Why Hetki Does Not Build Barrel Saunas: Our Approach to Finnish Outdoor Log Saunas
We don't build barrel saunas. And we don't intend to.
From time to time, people ask us whether Hetki offers a barrel sauna, and the answer naturally leads to another question: why not?
As the founder of Hetki, I think that's a fair question. Barrel saunas are popular, particularly in international markets, and they're typically considerably less expensive than log saunas. From a purely commercial perspective, you could therefore ask why we wouldn't make one too.
The answer says quite a lot about what I wanted Hetki to be when I founded the company, and what we still want it to stand for today.
It isn't because we think a barrel sauna can't be a good sauna. Put a proper sauna heater with enough stones inside, throw water on those stones and you can have real löyly. Our reasons have more to do with what we want a Hetki Sauna to be and the experience we want it to create.
In this article, I'll explain why we've chosen the traditional log sauna instead, including:
the sauna experience and the quality of the löyly
more freedom to design the interior around the bathers, benches and heater
solid log construction, thermal mass and long-term durability
a properly constructed insulated roof
timeless design rooted in the Finnish log sauna tradition
fully assembled delivery instead of a DIY sauna kit
a product designed to bring joy and wellbeing for decades
If you're considering an outdoor sauna yourself, these are also some of the questions worth thinking about before deciding what kind of sauna is right for you.
The Sauna Experience Comes First
Ultimately, many of our choices begin with the experience we want to create inside the sauna.
A sauna isn't only about reaching a certain temperature. It's about the löyly, how the heat feels on your body, how comfortably you can sit or lie down, how the air moves and how the whole space makes you feel.
And the sauna experience isn't only about heat. It involves all the senses. The solid log walls contribute to the way the sauna feels, both physically and visually, and give the room a distinctive character and atmosphere. The wood has its own scent and feel, and the benches feel warm and natural against the skin.
This is also where our reasons for not building barrel saunas begin. We know the kind of sauna experience we want Hetki to create. For reasons we'll explain in the following sections, the barrel form doesn't give us the same freedom to achieve it.
For us, the experience comes first. The building is there to make it possible.
We Build Authentic Finnish Log Saunas
Let's start with what we are rather than what we aren't. Hetki crafts authentic Finnish log saunas.
Log saunas have been built in Finland for centuries and remain a familiar way of building freestanding outdoor saunas today. You see them all over the country at homes and summer cottages. Logs have proved well suited to the repeated heat, humidity and temperature changes of sauna use, as well as the demanding conditions of Finnish winters and summers.
In a log sauna, the logs aren't simply a surface material. They form the structure of the building itself and provide substantial thermal mass. At Hetki, we use Finnish spruce logs, made from slow-grown, dense-grained wood.
This is the sauna tradition we've chosen to follow, developed for the way people live today.
Why Barrel Sauna Design Limits the Interior Sauna Layout
One of the first things that shapes that experience is the geometry of the sauna room.
For us, the starting point is the person using the sauna. Where are you sitting and where are your feet? How high is your body in the room? Can you comfortably change position, put your feet up or lie down? Where is the heater in relation to the bathers? How does the löyly move through the space?
Every sauna design involves constraints and compromises. Hetki is no exception. But we want the basic geometry of the building to give us as much design freedom as possible when considering these questions.
A barrel sauna starts with a strong predetermined geometry. Because the walls curve inward as you move higher, raising the benches also moves the bathers into a narrower part of the room. Keeping the benches lower creates more usable width, but it also leaves the bathers lower in the temperature gradient.
None of this means that a barrel sauna can't get hot or produce good löyly. It can. For us, the more relevant question is why we would begin with a shape that restricts our freedom to design the interior the way we want. A rectangular sauna room gives us more freedom to determine bench height and depth, foot position, heater placement and the relationship between the bathers and the warmer upper part of the room.
We have our own design constraints and compromises. We simply prefer a geometry that gives us a better starting point for creating the sauna experience we want.
