Move over, stamp collecting – there’s a new niche hobby in town. Serious collectors now scour flea markets in Helsinki and Moscow for:

• Cold War-era Soviet military sauna hats
• 19th-century Finnish “smoke sauna” variants
• Limited edition designer collaborations

The rarest piece? A 1920s St. Petersburg Art Nouveau sauna hat featuring enameled birch tree motifs, which sold at auction for $8,400 last year.

Online forums like SaunaHatLovers.com have thousands of members trading care tips and hunting for grail items. “Each hat tells a cultural story,” explains collector Dmitri Volkov. “The craftsmanship is incredible – these were made to last generations.”