Visitors At This Bitcoin-Heated Spa Are Complaining About Mold and UTIs

On both sides of the East River, well-heeled New Yorkers have for a few years been shelling out for the tranquility promised by Bathhouse, a high-concept spa company that boasts thermal pools heated by Bitcoin mining.

As Curbed reports, however, visitors and former employees at both of the spa's two locations claim to have experienced everything from mold and vermin on pipes and floors to unidentifiable "black particles" in pools and post-bath urinary tract infections.

The latest fracas regarding the "evil crypto baths," as local outlet Hell Gate called Bathhouse last year, began earlier this month when a Reddit user claimed that they got a UTI after going into two "kinda dirty and gross"-looking tubs at the company's location in Brooklyn's Williamsburg neighborhood.

"I thought it would be fine," the user wrote, "but then I ended up with a UTI."

Days prior, the poster claimed, another friend went to Bathhouse's other location in Manhattan and "also ended up with a UTI." In response, another, since-deleted user claimed that they too had gotten the same infection within 48 hours of their last time at the Williamsburg location — which, it bears noting, has been the subject of 17 calls to New York City's Department of Health and Mental Hygiene since 2022.

"I'm sure that it came from [B]athhouse," the responder wrote. "The water just felt ick to me, especially that lukewarm pool. Maybe they aren't using enough chlorine or something?"

After that, the Bathhouse floodgates opened in kind. From complaints about hair floating in pools and fellow visitors' "horrible" hygiene — exacerbated, no doubt, by many of them not showering — to a secondhand claim about a friend who got ringworm after going to the Williamsburg spa, it seemed that the only thing dirtier than Bathhouse was the rumor mill surrounding it.

As these things tend to go, the gossip made its way to TikTok, where Justine Smith, a woman who claims to be a former "body scrubber" at the Williamsburg location, had mold problems — and had photos to back up her accusations. In an interview with Curbed, Smith said that the issue was so bad, she and her coworkers would try to cover the smell with essential oils. It didn't always work, the woman said, and sometimes she'd catch customers making sour faces "because there's a stench in the room."

Another former employee, whose name was not shared, showed Curbed videos of wormy-looking insects crawling around the brick walls and floor tiles. Those videos, the employee claimed, were shot in one of the rooms that houses the spa's steam baths.

NYC's health department told Curbed that it's investigating the recent claims — six of those 311 calls were, notably, made in the last week — and has, per records the website viewed, sent Bathhouse a letter about a mold complaint.

As for Bathhouse itself, it says these many allegations of grossness at its facilities are little more than gossip.

"The health and safety of our customers is our number one priority and always has been," the company told Curbed in a statement. "These rumors are blatant and defamatory lies which seem intended to harm our business."

More on infections: Parents Followed RFK Jr’s Crackpot Advice and Had to Send Their Kids to the Hospital With Yellowed Skin

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