Hot Tub Journal

A Large Wood Fired on the deck of an off-grid island cottage in Minaki, Ontario: filled from the lake, used most summer days, and closed up for a minus 40 winter with a routine worth copying.

Eight wood fired hot tubs on the shore of St. Margaret's Bay, each drained, cleaned and refilled with Atlantic sea water pumped straight from the bay for every reservation. How a small cottage resort thirty minutes from Halifax runs the most demanding tub program we know of.

A new-build cabin on Lake Sylvan in the Brainerd Lakes, designed around a Standard Electric AlumiTub sunk into a teak deck beside a glass-walled cedar sauna. Joel Gaalswyk on building it in, hiding the equipment, and turning it over in 90 minutes between guests.

A mid-century retreat by the river, minutes from the Beaver Valley Ski Club. Why the tub sits on the deck rather than at ground level, and what that solves in an Ontario winter.

A glamping camp outside Golden, BC, where the tub sits beside a sauna and a wood fired pizza oven. Why fire-heated suits a winter property, and what a December opening weekend asks of the insulation.

Five years of guest cabins on a Rocky Mountain ranch. Leo Downey on cleaning between guests, leaving the tub empty through winter without damage, and the booklet he leaves in the house.

A wood fired AlumiTub on the Ten Mile River in the western Catskills: four years at a busy guest cabin, refilled from the river every week, with a cold plunge down the bank. Owner and photographer Jennifer MacFarlane in her own words, with her photographs.

A backcountry lodge in the BC outback built around mountain biking, fishing and moto recreation. Why a tub that needs no power suits a property at the end of a long road.

Joanne McSporran installed her tub beside the ocean on a remote island in BC, a year into a cabin build. Her siting advice, and an argument for putting the hot tub in before the house.