russian bath

Russian and Turkish Baths on East 10th Street is oldest Manhattan bathhouse built by Jewish immigrants in 1892.

East Village location and a long history make this place one of the busiest banyas in New York. Heat rooms consist of "Russian sauna", "Swedish" and "Turkish" steam room. Or at least that's what the owners would like them to be called in quite an unorthodox classification.

The gloomy "Russian sauna" has cold shower, bare cement walls and benches. This may be an authentic Jewish shvitz you would likely to find in Poland, but why call it Russian?
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