Bathhouse Flatiron by Rockwell Group

Architecture and design as a vehicle to beguile and transport is a path often explored, yet rarely does a project deliver on such a promise. Bathhouse Flatiron by Rockwell Group – New York’s latest wellness destination framed as a “no-frills banya and luxury spa” by co-founders Travis Talmadge and Jason Goodman – is an indisputable exception.

Tucked in the belly of a converted parking garage beneath the chaos of midtown Manhattan, Bathhouse Flatiron is the younger sibling to the existing Williamsburg outpost and encompasses a sauna, steam room, thermal pools, treatment rooms, a cafe and more across three subterranean levels. The other-worldly design incorporates stylistic references from Blade Runner and imagined futuristic realms and ancient civilisations, bridged by the underlying concept of the Hero’s Journey. “The Hero’s Journey has this idea of procession built into the program, so we wanted to heighten that and create a sense of mystery while progressively removing people from their everyday,” says Rockwell Group architect Michael Fischer.

“The Hero’s Journey has this idea of procession built into the program, so we wanted to heighten that and create a sense of mystery while progressively removing people from their everyday,” says Rockwell Group architect Michael Fischer.

The arrival sequence begins at street level where, after passing through a lobby replete with a monolithic travertine counter, bathers descend a dimly lit spiral staircase to the first of many thresholds– a domed vestibule featuring a mural by Dean Barger Studios – before emerging in the changing rooms. Permeating these initial moments is a sense of anticipation that could be traced to any number of things, including the clever lighting, the hermetic effect of concrete and stone, or the gradual descension towards something surprising and restorative.

Though elevated, the changing rooms are but a quick stop on the journey and, upon descending another flight of stairs, the main space is revealed. Five thermal pools of different sizes – all lit in varying shades of blue to signify their temperature – glisten gem-like within the vast black room. Large pyramidal volumes hover over the pools, containing what the architects refer to as ‘rewards’: glowing fields of coloured lights only visible when wading in the water.

“The sauna ritual is performative, so the room was set up as an amphitheatre,” says Fischer.

The treatment rooms, saunas and steam room sit around the perimeter. Sauna masters occasionally perform Aufguss, a sensory experience featuring scented oils, music and heat, in the cedar-lined ceremonial sauna. “The sauna ritual is performative, so the room was set up as an amphitheatre,” says Fischer. In the steam room, DTILE, a Dutch three-dimensional tile, wraps the room, bringing a welcome roundness to the geometry, and the infrared sauna is lined in vertical hemlock wood panels oriented towards a backlit silhouette of tropical plants.

For those game enough, there’s the Russian-style banya. Clad in horizontal green-purple slate tiles and oriented towards a specialist-built black stone-encased furnace, it is the hottest of the rooms, hovering at 90 degrees Celsius. The heat from the furnace is prickly on the skin, but that’s the point, and the cold plunge that follows the heated experience is more invigorating for it.

The other-worldly design incorporates stylistic references from Blade Runner and imagined futuristic realms and ancient civilisations, bridged by the underlying concept of the Hero’s Journey.

Moving from the pools to the sauna to the steam room and back again is meditative in and of itself – especially when capped off with a massage – but the real upshot of Bathhouse Flatiron is the striking set of differences between the place and its context. Manhattan’s busy streets sit in stark contrast to the ethereal atmosphere down below, and this dichotomy works, without doubt, in its favour.

Interior design by Rockwell Group. Build by RW Projects. Electrical, mechanical and plumbing engineering by Collectif Engineering. Brand design by Savvy Studio. Furniture by Paola Lenti and Rockwell Group. Lighting by Loop Lighting. Artwork by Dean Barger Studios.