The Shorewood Custom Cedar Sauna

A dated home gym and bathroom in Shorewood, Minnesota had run their course. Rather than a simple refresh, FORMA took the space down to the studs and rebuilt it into something the homeowners will actually use every day: a genuine, spa-caliber sauna, designed and built entirely in-house from demolition through final finish.

The interior is fully wrapped in custom milled cedar, chosen and cut specifically for this space rather than pulled from a standard kit, giving the room a warmth and craftsmanship that off-the-shelf sauna packages simply can’t match. Heat comes from a premium HUUM sauna heater, prized by sauna purists for its clean, even heat and near-silent operation, paired with custom lighting designed to keep the space feeling calm and intentional rather than clinical.

Every element, from the cedar detailing to the heater selection to the lighting plan, was chosen to work together as a single, cohesive wellness space rather than a collection of separate upgrades. It’s a clear example of what’s possible when demolition, design, and installation are handled by one team under one contract: a full gut renovation that reads as a finished, professionally designed retreat, not a DIY sauna kit bolted into a leftover room.

This project is a good look at what FORMA’s sauna and wellness work actually involves: real construction expertise applied to a space most homeowners assume has to be a prefab add-on, turned instead into a custom-built part of the home. It’s the kind of project we’re regularly asked to bring to homes in Shorewood and the surrounding lake communities of Excelsior and Deephaven.