Steam rooms for Lagos and Abuja homes and hotels

Tanking behind the mosaic

Walls and ceiling are lined with wedi building boards — we are official wedi sellers — with every joint taped and sealed, with a liquid membrane and a screed on the floor that slopes one in fifty or steeper to the drain. A sloped or domed ceiling keeps drips off the bench. Where the room is built against existing blockwork, as it usually is in Lagos, the board system is sealed to it all round rather than stopped short.

Indigo mosaic or terrazzo is the finish; it is never the waterproofing. In Abuja, where the air is drier for much of the year, the same build-up applies — the room itself is just as wet inside, whatever the weather outside.

A fan that runs until the room is dry

On the lagoon the outside air is often close to saturation, so the room cannot dry by opening the door. A fan ducted to the open air runs on a humidistat after every session and keeps going until the room is actually dry; a timer would stop it too soon on a wet evening. A duct ending in the ceiling void simply wets the roof.

Borehole water and the power circuit

Many Lagos and Abuja houses run on borehole water, and its hardness can differ between neighbours. A sample from the tap that will feed the generator is tested first, and the result decides between a softener, an auto-flush generator or neither.

A steam generator is also a large electrical load. It goes on its own circuit on the essential side of the changeover, interlocked with any sauna heater so the two never start together on the inverter.

Prices

Hotel and club steam rooms get a larger generator with an automatic flush cycle, because the door opens every few minutes through the evening and the tank must not scale between monthly services.

Want it priced? Send the room size, a photo and whether you are on borehole or mains; we reply within one business day.

In short

• wedi boards sealed to existing blockwork, membrane under the floor
• Humidistat extract ducted outside — never into the ceiling void
• Borehole water tested before the generator is chosen
• Generator on the essential circuit, interlocked with the sauna heater