The Law of Löyly, Bench Height and Heat in a Barrel Sauna
This brings us to the famous Law of Löyly. In simple terms, the principle says that the bathers' feet should be at or above the level of the top of the sauna stones. Warm air rises, so positioning the body higher in the room generally creates a more balanced temperature from head to toe.
The Law of Löyly can be particularly challenging in many common barrel sauna layouts. They often have a single seating level running along the curved sides, with the bathers' feet below the top of the sauna stones when sitting conventionally. Raising the benches can be difficult because the curved walls reduce usable space as you move higher. Straight walls don't remove every design constraint, but they make it considerably easier to position different bench levels in relation to the heater, the stones and the warmer upper part of the room.
At this point, however, I think it's important to be equally transparent about our own design. Hetki doesn't perfectly fulfill a literal interpretation of the Law of Löyly in every configuration either. Our saunas are transported fully assembled, which limits the overall transport height and therefore how high every bench level can be positioned. This is a compromise we accept because fully assembled delivery is an important part of the Hetki concept. Our upper benches are 60 cm (23.6 in) deep, giving bathers space to bring their feet onto the upper bench, change position or lie down completely in the warmer upper part of the room.
The Law of Löyly shouldn't be treated as the only measure of sauna quality. But when it comes specifically to bench height and the position of the bathers in relation to the heater stones, we prefer the design freedom that a rectangular sauna room gives us.
Barrel Sauna Construction vs. a Log Sauna
Another fundamental difference is the construction philosophy.
Many modern barrel saunas use a construction principle in which timber staves, often around 38–42 mm (1.5–1.65 in) thick, can form the interior surface, exterior wall and curved enclosure at the same time, often without a separate insulated wall or ceiling structure. There are obvious reasons for this approach. It uses less material, reduces weight and makes compact transportation possible. The lighter construction also means considerably less thermal mass than in a sauna built from thick logs. That isn't necessarily a disadvantage in every situation: a lightweight sauna can heat up quickly. But it's a different thermal behavior. It simply reflects different priorities.
Hetki takes a different approach. Our 88 mm (3.5 in) laminated spruce logs form the load-bearing walls of the sauna, while the sauna has a separate insulated roof structure with permanent metal roofing. This approach uses more material, adds weight and increases manufacturing and transportation costs. We accept those trade-offs because they follow from the kind of sauna we've chosen to build.
Wood is a living material, and every wooden sauna moves over time. Heat and humidity inside the sauna, combined with changing outdoor temperatures and weather conditions, repeatedly put the structure through demanding cycles. This is another reason we use robust laminated logs. Their construction provides greater dimensional stability and helps reduce shrinking, twisting and cracking as the wood responds to changing conditions.
With thinner timber construction, movement can become more visible. Gaps can develop between the boards of a barrel sauna, sometimes large enough for daylight to show through. That isn't only an aesthetic issue. Gaps allow heat to escape and can affect the consistency of the sauna environment and, ultimately, the experience inside.
If you're comparing outdoor saunas, it's worth looking beyond the appearance and asking how the sauna is actually constructed: how thick are the walls, how is the roof built and insulated, and how is the structure designed to handle years of heat, moisture and changing weather?
For us, a sauna isn't simply a shelter or a product. It's a building, and we believe it should be designed and constructed accordingly.
Outdoor Sauna Design: Why We Prefer Timeless Finnish Architecture
Function is one thing. Aesthetics are another, and here I have to admit that I'm completely biased.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I have no intention of arguing about taste. Some people like the distinctive barrel form, while others clearly don't. If there's already a barrel-shaped hot tub in a garden, for example, I can also understand the visual logic of placing a similarly shaped sauna next to it.
The barrel shape simply isn't the design language I wanted for Hetki. Our design has its roots in the traditional log sauna. The log walls and dovetail corner joints make that heritage visible, while the overall architecture is clean, simple and contemporary.
I wanted Hetki to be recognizably Finnish without looking nostalgic: traditional in its roots, modern in its expression and deliberately simple. Whether that's more beautiful than a barrel sauna is entirely for you to decide.
