Saunas and spas on the North Coast, New Alamein and Alexandria

Who builds on the Mediterranean coast

In the Sahel villages the brief is a sauna and cold plunge for July to September, built and commissioned in the months when the coast is empty and left with a written shutdown routine. In New Alamein the work is hotels, towers and branded apartments, where we join the main contractor's programme and keep the on-site window short because the rooms arrive factory-built. Alexandria is apartments and older villas, with tight electrical boards and air that never quite dries a closed room.

New towers and villas usually have three phase; older Alexandria flats run 220 V single phase and often need a board check before a heater is promised. Every wet room on this coast gets ducted extract on a humidistat, and fixings are stainless throughout, because salt air and a building shut for months are a poor combination for anything metal.

Indicative budget on the North Coast

Indicative, supplied and installed; fixed after a survey.

Delivery, timing and the closed season

Alexandria is the natural port for this coast, so crates travel a short road leg west to the Sahel or New Alamein. A room takes 6–10 weeks from drawing approval to commissioning, which means a sauna for next summer should be drawn by early spring. Our crew commissions it, trains a caretaker and leaves the shutdown and restart checklist. Message us the plan of the terrace or apartment for an itemised figure.

A Sahel sauna that sits idle from October to June needs that routine: heater isolated, stones checked for damp before the first firing, the plunge drained and dried, the chiller covered against salt, and the extract left on its humidistat so the room does not sour behind closed shutters. It goes into the handover notes, and a maintenance contract can cover the opening visit each spring.

North Coast (Sahel)

The Sahel is the strangest market we work in: a coastline that is full for three months and shuttered for nine. Everything about the schedule follows from that.

Build in the closed season, always

Nobody wants a contractor next door in August. We do the heavy work between October and April, which is also cheaper and faster because the roads are empty and the trades are available.

The corollary is that commissioning happens months before use, so we specify a proper shutdown and restart routine and leave it in writing — a suite that sits idle for six months needs draining, isolating and a checklist before the season opens.

Mediterranean salt and closed-up buildings

Salt-laden air plus a building locked for months is how corrosion and mould get started. A4 stainless everywhere, a drained ventilated cavity, and a ventilation strategy that works while the house is empty.

We specify a run-on extract with a humidistat rather than a timer for exactly this: it runs when the air needs it, not when somebody remembered to set it.

Second homes, remote owners

Most clients here are not present. We photograph everything, send weekly updates, and leave a handover pack and a spares list with part numbers so a caretaker can deal with the common failures without waiting for us.

New Alamein

New Alamein is being built from nothing, which means we are usually working alongside the main contractor rather than after them. That is the best moment to build a wet room and the hardest programme to hold.

Building inside a live construction site

Working as a subcontractor on a tower means our programme depends on other people's. Cabins, benches and plant are built and dry-assembled in our Istanbul factory first, which keeps our on-site window as short as possible, because that window will move.

It also means the drainage, the extract routes and the electrical capacity can be right from the beginning, which is worth more than any finish.

High-rise wet rooms

A wet room above other apartments has to be tanked to a standard that assumes failure. Full membrane, upstands, a secondary drain where the layout allows, and a leak test signed off before anything is tiled.

Plant on a tower needs a serviceable location that does not involve a crane. We plan that with the developer rather than discovering it at handover.

Mediterranean specification

Same as the Sahel: A4 stainless, drained cavities, humidistat-controlled extract. A sea-facing tower gets salt on the windward side year round.

Alexandria

Alexandria is humid in a way the rest of Egypt is not. A wet room here that does not dry out overnight will smell by the second season, and ventilation stops being a detail.

Humidity is the design problem

Mediterranean air does not dry a closed room. Every hot or wet room gets mechanical extract, ducted out, on a humidistat rather than a timer so it runs when the air needs it.

Vapour barriers must be continuous and correctly placed, warm side, with every penetration sealed. A barrier with gaps in this climate traps moisture inside the wall, which is worse than no barrier at all.

Old buildings, small services

Much of Alexandria's good housing stock is old, with limited electrical capacity and service runs that were improvised decades ago. We survey the board and the risers before promising a heater size.

Salt without the Red Sea's bite

Mediterranean salt is real but gentler than the Red Sea's. Stainless fixings and a ventilated cavity remain non-negotiable; sealed plant enclosures are usually unnecessary here, which takes cost out.