Fluid Form is bringing back what bathhouses have always been: communal spaces where people gather to relax, connect, and feel good together. Rooted in Eastern European banya traditions, honoring practices across cultures.
Leah's grandfather Nahum spent almost 20 years hosting Friday night banya at his friend Lazaar's apartment building in Santa Monica. They'd converted an 8-person sauna and barely-heated pool into a makeshift Russian bathhouse.
Family and friends would show up for the same ritual: extreme heat, freezing pool, platza with eucalyptus veniks Nahum tied from stolen branches, vodka and zakuski in the apartment building rec room. This ritual kept their community together through everything.
After 15 years in tech and media, Leah realized she wanted to return to her hospitality roots and build something that honored that Friday night tradition. Together with architects and designers Benzi Rodman and Kathryn Sonnabend, she created Fluid Form to continue her grandfather's legacy and build gathering spaces for a new generation.
Bathhouse culture was never about that. You go to relax. To be warm. To talk. The health benefits happen because you're actually enjoying yourself.
In a world that spends too much time online and alone, we're bringing back what actually works: showing up, being present, sweating with strangers who become friends.