Moroccan hammam scrubbing eased my body image shyness

She scrubbed so vigorously, I swear I lost 10 pounds of flaky skin. From my entire body – not just arms and legs. If you’re troubled by body image doubts, go to a public Moroccan hammam. That adventure eased my shyness about exposing wrinkles, stretch marks and fleshy rolls before other women.

Hammams – especially the public baths that most Moroccans use (rather than the private spas aimed at tourists and the wealthy) – offer a key cultural experience. So of course I wanted to go, to see what that black soap and Kessa mitt scrub was all about.

But could I feel comfortable with near nudity?

Both my daughters, who grew up in marginally more enlightened body-image times than the 1970s, and my loving husband have told me I have body image issues. And I know they’re right. But it’s difficult to get past engrained thought patterns that slim and smooth are desirable while wrinkly rolls are not.

My hammam experience instructed those evil voices in my head: “Shush. Calm down.”

About Moroccan hammams

Public, neighbourhood hammams are often obscured down small alleys.

Since I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, and didn’t want to violate hammam etiquette, I did a lot of reading before our April trip to Morocco (which included camel riding!).

I discovered that hammams have been around in the Islamic world since the 7^th century. Like Roman baths before them, they are places not only for cleansing, but also for religious purification, social bonding, gossip, and making connections. The hammams’ extensive furnace systems send hot water through pipes under the floors to create a warm, steamy, enveloping feel.

Many villages and every city and town have hammams. Moroccans go usually once a week, especially on Fridays to purify themselves before attending the mosque. Hammams will have either separate areas for men and women, or separate times when men and women can visit. 

Morocco has two types of hammam:

• Spa: Tourists are encouraged to try the hammam experience for the first time at an upscale luxury spa hammam, usually found in fancy hotels and riads. Spa hammams offer privacy, all the supplies needed, and someone to guide you through the experience. They are, of course, more expensive.
• Public: The traditional neighbourhood public hammam is the basic, no-frills version that most Moroccans experience every week (although they do also go to spa hammams). These public hammams are communal, with big open rooms and no privacy whatsoever. You must bring all your own supplies. These hammams can be tricky to find, since they often have a simple door with no sign. Our walking tour guide in Marrakech pointed out a few. Mostly, you look for piles of firewood near doors marked “Hommes” and “Femmes” (“Men” and “Women” in French).

I wanted to dive right into the local experience, so I opted for a public hammam that’s the oldest in Marrakech – the Mouassine Hammam.

Mouassine Hammam

The main entrance to the Mouassine Hammam is tucked into a corner of the medina, guarded by countless motor scooters that zip along the narrow lanes.

The day before my hammam adventure, we stumbled upon the Mouassine Hammam while wandering in the medina. This is the oldest, and one of the largest, hammams in Marrakech, built under the orders of Sultan Abdallah al Ghalib in 1562, during the Saadian dynasty. It’s part of a larger complex that includes a mosque, library, madrasa (religious school) and fountain.

“Offering an affordable, no-frills experience, the hammam provides visitors with an opportunity to step back in time and immerse themselves in the local tradition,” the website promised. “This traditional bathhouse is an ideal choice for those seeking an unpretentious and genuine Moroccan spa experience.”

My online research had outlined a long list of stuff you’re supposed to take with you, most of which could be purchased at hammams or in a souk (market):

• Savon beldi: traditional black soap made from olive oil and laurel
• Kessa mitt: a rough exfoliating mitt with no thumb 
• Clay paste: called ghassoul or rhassoul
• Water bucket: for rinsing off
• Plastic mat: to sit on the hot floor
• Flip-flops
• Towel
• Change of underwear

I had sandals, a small quick-dry travel towel, and a change of underwear. The rest I lacked.

This man left the hammam carrying his hammam tools and soaps in a basket. Was I supposed to have the same? At first, I wasn’t sure. But that’s part of the adventure of a neighbourhood hammam – as a tourist, you don’t have someone to hold your hand.

At the entrance, I examined the menu of treatment options and was relieved to see that the Formula Beldi included all the items I didn’t have. This package included entry, soaping with the black savon beldi, relaxation of 10 to 15 minutes in the hot room, scrub, wrap with natural rhassoul (for a purifying effect), more relaxation in the hot room, and a glass of Moroccan mint tea at the end. All for 170 dirham (about 17€ or $27 Cdn).

It wasn’t quite the inexpensive 4€ to 5€ I’d been led to expect, but I figured you’d need to bring all your own tools and soaps, and scrub yourself, for those prices. It also wasn’t the 35€ to 50€ minimum that the spa hammams charged. I felt 17€ was a good compromise.

(A week later, when we were in Fes, I stopped at the Hammam Mernissi in the medina. The reception guy said appointments are mandatory and showed me the price lists. They started at more than double what I’d paid at Hammam Mouassine. As I perused the pages, he casually slipped a paper over the prices for locals, so I wouldn’t see them. I looked him straight in the eye, although I didn’t verbalize what I’d seen. I didn’t appreciate the subterfuge. I did not make a reservation.)  

