16/02/2024
TITANIC: THE TURKISH BATHS TODAY...
Twelve thousand feet down in the freezing darkness of the North Atlantic, the Turkish Baths in the wreck of the Titanic remain a stunningly bizarre blaze of brilliant colour.
The tiles on the walls retain their vivid, luminous blue and green backdrop. The details are as intricate, as delicate as the hieroglyphics in any ancient Egyptian tomb. And, for sure, Titanic is a temple of the deep. Eleven storeys of smashed, silent ruined splendour, sprawled across the sea bed like some kind of wrecked skyscraper.
Today, moonfish flit in and out of the place where Madeliene Astor once paused to chill out. The delicate, ornately detailed ceiling lamps are still in place, though the light they once cast has long since snuffed out.
Small, white deepwater crabs scuttle along the same alleyways where Maude Slocombe once strode with piles of perfectly primped, fluffy white towels. Those walls are as much of an echo as a vision these days. The tales they can still tell stagger the imagination.
The Turkish Baths are located deep down on F Deck, and were adjoined by a nearby swimming pool. In the world of 1912, both were open to men and women at separate hours. Admittance came via a ticket purchased from the Purser's Office on C Deck.
The debris that litters the floor of the Turkish Baths today is a torn, sundered mass of once opulent detritus. There were cushioned chaise lounges, delicately detailed Damascus tables, folding chairs, fashioned from teak, and heating blankets aplenty here. Designed to epitomise cool, timeless Moorish style ease and opulence, the central Cooling Room had the look- and the lure- of some exotic Turkish Hamman.
The small changing cubicles are still in place, but the screening curtains across them have long since surrendered to the ravages of time and tide. The solicitous stewards that once brought refreshments to the passengers here are just echoes, too...