Fully Assembled Outdoor Saunas, Not DIY Sauna Kits
There's also a fundamental difference in how the sauna reaches its owner. Many barrel saunas are designed for compact transportation and assembly at the destination. Hetki takes almost the opposite approach. Our saunas are built and finished at our workshop because we want the construction, finishing and quality control to happen before the sauna reaches the customer. The complete sauna is then transported to its destination and placed onto a prepared foundation: fully finished, delivered in one piece and ready to use the same day.
Shipping a complete small building is obviously more expensive than transporting a compact stack of components. But that's only one part of the equation. A sauna kit still needs to be assembled at the destination, which takes time and labour and comes with its own cost. With Hetki, we choose to do that work before the sauna reaches the customer. Buying a Hetki shouldn't become a construction project for the customer.
We want the journey from ordering to enjoying the first löyly to be as easy and reliable as possible. We also want to know how every sauna was built and finished before our name goes on it. For me, fully assembled delivery isn't just a logistical decision. It's part of the product and part of the customer experience.
Barrel Sauna Price, Value and Our Business Choice
All of these choices have a price.
Barrel saunas are typically considerably less expensive than log saunas, and of course that matters when someone is choosing what to buy. But price and value aren't quite the same thing. I don't believe that the lowest purchase price automatically means the best value, just as I don't believe that the most expensive sauna is automatically the best.
The right question isn't simply what one sauna costs compared with another, but what you're getting for that investment and which of those things matter to you. For us, it's the combination of the sauna experience, construction, materials, craftsmanship, design, ease of ownership and the years of joy and wellbeing the sauna can bring. Our aim is to craft a sauna that we believe offers excellent value for the investment our customers make. For us, a barrel sauna simply isn't the right way to deliver that. We'd rather focus on creating that value than trying to compete at the lowest end of the market.
As an entrepreneur, I'd be lying if I said I don't understand the commercial attraction of the barrel sauna market. Hetki is a business, we want to grow, and we want to bring sauna to more people around the world. Barrel saunas occupy a considerably lower price category and have become popular in many international markets. Designing a simpler product for DIY kit shipping could potentially allow us to reach a much larger market. I understand that logic very well. But we'd also be building a different product for a different reason.
One thing I've learned as an entrepreneur is that deciding what not to do can be just as important as deciding what to do. Commercial opportunity alone isn't enough reason to make something, particularly if pursuing that opportunity would mean changing the fundamental product philosophy behind Hetki. I'd rather see us become exceptionally good at building the kind of sauna we believe in than try to be everything to everyone. This doesn't mean there's anything wrong with the barrel sauna market. We've simply chosen not to be part of it.
Sustainable Outdoor Saunas Should Be Built for Generations
One of our values at Hetki is respect for the environment, and this is another area where I think we need to acknowledge trade-offs honestly.
A sauna that uses less material and weighs less has obvious advantages in terms of resource use and transportation. Our approach uses more wood and involves transporting a much heavier finished product.
But sustainability isn't only about how much material goes into a sauna or how much energy is needed to transport it. How the sauna performs throughout its lifetime matters too. A properly designed and constructed sauna that retains heat effectively requires less energy to maintain the desired sauna temperature. This is another reason why construction, thermal mass and a properly insulated roof matter to us.
Useful life belongs in the sustainability discussion too. Our ambition is to build saunas that remain useful and bring joy and wellbeing for decades. Wood also stores carbon absorbed from the atmosphere while the tree was growing, and that carbon remains stored in the wood for as long as the product stays in use. The longer a wooden building such as a Hetki Sauna lasts, the longer that carbon remains stored in its structure.
Ideally, a Hetki Sauna shouldn't be something enjoyed only by its first owner. We want them to be enjoyed by one generation, then the next, and perhaps the one after that. For us, longevity, energy efficiency and carbon storage are all part of the sustainability discussion.
Is a Barrel Sauna a Finnish Sauna?
So, is a barrel sauna a Finnish sauna? That depends on what we mean by a Finnish sauna.
