family.
When it’s finished I stagger over to the
ice bucket challenge, then to the plunge
pool, and then, oh joy, vodka shots are
served to me by a uniformed attendant.
People pay £140 to £175 for this treatment.
Now well into my three-hour-long
banya afternoon, I head back to the steam
room. I begin chatting to two Russians and
a heavy-set Brit who looks like a bald
Logan Roy. One of the men is reminiscing
about his Ukrainian youth and longing for
the days when he could take a banya and
then run out into the cold, dousing his
naked body in snow. Miraculously, I don’t
fear for my life. In fact, I have a bit of a
giggle with the Russians and even dare to
deploy my favourite Seinfeld one-liner.
“Jeez,” I announce to my bath house
buddies after five minutes in the 90-degree
steam. “It’s like a sauna in here.”
russianbanya.co.ukSimon Mills at the
Russian bath house
(sauna hat optional)males. I am almost certain that Beckham
does not suffer similarly.
Two: extreme heat. I cannot bear being
hot. I drive my kids crazy by leaving doors
and windows open and turning off the
combi boiler, even in winter. Then again...
Three: the cold, particularly ice-cold
water. I am a complete and utter wuss
when it comes to showering under any-
thing less than piping-hot water. I don’t do
wild swimming or take cold baths.
And four: Russian men. I am scared of
them. I’ve watched too many movies
where some poor, un-inked, western wimp
gets rubbed out by one of those golovorez
types — coldly strangled in the muggy hot
steam room, left for dead in his white flip-
flops and a sodden towel. This could
happen to me. Worse still, everyone would
see me naked (see number one).
The Bath House isn’t like this. The place
is fitted out in authentically luxe-austere,
five-star oligarchal style with civilised,
subterranean changing rooms, gently
erotic mosaics inspired by the paintings of
Zinaida Serebriakova and vintage fixtures
and fittings from the famous Sanduny
banya in Moscow. Best of all, I am encour-
aged to keep my Orlebar Brown trunks on.
A traditional banya is a bit more basic —
a simple, lake-adjacent, wood-fired log
cabin comprising a parilka (steam room),
a moyka (wash room) and a predbannik
(relaxation room). Before domestic
plumbing, groups of hardy men and sturdy
women (on separate visits usually) spent
long hours moving from one area to
another, cleansing and rejuvenating,
drinking cold beer, munching on herring
and solving problems: “pomylsya, budto
zanovo rodilsya” — “Washed, born again”,
as they say in Moscow.
For Vladimir Putin a banya has been the
stage for a series of defining moments.
In 1996, for instance, he had lost his job at
the St Petersburg mayor’s office and had
retreated to his back-garden banya. He
emerged from the lake to find his banya on
fire and was devastated because he’d left
his crucifix inside. But then a miracle —
from the banya’s ashes firefighters discov-
ered the charred necklace. He took this as
a sign, a rebirth... and became president.
Years later Putin is enjoying a heated
discussion with Gerhard Schröder when
the banya catches fire again. “Gerhard, weVodka shots, sweat
and twigs: am I
man enough for
the Russian spa?
The latest A-list male bonding spot is a ‘banya’ in Belgravia (fans
include David Beckham and Guy Ritchie). Simon Mills checks in
I
am sitting in a former bank in Belgra-
via, dressed only in my swimming
trunks and a silly felt hat that’s
supposed to stop my head from over-
heating. It’s 93C and rivers of perspi-
ration are pouring from my body.
I have come to the Bath House, a
Russian banya around the corner from
Buckingham Palace, to sweat away my
machismo filth and man shame, and purge
my residual alcohol and self-pity.
Soon I will be taking a sound beating
from a duo of meaty-looking male Russian
banshiks, as they are called, who will pun-
ish my body with venik — twigs made from
birch, oak and eucalyptus branches —
during a stifling and balletically butch
parenie. This will be followed by bucket-
loads of iced water straight onto my head,
self-administered, from a height. After
which I will revive myself with shots of
Beluga vodka and spoonfuls of Royal
Oscietra black caviar, then lie down on
a bed of hay (real hay — in Belgravia!).
This may resemble the kind of macho
purging activity you’d see in an episode of
Succession to go along with the boardroom
backstabbing and boar-hunting weekends,
but a serious banya session with your com-
rades is now the go-to activity for very
modern British men too. David Beckham
and his film-maker mate Guy Ritchie
recently took a group of pals to the Bath
House’s private space for a long afternoon,
and Tuesdays — its gentlemen’s day — are
now teeming with men on “bro-bonding”
days, the director Robert Procopé says.
A former investment banker, Procopé
got into male banya culture during years of
living and working in Russia. Back in the
UK, with serviceable London banyas pop-
ping up in Hoxton and South Kensington,
Procopé sensed a gap in the market for a
luxury, Royal Borough interpretation. He
teamed up with a Ukrainian-born builder
of private saunas, Alexander Lazarev —
who has been doing a roaring trade install-
ing them in the back gardens of London’s
wealthy — and together they opened the
Bath House. Since Covid restrictions
relaxed in May, business has been cooking.
Letting it all hang out, Procopé says, is
the true function of the banya — a place
where men commune to celebrate, medi-
tate or commiserate. “Stuff men tradition-
ally aren’t particularly good at,” he says.For as men’s pores open up, they will
lay themselves bare a little also. They
will talk about stuff. Unpack things. With
other men. Life, death, work, divorce,
success and failure. Subjects that often
go untouched.
“Unlike going shooting, playing golf or
watching football, the banya offers a
looser, more liberating experience,”
Procopé says. It’s perfect for the modern
man. Yes, he admits there can be some
robust, bath house showboating some-
times: men ladling extra water on the
stove, toughing out the heat. “But mainly
it’s the freedom and the lack of a scheduled
framework that men appreciate. There is
no preening going on, no competition, no
self-consciousness. You come for half an
hour or three hours. You can wander
around, take a treatment, or a drink, as
you please.”
Certainly, with no phones or expensive
wristwatches by which to judge the status
of one’s fellow banya bros, the speakeasy
atmosphere, the semi-nudity and the silly
hats we all wear conspire to create a
democratising effect in the rooms. “Every-
one, prince or pauper, is the same. As they
say in Russia, ‘There are no epaulettes in
the banya,’ ” Procopé says.
What the Bath House is also definitely
not is a feminine-feeling spa (although
I am told its women’s and mixed days are
just as popular). There are no vases of lilies
in reception, no white sofas, no scented
candles or aromatherapy oils. This, com-
rade, is the anti-Goop. Good for mind and
body, great for hangovers and a socio-
political leveller. And I, for one, want to
stay all night and party like a Russian.
This, I admit, is something of a surprise
because, despite the ringing celebrity
endorsement from Beckham, I had not
been looking forward to my visit. Why?
On paper the banya environment and the
parenie treatment comprises lots of things
I really don’t like at all.
Number one: men’s naked bodies. Other
men’s, for sure, but mostly, primarily, my
own. A profound corporeal self-loathing
means that at home I am naked for wash-
ing and sex only. I despise the lump of
ageing and unathletic pudding that I have
to look at in the bathroom mirror every
day. I’m even less comfortable showing it
off to a group of other flabby, middle-agedThe semi-nudity
and the silly
hats we all
wear have a
democratising
effect
Banca do Antfer
Telegram: https://t.me/bancadoantfer
Issuhub: https://issuhub.com/user/book/