Vabali: Are People Actually Having Sex There?
- Amanda Sandström Beijer
- 3 days ago
- 7 min read
If you've spent more than three months in Berlin, you've heard someone wax poetic about Vabali. The Balinese-themed wellness temple tucked into the Moabit wasteland, where stressed-out consultants, burned-out techno DJs, and polyamorous product managers all go to forget they have a LinkedIn profile. It's the city's worst-kept secret, a sprawling FKK (Freikörperkultur) spa where you're required to strip down, soak in saltwater pools, and learn the most German lesson imaginable: a naked body is not an invitation. It’s just… a body.
Because FKK isn’t “naked culture” like some cheeky European meme. It’s an actual German tradition of body freedom and naturalism—built on the idea that you can exist without performing, selling, or sexualizing your skin. FKK is anti-objectification in practice: you’re a human in a body, not a sexual object in a room. And that’s why Berlin can do nude spas in broad daylight without turning it into a low-budget porn set.
Vabali is wildly popular. On any given Sunday afternoon, you'll find 500+ nude bodies draped across teak loungers, sipping overpriced matcha lattes like they've discovered enlightenment. The architecture is genuinely stunning, bamboo, stone gardens, outdoor pools that steam in the winter air. It's the kind of place where you immediately feel like you've escaped Berlin's concrete nihilism, even though you're technically still within S-Bahn distance of Hauptbahnhof.
But Vabali is not a sex club. Not even close. And if you can’t hold that thought in your head while looking at a naked person, you got it: you’re the problem.
FKK 101: Nakedness Does Not Equal Sexual
FKK isn’t a “paradox.” It’s actually pretty simple, and painfully German in its clarity: nakedness does not equal sexual. The whole point is to remove the erotic charge that the tourist gaze tries to slap onto every visible nipple like it’s an emergency.
In an FKK space, you’re surrounded by hundreds of naked strangers, but the expectation is that you’ll behave like a normal person in a public place—because that’s what it is. No staring. No prowling. No performing “I’m sooo liberated” while acting like everyone’s body is public content for your brain. The vibe is respectful naturalism: bodies existing without being turned into currency.
According to Vabali's official operational guidelines, guests must "reduce tenderness to a minimum" throughout the spa. In bathing facilities, saunas, pools, relaxation rooms, physical displays of affection are completely prohibited. Even waterbeds and loungers can't be shared between guests. The spa literally enforces a one-person-per-horizontal-surface rule.
In normal-human terms: a quick, non-performative hand-hold might slide (depending on staff and setting), but anything that reads as intimate or sexual is a hard red line. This isn’t a courtroom “ban” situation; it’s etiquette that protects the tranquil environment and the sensitivities of other guests—aka the people who came here to sweat in peace, not witness someone’s foreplay audition.
Can you have sex at Vabali spa?
Absolutely not. The rules aren’t “anti-fun,” they’re anti-sexualization: once you drag sexual energy into a neutrally nude space, you’re not being liberated—you’re being invasive. Expect to be told to stop or be escorted out, sometimes publicly.
What are the rules for FKK spas in Berlin?
FKK (Freikörperkultur) spas require full nudity in bathing areas but maintain strict boundaries: no sexual contact, minimal physical affection between partners, and respectful behavior at all times. These are wellness spaces, not swingers clubs.
The cognitive dissonance is dizzying. You're nude. Everyone else is nude. You're sitting in a 90°C Finnish sauna with strangers' sweat dripping onto the same bench. But if your partner rests their hand on your thigh for more than three seconds? You've just committed a cardinal sin.
The Story: When the Rules Come for You
I was there on a Tuesday evening in November, off-peak, cold as hell outside, which meant the outdoor pools were thick with steam and the saunas were packed. I'd planted myself in the Meditation Sauna, the big one on the upper floor, outdoors.
The air was dense, eucalyptus oil, cedarwood, and that unmistakable sauna smell that's half purification, half human marination. I was zoned out, half-meditating, half-fantasizing about the laksa I'd eat afterward, when I noticed them.
A couple. Mid-thirties, attractive in that "we definitely have a Feeld profile" way. They were sitting close, too close for Vabali standards, and at first, it was just a hand on a knee. Innocent enough. Then the hand moved. Higher. Their heads tilted toward each other. She giggled. He whispered something. His fingers traced her inner thigh.
The room temperature didn't change, but the energy did. You could feel it, the collective tension of 20 people pretending not to notice while absolutely noticing. I left. Heard moaning coming from the sauna from the litium pool where I was sitting to wait them out.