An adventure to find the women’s entrance

In the furnace room, note the tall ceramic pots (called tangias) covered in foil and a teapot nestled into the hot ashes (above and below). Why waste a good fire? That’s dinner cooking for quite a few people! Wood is piled in several places to fuel the fires that heat the hammam.

The next day, we found our way back to the Mouassine Hammam (which, if you’ve ever been in a Moroccan medina, you will realize is an accomplishment itself!). Bill was not interested in being exfoliated, so I handed him all my valuables, minus the cash I needed for entrance and a tip, and he went off in search of the Secret Garden.

A note about photos: none are allowed inside, to ensure privacy, so I can’t share inside views. I took some of these photos before handing my phone to Bill; others, we took afterwards.

No one stood at the entrance, and I was unsure where to go. I ventured down a long hallway.

“Où est le hammam pour les femmes?” I asked a man who looked like he worked there.

“À gauche, pour les hommes,” he said, pointing to the men’s hammam on the left. “Les femmes,” and he pointed down the long hallway straight ahead. The narrow corridor was lined with piles of split firewood, the first of many wood piles, I discovered as I turned sideways to inch past.

“Salam alakum,” I greeted the furnace man, an older gent sitting on a stool eating bread, just outside the furnace room. He nodded in return. 

At the end of that hallway, I exited into a derb (like an alley only smaller). It felt like I’d left the hammam, and that’s because I had. I retraced my steps to the furnace man, and he said, via sign language, to turn left into that derb.

Just finding the women’s entrance had become an adventure! I followed his instructions and finally found it, quite some distance from the men’s. Pretty blue and white zellij (traditional tiles), pierced metal wall sconces and hanging lights, and intricate sculpted plasterwork surrounded the arched doorway.

The lovely women’s entrance to Mouassine Hammam is in a derb (smaller than an alley), quite a distance from the men’s.  

I entered a room with several small cubicle doors that I initially thought were the change rooms, but they turned out to be the massage rooms. (You can pay extra for a massage.) After another turn, I found the entrance desk, in a room lined with cushioned benches where several older women sat. One peeled carrots and another sliced them into a pot. Odd.

The desk was efficiently run by a young woman who immediately sensed I spoke no Arabic and my French was tortured. She responded in English.

“You’ll have to tell me what to do,” I cautioned. “This is my first time.”

She smiled. She knew.

Entrance Clerk assembled a basket for me, with a pair of flipflops, a towel, a new wrapped Kessa mitt, and a token to give to my attendant. Pointing to an open alcove at the other end of the room, she told me to put all my clothes in the basket and store the basket in a nearby locker.

The only other customer was a tall, fit young woman who appeared from the alcove wearing a towel, so I followed suit. Shyly turning my back to entrance desk, I removed all my clothes, dithering about underwear. On or off? I left them on, wrapped the towel around myself, then deposited my basket in the locker. No key; I was glad I’d given my valuables to Bill, although the place did not appear to be teeming with robbers.

One of the carrot ladies, who turned out to be my Scrubber Lady, beckoned me through a doorway into an enormous steam room that could have held 50 people. She pointed to wall hook and a mat, on the far side of the fit young woman who was now starkers naked, lying on her mat with her own scrubber lady working on an arm.

I passed by Starkers (a natural blonde), hung my towel on the hook, and sat on my thin rubbery mat. I drew my knees up, wrapped my arms around my knees to cover my toplessness, and contemplated my surroundings.

I wished I had my journal and pen to take notes. Here’s what I recall. A series of pointed domes, almost Gothic-like, made up the high ceiling. Every surface was covered in light grey tiles, with a blueish border at shoulder height. Natural light filtered in through tiny windows up high, resulting in a calm, dim atmosphere. Dripping water echoed.

The room was pleasantly warm – not hot, no billowing steam, just the perfect temperature for when you’re nearly naked. My pores were (I assume) opening and my muscles relaxing for my upcoming scrub.

Starkers and I remained the only customers. I stole sideways glances at her to watch the process. I thought she had tattoos up her legs until I realized that was the black beldi soap.

My Scrubber Lady changed into short black yoga leggings and a tight black top, then filled buckets at a tap in the corner. Grabbing a short-legged stool, she came to sit beside me. She took my token, unwrapped my Kessa mitt, and motioned for me to lie on my stomach.

“Excellent,” I thought as I assumed the position that hid my frontal nudity. I would have been a goddess in the time of Rubens, who painted curvaceous, lumpy female bodies that defined beauty.

Let the scrubbing begin!

The entrance hall of the Mouassine Hammam held a glass case displaying products for sale: tan, blue and black Kessa scrubbing mitts at the back, plus bars and jars of soaps, some with argan oil. 

I had thought the black beldi soap came first but instead she rinsed me with warm water, rubbed a light oil (argan oil?) all over my back, and the scrubbing began.  

That Kessa scrubbing mitt was rough! Like sandpaper. But not too rough. Her pressure was just right. I felt the dead skin and impurities rolling off me. 

As Scrubber Lady worked her way from my shoulders downwards, I considered my history of body image issues. After giving birth to three babies, I was used to utter strangers examining my lower privates. However, no one – no doctor, nurse, masseuse, or physio therapist – ever acknowledged my stretch marks until I had a hot oil massage in Chaing Mai, Thailand.