The barrel sauna itself has genuine Finnish history. Barrel saunas were commercially produced in Finland in the 1960s. By then, however, Finns had already been building log saunas for centuries. Barrel saunas are certainly not a prominent part of sauna culture in Finland. Speaking simply from my own experience as a Finn, I rarely come across them here.
What I find particularly interesting is how different that original Finnish barrel sauna was from many barrel saunas on the market today. It had separate interior and exterior timber layers, insulation and a vapor barrier between them, as well as separate protection from the weather. It weighed around 1,600 kg (3,500 lb), roughly the same as a Hetki Sauna today. In other words, although its shape was a barrel, it was built to a higher standard than many of the lightweight barrel saunas on the market today.
If we're talking about the shape, I wouldn't describe the barrel as particularly typical of the Finnish sauna tradition. Ask a group of Finns whether they consider a barrel sauna particularly Finnish and I suspect quite a few would hesitate. I probably would too. That's not a scientific conclusion, just my perspective as a Finn who has grown up with sauna.
But I don't think the shape of the building ultimately determines whether the sauna inside it is Finnish. For me, the more important question is what happens inside. Finnish sauna isn't a dry sauna. Water is thrown on hot sauna stones to create löyly, and löyly is the soul of the Finnish sauna experience. If a barrel-shaped sauna has a proper sauna heater with enough stones and is designed to create good löyly, then I think there's a reasonable case for calling it a Finnish sauna.
Sauna has taken many forms over generations. Hetki has simply chosen another path within that tradition: the traditional Finnish log sauna.
Our Purpose Shapes the Saunas We Build
When I founded Hetki, I didn't want to create just another company selling sauna products. I wanted us to create excellent Finnish saunas that our team could genuinely stand behind and be proud of, and perhaps even saunas that Finland could be proud of. Our purpose became to bring joy and wellbeing to people's lives with the help of real Finnish sauna, and that purpose still guides what we do.
But our purpose isn't an argument against somebody else's sauna. It's a guide for our own decisions. When we ask ourselves what kind of product best represents the experience, quality and customer satisfaction we want Hetki to stand for, our answer is the log sauna. The product should follow the purpose, not the other way around.
Barrel Saunas Divide Opinion. Make Up Your Own Mind.
Barrel saunas certainly divide opinion. Spend enough time in international sauna discussions, particularly in social media sauna groups, and you'll come across some rather strong views about barrel saunas. Some people love them, while others describe them in terms I probably shouldn't repeat here. But neither I nor Hetki have any interest in putting down other sauna makers or telling people what kind of sauna they should or shouldn't enjoy. Our choice is about what we want to build and what we want Hetki to stand for.
Not long ago, I happened to have an interesting experience with the same group of people. On one occasion we went to a Hetki Sauna, and later we went to a barrel sauna. Afterwards, one of them said something that stayed with me: “Now we know there are differences between saunas.” I realise how biased this anecdote is. I'm the founder of Hetki and make my living in the sauna business, and one comment after two sauna experiences certainly isn't scientific evidence of anything. Still, I liked it because the person didn't say that Hetki was better or that the barrel sauna was bad. The observation was simply that saunas are different. Perhaps that's ultimately the best advice I can give.
Don't take my word for it, and don't take the strongest opinions you find online at face value either. If you have the opportunity, try different saunas yourself. Sit in them, throw water on the stones and feel the löyly. Notice where the heat is, how your feet feel, whether the benches are comfortable and how the space works around you. Look at the construction and design, and think about what matters to you in terms of price, delivery, ownership and how long you want the sauna to serve you. Most importantly, pay attention to how the sauna makes you feel. Then make up your own mind.
I have made up mine. Hetki builds Finnish log saunas, designed with the sauna experience at the centre, built and finished at our workshop and made to bring joy and wellbeing for decades, hopefully even from one generation to the next. That's the path we've chosen, and that's why Hetki doesn't build barrel saunas.
Janne Oksanen
Founder & CEO of Hetki Finland
