Its creators took some heat. Then, the plunge.

Floating quietly in Richardson Bay, Fjord reimagines the Scandinavian sauna. The minimalist retreat — two aspen-lined steam rooms perched on a concrete barge — offers warmth and calm against Sausalito’s cold tides. Launched last August, it has become a ritual: heat, plunge, repeat.

The project almost never left shore. Founders Alex Yenni and Gabriel Turner spent months negotiating with eight regulatory agencies before their vision could float. To give it form, they enlisted San Francisco architect Nick Polansky, who drew on the language of harbors and hulls to design something that felt native to the water. 

“The dock was built in 1982 in an industrial zone, and they were hoping to reinvigorate the harbor with recreation,” Polansky says. His task: make a public-use sauna that fit its surroundings. “I used military camouflage tactics,” he adds, referencing the dazzle-painted ships once meant to blur into sea and light.

On the pontoon — first built for the 2013 America’s Cup — Polansky overlaid a redwood deck and upcycled old beams as benches. Two modified 8-by-10-foot shipping containers, hold 12-kilowatt heaters and bleacher seating for six. Each has a window wall facing the bay. 

A slatted pergola filters sunlight into a geometric pattern across the deck. A curved fence of redwood and cedar screens three sides, while the open edge invites swimmers down for a plunge, a rinse beneath the outdoor shower, or a climb to the roof deck for sunning. Over time, the materials will age, blending into the bay’s palette of grays.

“This is a new scope of work for me,” Polansky says. Still, the project connects to his long-term focus on waterfronts. “With sea level rise, we need to rethink harbors. That was the thesis of my graduate work at MIT.”

He looks back at the floating deck. “The water,” he says, “is more than a parking lot for boats.”

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