Thermae Bath Spa £45 million. Thermae Bath Spa eventually opened to the public on 7 August 2006, ending a 28-year period during which the waters remained unavailable for bathing. The spa is largely sited in a new 'Glass Cube' building by Sir Nicholas Grimshaw, near the site of the ancient Royal Bath, which has been interlinked with historic Georgian spa buildings such as the nearby Hot and Cross Baths. The building is in a strongly contemporary style in contrast to its Georgian surroundings. The complex houses both traditional and modern spa facilities. A 2014 survey indicated the spa attracted an extra 260,000 visitors
Ancient Roman bathing on Hadrian's Wall, or at Bearsden fort), they still often frequented the numerous public bathhouses in the cities and towns throughout the empire. Small bathhouses, called "balneum" (plural "balnea"), might be privately owned, while they were public in the sense that they were open to the populace for a fee. Larger baths called thermae were owned by the state and often covered several city blocks. The largest of these, the Baths of Diocletian, could hold up to 3,000 bathers. Fees for both types of baths were quite reasonable, within the budget of most free Roman males. Some of the earliest