The jjimjilbang: the Korean sauna that never sleeps

It is three in the morning in Seoul. The last subway passed long ago, but a light stays on at the street corner. Inside, dozens of people in matching shorts and T-shirts sleep, play, eat hard-boiled eggs or doze in a heated room lined with salt and jade. Families, students, travelers, night owls: a whole slice of Korea lives there, in pajamas, sheltered from the world. This is a jjimjilbang.

The jjimjilbang is one of the most singular and beloved institutions of South Korea: a complex of public baths and saunas, open 24 hours a day, where one comes to wash, sweat, relax, eat, sleep and spend time with family or friends. Halfway between the Roman baths, the Scandinavian sauna and the collective living room, it has no real equivalent elsewhere.

At the origins: from public bath to leisure temple#

The jjimjilbang descends from a long tradition of East Asian public baths. Before private bathrooms became widespread, Koreans frequented the mogyoktang (목욕탕), the neighborhood bathhouse, to wash in hot water. It was a utilitarian as much as a social place.

As Korea grew richer, these baths transformed. In the 1990s and 2000s, they grew larger, equipped themselves with multiple heat rooms, restaurants, rest areas, play spaces and screens: the simple bath became a true leisure complex, where one can spend an entire day, even the night. The modern jjimjilbang was born.

The jjimjilbang is not only a place where one washes: it is a space of national decompression, where hierarchies fall along with clothes, and where Korea, so hurried by day, finally comes to slow down.

How it works: the bather's journey#

At the entrance, you pay a modest fee and receive a uniform: a T-shirt and shorts, often matching, identical for everyone. It is this outfit that makes the iconic image of the jjimjilbang. You leave your shoes and belongings in lockers.

Then comes the separation: the bath zones are strictly single-sex and are entered completely naked. You shower seated, move from a hot pool to a cold pool, sweat in saunas. Then, dressed again in the common outfit, you join the mixed spaces: the famous themed heat rooms, the rest areas, the restaurants. It is there that families and friends gather.

The heat rooms and their virtues#

The heart of the experience is the heat rooms, small kiln-shaped chambers where one lies on the burning floor. Each has its specialty: a room lined with salt, jade, amethyst, charcoal or yellow clay (hwangto), at temperatures ranging from warm to nearly unbearable. Beside them, an ice room allows cooling off.

To these rooms, Korean tradition attributes all sorts of benefits: elimination of toxins, muscle relaxation, improved circulation. Beyond the supposed virtues, the alternation of very hot and very cold produces a feeling of deep relaxation, close to that sought in saunas around the world.

Eating, sleeping, playing: life at the jjimjilbang#

The jjimjilbang is also experienced through the stomach. You enjoy eggs baked in the saunas' steam (maekban-gyeran), a glass of sikhye (a sweet fermented rice drink) served chilled, noodles, ice cream. These snacks are an integral part of the ritual.

But the jjimjilbang is also, and this is its great originality, a place where one sleeps. The common rest rooms, with their mats and headrests, welcome those who missed the last subway, budget travelers, families on a getaway. For a few euros, one spends the night there, which makes it one of the most economical lodgings in Korea. There are also screens, game rooms, sometimes gyms or karaoke rooms.

The etiquette: nudity and the seshin#

For the foreign visitor, the most baffling thing remains the mandatory nudity in the bath zones. In Korea, it has nothing sexual or embarrassing about it: one washes naked, among people of the same sex, as has always been done. A golden rule precedes the bath: you shower carefully before entering the common pools, out of respect for others.

One ritual deserves mention: the seshin, the vigorous body scrub. For a few won, an ajumma (a middle-aged woman) in underwear energetically scrubs the bather's skin with an abrasive mitt, rolling off dead skin. The experience, intense and sometimes painful for the uninitiated, leaves the skin extraordinarily soft — and constitutes a rite of passage for whoever wants to taste authentic Korea.

To discover the jjimjilbang is to discover an intimate Korea, undressed of its usual codes: a country that, behind its image of frenetic modernity, still knows how to gather naked and in pajamas around heat. To learn Korean is also to learn these words — jjimjil, hanjeungmak, seshin, sikhye — that exist nowhere else, because they describe a unique way of taking care of oneself, together.

FAQ#

What is a jjimjilbang? A jjimjilbang (찜질방) is a Korean public bath and sauna complex, open 24 hours a day, where one washes, sweats in heat rooms, relaxes, eats and can even sleep, alone or with family.

Do you have to be naked in a jjimjilbang? In the bath zones, yes: they are single-sex and entered completely naked, as in any Korean public bath. In the mixed common spaces (heat rooms, rest areas), one wears a uniform provided at the entrance.

What can you do in a jjimjilbang? Wash, alternate hot and cold baths, sweat in themed heat rooms (salt, jade, clay…), eat snacks like baked eggs, rest, play, and even spend the night there for a few euros.

What is the seshin? The seshin (때밀이) is a vigorous body scrub practiced in Korean baths: a person energetically scrubs the bather's skin with an abrasive mitt to remove dead skin, leaving the skin very soft.

Photo credits: the images used in this article come from Pexels and Unsplash and are royalty-free.