Then, like a German efficiency algorithm made flesh, a staff member appeared. Brought them out and escorted them away. Hausverbot. This walk of shame was the worse, yet most pleasurable one I've seen. Just a strict, icy voice cutting through the eucalyptus haze:
"You need to leave. Now. I'll escort you out."
The couple froze. The woman's face went from flushed to pale in half a second. The man tried to stammer something: an apology, an excuse: but the staff member wasn't interested. She gestured toward the exit with the kind of authority that suggested she'd done this 400 times before and would do it 400 times again.
What happened next was pure bathing robe public shaming excellence. The couple had to stand up, grab their towels, and walk out of the sauna while every single person watched in silence. No one said a word. But everyone knew.
They were escorted through the main bathing area: past the saltwater pool, past the relaxation lounges: still dripping wet, still visibly humiliated, and directly to the locker rooms. I heard later from a friend who works there that they were banned. Not for a month. Not for a year. For life.
And here’s the part newcomers always get wrong: the problem wasn’t the nudity. The problem was the sexualizer—the person who walks into an FKK space and treats it like a sex space because they can’t imagine bodies outside of sex. It’s a clash of cultures: the entitled “I paid for this so I can do whatever” vibe versus the respectful naturalist who understands the social contract.
Vabali didn’t escort them out for being naked. Everyone was naked. They were escorted out because they crossed Vabali’s actual etiquette line—“physical expressions of affection must be limited to a minimum”—and slid straight into intimate/sexual territory. That’s the moment a tranquil environment becomes a stage, and everyone else becomes an unwilling audience.
All because they couldn’t handle the concept that naked doesn’t mean available, and nude doesn’t mean sexual.
Vabali isn't pretending to be a sex club. It's not KitKat. It's not Lab.oratory. It's an FKK spa, and the entire experience hinges on everyone understanding what that means. The moment someone breaks the rules, the illusion collapses. The safety disappears. And that person gets escorted out in front of 500 witnesses.
Vabali Etiquette 101
Look, I get it. You're naked. Your partner's naked. The setting is objectively romantic. The temptation is real. But if you want to avoid becoming Berlin's most embarrassing Vabali expulsion story, here's what you need to know:
1. Keep Your Hands to Yourself Seriously. No thigh-touching. No shoulder massages. No "innocent" cuddling on the loungers. If it looks like affection, it's off-limits.
2. Don't Share Furniture The one-person-per-lounger rule exists for hygiene and boundary reasons. Your romantic waterbed fantasy ends the moment staff sees two bodies on one surface.
3. Go for the Aufguss, Stay for the Restraint The sauna ceremonies (Aufguss) are genuinely incredible: theatrical, immersive, and borderline spiritual. Enjoy them. Let yourself get lost in the ritual. Just don't let your hands wander in the haze.
4. Understand the Gaze There's a difference between appreciating the human form and leering. FKK culture operates on mutual respect. Treat it like accidental eye contact on the U-Bahn: acknowledge, then move on.
5. Save the Kink for Actual Kink Spaces If you want to explore exhibitionism, voyeurism, or public play, Berlin has dozens of spaces designed for exactly that. Vabali is not one of them. Respect the context.
What happens if you break the rules at Vabali?
You'll be asked to leave immediately, often publicly, and may face a lifetime ban from the facility. Staff enforce rules swiftly to maintain the spa's atmosphere and protect other guests.
FKK is not “public foreplay,” it’s public neutrality. The etiquette around affection being kept to a minimum is the bouncer at the door of your lizard brain, telling it to stop narrating every naked body like it’s an audition.
Is FKK sexual in Germany?
No. FKK is rooted in body freedom and naturalism, with strong social expectations of respect, non-sexual behavior, and boundaries—especially in saunas and spa settings.
Why does Vabali limit affection even between couples?
It’s the clearest line between “nude wellness” and “sex space.” A little neutral contact might be tolerated, but once it tips into intimate/sexual territory, the entire room gets sexualized by default—and then the people who just wanted to exist in their bodies (the actual point) lose the space.
You're not going to Vabali to get off. You're going to practice something Berlin is weirdly good at: being unbothered by bodies. And if you can’t do that—if you’re stuck in the tourist gaze where nude automatically means sexual—then it may be time to leave the city.
So go. Strip down. Soak in the saltwater. Let the eucalyptus oil burn your sinuses. Enjoy the calm, the quiet, the radical normality of nakedness. Just keep your hands to yourself, because the people trying to force sexual energy onto Vabali are the ones ruining the vibe—and they should get escorted out.