Hitting just before new years fitness resolutions become less resolute, Warehouse Gym has opened a new location in Dubai Design District. The three-year-old, purpose-built mecca – known for its dedication to the design community, including startups, entrepreneurs and established international brands – is prime real estate for a visually exciting workout zone.
The interiors architects – VSHD Design, led by Rania Hamed – aimed to appeal to ‘the design savvy community’, and took their queues from brutalism, using locally cured concrete bricks and flooring, resilient to heavy use. The whole space, clad in this atmopsheric grey, will develop an appealing patina over time. Accents of gold-hued copper add a voguish polish, while a 17m long glass window invites visitors in from The Block – the adjacent recreational facility featuring a skate park and basketball court.
Straying from the usual design-world inspiration bank, Hamed and her team looked to underground fight clubs to toughen up the otherwise fairly clean-cut aesthetic. Imposing concrete columns are left exposed, and a giant graffiti mural spans one wall.
The facilities, squeezed into the somewhat awkward 600 sq m space, include a gym floor, juice bar, cycling studio and circuit training factory. The unit was once carved up into three separate retailers, so Hamed and her team had to overcome the disrupted spacial design by completely rethinking it. They created a sense of unity by rotating the design around a central glass box housing the cycling podium, in which (from a distance) cyclists appear to levitate while pedalling.
INFORMATION
For more information, visit the Warehouse Gym D3 website
-
At The Manner, New York has a highly fashionable new living roomThe Manner, a new hopsitality experience by Standard International in the heart of SoHo, triples up as a hotel, private residence, and members’ club
-
First look – Bottega Veneta and Flos release a special edition of the Model 600Gino Sarfatti’s fan favourite from 1966 is born again with Bottega Veneta’s signature treatments gracing its leather base
-
We stepped inside the Stedelijk Museum's newest addition in AmsterdamAmsterdam's Stedelijk Museum has unveiled its latest addition, the brand-new Don Quixote Sculpture Hall by Paul Cournet of Rotterdam creative agency Cloud
-
The best gyms around the world for design buffs in 2018 -
Skate park design goes to the British seaside with Guy Hollaway’s F51F51 is Folkestone's brand new, dedicated, multistorey skate park, courtesy of the Roger De Haan Charitable Trust and Hollaway Studio
-
Community centre architecture redefined: Holborn House by 6a and Caragh Thuring opensHolborn House by 6a Architects and Caragh Thuring opens for the Holborn Community Association in London, bridging art and community architecture with people at its heart
-
Pink concrete skatepark is a striking urban landmark in the Chihuahuan DesertA team of architects, landscape designers, sociologists and urban planners came together to create La Duna, a fine example of skatepark architecture on the northern border of Mexico
-
Last chance to play: Yinka Ilori's colourful basketball court in Canary Wharf is a slam dunkArtist and designer Yinka Ilori applied his signature colourful geometries to his design for this new public basketball court in Canary Wharf, London
-
Building muscle: London architecture walks and runsTry these London architecture walks and runs for some physical and intellectual edification
-
Janne Tuunanen captures modernist architecture of renovated Helsinki Olympic StadiumPhotographer Janne Tuunanen captures the sharp modernist architecture of the recently renovated Helsinki Olympic Stadium in Finland in his latest series
-
Yinka Ilori’s colourful skatepark in France is a pillar of the communitySport, street art and community merge in Yinka Ilori’s skatepark in Roubaix, project that is part of Lille’s World Capital of Design 2020