After my tiny Thai masseuse massaged warm oil into my back, arms and legs, she had me roll over for the top side. That’s when she got a good look at the stretch marks on my lower abdomen.

Her eyes widened.

She nudged her fellow masseuse, who was massaging my daughter on the mat right next to me, said something in Thai and pointed to my stretch marks. Fellow masseuse leaned over for a closer look. After a bit of back and forth in Thai, my masseuse said to me in English, “Baby?”

“Yes. Three big babies,” I replied, holding up three fingers.

“Ahhhh,” they both said, with understanding in their voices, but I still felt freakish. Surely I wasn’t the first stretch-marked woman to have a massage?!

We often saw ladies sitting together on benches chatting in the late afternoon, much like they would chat in a hammam.

Scrubber Lady reached my butt. She yanked my underwear into thong position and continued her thorough scrubbing right down to the callouses on my feet.

Then, she motioned for me to roll over onto my back. Everything exposed! But nothing fazed my Scrubber Lady. She proceeded to rub a light oil all over my front and continued scrubbing.

To get at my armpits, she gently grasped each breast and moved them aside. Surprisingly, I did not feel uncomfortable at all – it felt much like the professionalism that goes with a doctor’s breast exam. Scrubber Lady has seen ‘em all, from pert to pendulous. She scrubbed gently around, but not right to the tip.  

At my lower abdomen, she did not raise an eyebrow at my spaghetti bowl of stretch marks, as my Thai masseuse had. All she did was thrust my underwear into frontal thong style so she could scrub my hips and on down my legs.

Then I sat up so she could do both sides of each arm. To brace herself, she placed my hand against her breast and scrubbed up and down each arm. Well, fair’s fair, I thought.

I had read that I would be “absolutely astonished—and perhaps a little horrified—to see literal rolls of dead skin, like grey noodles, coming off your body. Don’t be alarmed; this is completely normal!”

I hadn’t really believed it would be that bad – grey noodles? – but that’s exactly what happened!

“C’est incroyable!” I said to Scrubber Lady, pointing at the curls of my former skin that the steam and soap and scrubbing had dislodged. I don’t know if she understood French or not, but she smiled.

Truly, the rolls of dead skin are the most astonishing part of the hammam experience. I was surprised I had any skin left.

Scrubber Lady took small buckets of water from her larger bucket and rinsed me head to toe. Quite thoroughly. My curls of dead skin swirled down the drain.

With Starkers as the only other woman there, I didn’t experience that group dynamic or bonding I’d read about, when women sit around chatting and scrubbing each other’s backs. Although Moroccan women dress conservatively in public, with many covered head to toe, they leave all that fabric behind in hammams. I´m sure I would have blended in well.

Mint tea – served just about everywhere you go in Morocco – was served to me at the end of my hammam experience. (This photo was the tea served at our riad when we checked in.)

Then came the savon beldi, the traditional Moroccan black soap, which she spread all over me. It doesn’t foam up but is more gel-like.

She held my hand as I stood (which was good, since I do tend to get light-headed) and put on flip-flops. Then she showed me into the next room to another mat. I had expected the next room to be hotter, but it was about the same warm, enveloping temperature. I laid there for 10 to 15 minutes, hoping the black soap would indeed offer the physical and spiritual purification as advertised.

I may have dozed, because I started when I heard “Madame! Madame!”

Scrubber Lady called me back to my first mat where she rinsed off the savon beldi with buckets of warm water. (Starkers was long gone so I couldn’t bond with her.)

Applying some sort of shampoo to my head, Scrubber Lady washed my hair, which felt wonderful. There may have been a citrusy-scented water or light argan oil applied too. I lost track amidst all the rinsing – she tipped bucket after bucket of warm water over me again. 

I sat on my mat in the warmth once again, contemplating life and nakedity for another 10 minutes. Finally, reluctantly, I got up, retrieved my towel, and went back to the changing alcove. I dislodged my wet underwear, got dressed and re-entered the world.

I positively glowed after my hammam experience. My hair was a mess, but my skin felt wonderful!

Back at the entrance desk, Reception Clerk handed me a glass of mint tea and I sat on the padded bench.

“Is it usually this quiet?” I asked. She said my timing was good since there were a couple of big groups booked in for later that day.

I watched the pot of vegetables, now simmering on a propane-powered burner on the floor.

“Is that for dinner?”

Reception Clerk confirmed that it was indeed dinner for all the ladies who work there.

As I sipped my tea, I kept running my hands up and down my arms. My skin had never felt so soft and smooth. Even without a massage, I felt languorous, heavily relaxed, and deeply happy with the world in general.

I can’t say I’m cured of my body image problems, but the hammam experience has softened my symptoms. I’m learning to accept that this is what a 67-year-old body looks like, post-menopausal waist thickening, bingo arms and all.

I left my Scrubber Lady a big tip. She smiled widely as I waved goodbye.

We visited Morocco in April 2026. Find out where we are right now by visiting our ‘Where’s Kathryn?’ page.