Schvitz Health Club

01/15/2026

Discover The Schvitz, Detroit's historic bathhouse since 1930. Revived by funeral director Paddy Lynch, this North End landmark offers saunas, steam baths, cold plunges, and communal wellness in a storied space once tied to Jewish immigrants and the Purple Gang. Unwind in an inclusive urban oasis.

01/11/2026

We're happy to announce that after months of renovation and restoration, "Schvitz House" is finally ready for occupancy.

THE DETAILS...
Completely updated 3 bedroom, 1.5 bath home located directly behind the club on Melbourne (you can quite literally walk over in your robe). Offering a One Year Lease for up to 3 housemates. $2,400/month. Schvitz covers water. Residents pay DTE. The 🍒 on top: lease includes unlimited schvitzing for all residents. Could be the greatest amenity in the history of north end housing.

Message us to book a tour. Happy 2026 from the finest bathhouse in the Midwest.

01/02/2026

As we say goodbye to 2025, we wanted to share with you a recap of what we accomplished, thank our Patreon patrons who made it possible, and give you a preview for some of the changes coming this year.

First, Helmut and I would like to wish you all a happy new year and pass along our hopes that 2026 treats you and yours well. I won't lie: 2025 was challenging, and fighting stage 4 cancer while having had to return to work in order to keep my insurance meant that I have had less time and energy to devote to the site, but that said, we still accomplished a lot in 2025.

We added 3,898 photos to the website in 2025, and there are now 16,427 on the site. Many of these are images taken by our very own Helmut Ziewers, but we also added hundreds of historic shots, including many of Belle Isle from the collection of Vance Patrick. There will be thousands more undoubtedly added in 2026.

We also added 66 buildings to HistoricDetroit.org, bringing to 1,019 the number of entries on offer. However, that many buildings has made finding what you might be looking for more difficult, so we are working to add search filters to the main building page to narrow down what you're looking for.

We ended the year by taking an in-depth look at the history of one of Detroit's most important civil rights locations, the Ossian Sweet House. It's an admittedly heavy read for holiday time, but an important one. You can find a link in the comments to that entry.

We had an issue with the maps on some of the building pages that were either missing or showing inaccurate locations. We fixed those. We also had an issue with the vintage postcard images, and had to retag all 3,500 of them.

One of the side projects I've wanted to add to the site was a list of the origins of Detroit street names. Though not a priority, I'm hoping to get this at least started this year.

We also will be welcoming HistoricDetroit's first interns, Corey Fein from Michigan State University and Alexander Grauman from Wayne State University. They will both be working to expand the offerings on the site and to provide you with even more content this year.

We'll also continue to add content to our free Substack, which you can subscribe to at historicdetroit.substack.com.

The Shop is gone. We had been using Ecwid, which allowed us to list a few items for no listing fees. Ecwid removed that option, and as a money-losing, not-for-profit enterprise - and based on how few sales the shop generated - we decided to remove it. We will explore new ways to make historic postcards, vintage Michigan Central Station tickets and AnimateDetroit plushies available in the future.

Stay tuned for more updates in the months ahead!

01/02/2026

"Harmless Insanity"

12/30/2025

“There’s this unspoken rule,” Paddy says. “You don’t have to like each other, but you have to love each other.” Conservative old-timers steam alongside younger creatives. Wealthy suburbanites sit next to blue-collar regulars. Veterans, artists, immigrants, recovering addicts, chefs, athletes all sweating shoulder to shoulder. And as Paddy points out, “they might not otherwise hang out if it weren’t for this place.”

When Paddy Lynch first walked into the Schvitz with a friend, more than a decade before he ever dreamed of owning it, the place was… well, rough. Dingy carpets. Drop ceilings holding decades of smoke. A stench that hovered somewhere between chlorine and ci******es.

12/29/2025

we’re so back / everything cleaned and ready for you / mondays are for everybody / schvitz chess 6-10 / tuesday women only 12-10 as always / wednesday thursday special hours 12-8 for everybody

12/28/2025

we are closed for the evening of sunday the 28th due to flooding / planning to be back monday at noon

12/24/2025

We are open every day.

12/20/2025

perfect solutions to two holiday stresses: come get a steam and leave with gifts everyone left on your list. too late to ship swag before the holiday, but we’ll get it out as fast as we can. better to stop in, get a little heat, maybe have a steak. but also we won’t hold it against you just hit the pro shop and bounce.

e-gift cards are available online for instant delivery.

we’re open every day, and the guys don’t mind if the gals pop in to shop on men’s days, but men should avoid walking in on women’s day, just can pull up out front and call 313-SCHVITZ and a host will help you out.

12/15/2025

while we’re a little too old school for the “sweatpants everywhere” look, when you’ve got to get up early for treats we think a crisp new set of loungewear is a good move. the latest merch drop is in the club and online while supplies last. and do make sure to get to early and often, it’s the cutest place with the nicest people and the absolute best baked goods in town.

and maybe we should do a collab with seen here, maybe forest wants to put a cute cardamom bun design on there??

thank you to for always taking great care of us and putting us on to the good stuff from .

also thank you to for the impromptu alley photoshoot.

12/12/2025

12/09/2025

schvitz, kvetch, nosh, kibitz, schmooze, you know all the things one does with assorted mensches, draycups, mavens, and schmucks, for 95 years or so, here every day for this