In the USSR, a private bathroom was a matter of pride and luxury.

In the distant 60s, in many villages and cities of the USSR, centralized water supply was completely absent. To get water, people used wells, but in most cases it was spent on cooking or drinking. It is clear that in such conditions there could be no question of a separate bathroom, and all personal hygiene procedures were carried out in the yard.

Personal hygiene in the Soviet Union, or How Soviet citizens washed

Most of the Soviet citizens at that time lived in communal apartments or in barracks, and young people lived in dormitories at higher institutions. And if a bathroom was also present in a communal apartment, then sometimes it was quite difficult to get into it due to the large number of people living in a small area, because several people used it at once families.

But in the barracks there was no such luxury. As for the dormitories for students, they also did not have access to a shower every day - in order to wash themselves, they had one day a week, which was called “bathing”. On other days, it was not possible to get into the shower room - it was locked.

In order to somehow maintain the purity of their bodies, people washed or simply wiped themselves with water in the kitchen or in their room.

The only optimal and convenient option that Soviet citizens happily used was a visit to a public bath. True, it was not possible to go there every day - whatever one may say, but our people were hard-working, so usually there was only one day in the week when a person could afford to visit the washing house. Then they washed the clothes that had accumulated in 7 days.

We see a completely different picture in Soviet cinema. There, people are always clean, dressed in ironed clothes, women - with styling and permanent makeup, men - clean-shaven and perfectly combed. It is clear that in reality, when you stood at the machine from morning to evening, this is almost impossible.

But the people of that time knew perfectly well how a public bath smelled when several dozen working people of various stripes gathered there: builders, miners, tractor drivers, milkmaids. And everything looked not at all like in the movies, but more vital and not quite fragrant.

That is why a separate bathroom for a Soviet citizen has become a special luxury and joy. It was this room that became the pride in each individual apartment, although it looked very modest and outstanding.