Turkish Baths Harrogate

Harrogate Turkish Baths is the flagship spa experience for Harrogate, offering contemporary treatments in original Victorian surroundings.  

The original Turkish Baths Harrogate was only one of a vast number of facilities available, including medicinal waters’ dispensary, hydrotherapy departments, mud baths and steam rooms.

There was a full complement of consulting doctors and popular treatments often involved water and electricity and had intriguing names like ‘Plombiere’ douche, Harrogate Hot Water and Galvanism.

The Turkish Baths enjoyed popularity throughout the 20th Century.

Today you can enjoy a more contemporary spa experience in these magnificent surroundings.

As you follow the ritual of heating, cooling and cleansing, you can move through the Hot Room Chambers including the Tepidarium (warm), the Calidarium (hot) and the Laconium (hottest), cool down in the Plunge Pool, visit the Steam Room or relax in the Frigidarium.

Treatments, refreshments, a spot of lunch are all available too so whether you are on your own, with a loved one or with friends, you will leave the Turkish Baths in Harrogate feeling relaxed, exhilarated and totally cleansed. 

In its heyday, Harrogate was known as ‘the English spa’ and a leading destination for European high society. 

Only the most flambouyant of design would be good enough for this clientele and so the Turkish Baths interiors were given a Moorish style with great Islamic arches and screens, walls of vibrant glazed brickwork, arabesque painted ceilings and terrazzo floors, laid by the very best Italian experts.

Members of every European Royal Family have visited Harrogate to take the waters.

Princess Alix Hesse and her sister, Princess Victoria of Battenburg, were regular visitors and amused themselves by racing their bath chairs through the streets of Harrogate and it was said that, on any morning during the spa’s season, it was possible to hold a cabinet meeting in the Pump Room, so many visitors visited the great treatment centre.

Only seven Turkish Baths remain which date back to the 19th century, three of which are in the UK.

None of them is as historically complete and in full working order as the Turkish Baths Harrogate.