Extreme Measures

When it comes to feeling great, you might want to catch a chill.

- Brooke Le Poer Trench

As a sign that our obsession with temperature extremes has reached peak hysteria, one of this year’s most talked-about hotel launches was a floating spa hotel in Swedish Lapland, just south of the Arctic Circle. Named Arctic Bath, it makes the most of its wilderness landscape by adding to it modern pine-clad cabins with Scandi interiors and all the hygge you can handle: crackling fires, sofas draped in sheepskins and views of snow-covered trees as far as the eye can see. Six cabins are set on land and six float on the Lule River, along with the doughnut-shaped spa. Guests are invited to run straight out of the wood-fuelled sauna and lower themselves into the bath, which is essentially a hole in a sheet of ice, and try to stay in for as long as they can stand. In this part of the world, the temperature in winter hovers around -13 degrees Celcius, so if that doesn’t sound relaxing to you, rest assured, along with bragging rights comes great health benefits.