The following images were captured by myself during a visit to South Wales based men only sauna. I was allowed entry while they were closed, as while they wanted to support my project, they also wanted to protect their customers, which of course was not a problem to me at all. In fact in meant that I was able to explore the space fully without getting in anyone's way. As you will see from the images below, there is a clear masculine style, involving industrial and military themes. Uses of basic building material and metals were abundant throughout the space. The architecture was closed and maze like, with lots of hiding places, cubby-holes and closets. lighting is minimal, though strong and coloured where present, making it difficult to see but also incredibly atmospheric.
These rooms such as the one pictured above, lined a small corridor, and each one contained a bench, a bin and a television screen that ran pornagraphic movies on a loop. The doors to these rooms could be locked from the inside (though they were safety lock so they could be opened from the other side in an emergency). Many of these rooms had small holes between them, carved into the wood and padded.
The walls are bare, mostly painted grey or black with no decoration or ornamentation save for the coloured spot lights illuminated them blue red or green. It makes the space feel as if it is made purely of simple geometric shapes.
Some of the spaces reminded me of photographic darkrooms I have worked in,
along these stairs and many of the corridors were dispensers of condoms and leaflets on safe sex. These were all regularly refiled.
A st Andrews cross, used for BDSM.
The space was incredible to explore and photograph with no one there. This playground of sex became a playground of photography for me, with its saturated colours, deep contrasts and almost non-euclidean architecture. In some of the images it is difficult to distinguish if what I have taken is even a true three dimensional space or just a series of colours and gradients. The space is so enigmatically designed that it almost folds in on itself. it very much lives up to the term uncanny, even if that is in as much as they are both somewhat undefinable.
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