Women of the Sauna: National Sauna Week Talk Now Available

During National Sauna Week, Kamu Sauna co-founder Becky Pelkonen joined Finnish folklorist Dalva Lamminmäki for a featured online presentation hosted by the Finlandia Foundation National.
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The session, Women of the Sauna: Keepers, Healers, and Future Builders, explored Finnish sauna culture, women’s leadership in sauna traditions, and the role of sauna as community care and social infrastructure. The full recording is now available to watch.

What is National Sauna Week?

National Sauna Week is an annual celebration of Finnish sauna culture in North America. Organized through Finlandia Foundation, the week highlights sauna heritage, public sauna events, educational programming, and conversations about how traditional sauna practices continue to evolve globally.

Dalva + Becky's talk this year focused on the historic and contemporary role of women in sauna culture - from Finland to Canada and beyond.

Five Key Takeaways from "Women of the Sauna"

​1. Sauna as Community Care

Historically, sauna functioned as a shared space of care, supporting childbirth, healing, hygiene, and rites of passage. It was (+ still is) a relational practice embedded in everyday life.

2. Women as Cultural Knowledge Holders

​Women have long served as sauna tenders, midwives, washers, and ritual leaders, transmitting embodied knowledge across generations. They continue to do so today.

3. Sauna as Living Heritage

Sauna culture survives through repetition and practice. Its continuity depends on rhythm, responsibility, and intergenerational transmission, not simply architecture or design.

4. Sauna as Social Infrastructure

Drawing on Dalva’s doctoral folklore research and Becky's doctoral work on regenerative third spaces, the presentation positioned sauna as essential social infrastructure, a cultural commons that strengthens community wellbeing.

5. Women Shaping the Global Sauna Movement

Today, women are leading sauna businesses, community spaces, and cultural education initiatives across Finland, North America, and across the globe. These women-led spaces are anchoring sauna as a living cultural practice rather than a passing wellness trend. Women in sauna today shared their voices on the way they hold space, build community, and see the future of sauna evolving.

Inspiring women from Finland + North America shared their voices at the end of the "Women in Sauna" talk like Azar Eskandarpour from "Humans Who Bathe."

Becky’s participation in National Sauna Week builds on her continued international leadership in the sauna sector. She has also been invited to co-host the World Sauna Forum with Sauna from Finland for the second consecutive year, reflecting growing global recognition of work connecting Finnish sauna heritage with community-rooted sauna development in Canada.
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If you are interested in Finnish sauna culture, women in sauna leadership, regenerative sauna practices, or the future of sauna in North America, this presentation offers historical depth and contemporary insight.

The full recording of Women of the Sauna: Keepers, Healers, and Future Builders is now available to view.