http://www.spa-london.org/ironmonger-row-baths/
LONDON Hot Rooms derive from a system dating back to Roman times, these hot rooms include the Tepidarium “warm room” –Caldarium “hot room” – Laconium “hottest room”. After the fall of the Roman Empire the Turkic people moved into what is now Turkey and the Roman baths endured through the Byzantium era and into the era of the Ottoman empire. The Turks called the Roman baths, Hamam, which is the Arabic translation of Bath.
The Romans were very hygienic people, believing that massages, bathing and exercise were all necessary for the maintenance of good health. A Roman Bath, much like spa LONDON day spas, had all these things available. Many of the spa LONDON day spas are situated within leisure centres with swimming pools and gymnasium just like in a Roman bath. The Romans made use of an outdoor gymnasium called a palaestra, where they would play sports and lift weights. The bathing rituals and use of hot rooms which followed the exercise, were not only hygienically beneficial, they also soothed the muscles after the strenuous exertion. Roman men would oil their bodies and remove the oil in a shower and with a scraper so as to clean their skin. This process is similar to the one used in the Elemis Exotic Lime and Ginger Salt Glow in which warm oils are dripped over the body before the exotic Lime and Ginger Salt Glow is applied.
After exercising and enjoying massage and body oil treatment, the Romans recommend the use of the three hot rooms and so do spa LONDON.
Tepidarium
The first room was heated with warm air of an agreeable temperature, in order to prepare the body for the increased heat of the vapour and warm baths.
The tepidarium was usually the most highly ornamented room in Roman baths. It was a room to sit in and be anointed in. In the Roman baths at Pompeii the floor is mosaic, the arched ceiling adorned with stucco and painting on a coloured ground and the walls are red.
While spa LONDON makes use of specially trained massage therapists, anointing in Roman baths was performed by slaves called unctores and aliptae. It sometimes took place before going to the hot bath, and sometimes after the cold bath, before putting on the clothes, in order to check the perspiration.
Caldarium
The tepidarium is connected to the warmer caldarium At one end was a round basin called a labrum, which contained cold water for cooling the body as the bather exits. At the other was a quadrangular bathingplace (puelos, alveus, solium, calida piscina). These basins were often made of marble but sometimes of precious metal like silver.
Laconicum
The Laconium is the hottest of the three rooms. Older Roman Baths do not have a laconicum, instead they offered a sweating-room, without a bath.
having completed the cycle of the three hot rooms, we recommend that you wash away the sweat and close your skin’s pores in a cold shower, a dip into the plunge pool or by making use of the ice flakes we provide in the ice fountain. The refreshing sensation of the Roman bath experience is the reason why one Roman emperor, when asked by a foreigner why he used the baths daily, responded, “because I do not have the time to bathe twice a day.”
