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During my stay in Liverpool, England I was looking for a sauna and conducted a search "Liverpool sauna" on Google. Splash Sauna Liverpool was the first hit, no other saunas on the first search results page. Apart from the muscular male photo on the front page and maybe "discrete location and entrance", nothing on the front page points to a gay club. When browsing to the facilities tab the place's nature becomes evident:

  • Fun room with large communal round bed
  • Maze, cell, sling, St Andrews cross, kneeling bench and glory holes

2 Answers2

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Are public saunas linked to gay culture in the UK?

If by public you mean clubs and the like, then yes. Taking Manchester as an example (you seem to know about Liverpool) a Google search manchester sauna selects 5 - 4 described with "Sauna" one "Adult Entertainment Club". Of the four, two advertise themselves as gay clubs. The other two seem more like 'massage parlours'.

pnuts
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Saunas in the UK are typically found in one of two places: Health/Fitness/Sports Clubs/Spas with swimming pools (places like Bannatynes, University sports centres etc.), and "Gay" saunas which are more oriented towards homosexual acts. If you want to just visit a normal sauna, there are plenty of places, you typically can also use the other facilites in the swimming pool area.

Bear in mind in the former it is not customary to remove garments when entering the sauna (unlike in many European countries), in fact it is pretty much forbidden in most places.

Crazymoomin
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