Before embarking on a Nordic spa treatment in Elk Island Park Retreat, a private camp on an acreage just a few kilometres from the national park, my friend Matt and I grab our towels from the front office inside a converted bungalow. We’re then directed to a 100-year-old rustic farmhouse across the driveway to collect a therapeutic ingredient from the owners, living inside the property’s original farmhouse.
After greeting us, Shweta Hanneman, who looks as stylish and cosmopolitan as the renovation, unzips a Ziploc bag and hands us five slivers of dark, fragrant wood.
“These are oud chips,” she says, passing us the fragrant, dark wood chips better known as the main ingredient in luxury Middle Eastern perfumes.
There’s no official connection between the chips and the Estonian-designed ÖÖD House sauna we’re about to use — aside from the poetic coincidence of the name — but they do enhance the experience. Shweta, who was raised by Indian expats in Saudi Arabia, has a firm belief that luxury can be generous but not showy. We say goodbye and head down a gravel road past the fancy glamping geodomes the retreat is best known for, until we come upon the sauna: one side clad in black Estonian wood, the other half mirrored glass reflecting the boreal forest so seamlessly that, were we coming from the other side, we might’ve walked right past it.
Inside the prep room, we towel off, read the safety and fire instructions, and open the second door — right into a wave of dry heat left by the previous guests. While Matt loads the fire, I sprinkle the chips onto the wood burning sauna stove and flip the wall-mounted hourglass. The scent rises quickly and soon I am awash in the rich, soothing fragrance, and in sweat.
Through the transparent mirrored walls, we see birds and squirrels. Every 15 minutes, we step outside for cool air and water (pro tip: bring lots). By the time the temperature climbs to 50°C, the scent has bloomed fully, the stress has melted, and I’m lying on the top bench, savouring the view. Unlike steam saunas, Nordic saunas like this rely on dry heat. They’re intense, but more breathable.
Later, Shweta and her husband Nathan invite us in. Over drinks, we talk about their hopes to add a cold plunge and the retreat’s recent evolution since Nathan and his brothers took it over from their parents and started reimagining it as a discreet but unabashedly bougie destination. Shweta’s Saudi upbringing exposed her to lifestyles of the very wealthy — servants, designer purses, Italian sports cars. But that’s not the version of luxe they want to promote. “There’s a difference between being bougie and being pretentious,” says Shweta.
The difference, she explains, is bougie is a luxury you do for yourself; pretentious is what you do for others to see.
