NOOTKA HOUSE SAUNA

Art Tahsis, Tahsis, BC
A Seaside Sauna

Tahsis Sauna - Photo by Mike Harvey, Winter 2021

JUNE 2020

The early Covid-19 era provided a pause in my work life, allowing for time and space to accept the unknown.

I was invited to a place, at the outer reaches of Vancouver Island West, called the Tahsis Farm.
For the first 3 months of Covid-Era, I designed and built a sauna, with local help, at the end of a winding, steep path, hidden in the trees at the water’s edge.

If you wanted to listen to whales blowing their plumes, while smelling rich cedar, yellow and red.

If you wanted to wipe the remnants of ash and charcoal from your steaming hands.

If you ever wanted to jump off a gangway into the deep dark blue, and not think twice because of the heat.

This was where.

Finished Sauna | JUly 2020

We employed the shou sugi ban method of charring the 2.5” thick yellow cedar siding, intending to protect the longevity of the structure.
As any structure that is off grid, entirely remote, and built without power, we did what we could with what we had. The structure is a combined effort of sparse vertical members framing the stacked structural siding.

Wood used:
Yellow Cedar
Red Cedar
Hemlock
Re-purposed interior siding

The Drawings

After several in-depth iterations, arrived at a modest layout, tucked between rocks and trees.

The Cedar Door

The Red Cedar door was milled on-site from wood received from the local log dump.

location

Tahsis is at the end of a road, a dirt road, and the Tahsis farm is even further. Positioned on the west side of the Tahsis Inlet, the farm was meant to be an Artist Residency, Farm Garden, and Creative Hub. It resides on the unceded territory of the Mowachaht-Muchalaht First Nations, and abuts the fascinating Ceepeecee inlet and lands.

Gratitude

Many thanks to the land, and the peoples come long before.
Thanks to the invite from the folks at Tahsis Farm.
Thanks for the time and space to begin a life-long obsession with Saunas.