From Portugal and Sweden to China and the U.S., these wellness destinations, including bright sports arenas, fitness centers, and wellness clinics, are all in tip-top shape.
Discover Must-See Wellness Destinations, From China to Boston
Yongxin Cardiac Rehabilitation Center by JYDP
An Interior Design 2023 Best of Year Award honoree, the 1,500-square-foot facility in Shanghai, China, calms the parasympathetic nervous system with curved walls and soffits and cutout partitions. Mimicking the makeup of the heart, circuitous interlocking shapes and lines in terra-cotta red and dusty blue represent arteries and veins, connotating vitality on the one hand and cool-headed professionalism on the other.
Gym U NYC by Charles Renfro and Stephen Alton Architect
The ’90’s fitness guru David Barton returns to the workout scene with a club rat–inspired space in what was previously the Chelsea YMCA (made famous in the ’70’s by the Village People). Informed by the 1927 sci-fi noir film Metropolis, it marries riveted steel columns, industrial fans, and International Klein Blue walls and lighting with DJ nights, personalized IV therapies, and the Mush Room, a fungi-focused café.
The TRACK at New Balance by Elkus Manfredi Architects
Recalling giant laces, two-story V-shape columns in New Balance red define the sneaker company’s 455,000-square-foot center in Boston encompassing a research lab, music venue, and the Broken Records beer hall, which coalesce around a 200-meter hydraulic track. In the offseason, other sports prevail: Netting overhead drops down, converting the space into volleyball, basketball, and tennis courts. It’s all capped by a roof fitted with nearly 2,500 solar-array modules.
Fisiminho Physiotherapy and Rehabilitation Clinic by L2C Arquitetura
The geometric rigor of the facade, with its window openings placed in an apparently random way to give dynamism to the street elevation and juxtapose the Braga, Portugal, parallelepiped building’s volumetric simplicity, repeats in the interior. Such rhythmic, high-contrast shapes as angular, highlighter-yellow wall graphics and round pendant fixtures join fluted, curvilinear partitions.
Fusion Fitness by Salone Del Salon
Sparked by campaign imagery from Alessandro Michele–era Gucci, a retro, neo-’70’s affect—see the recovery room’s wall-to-wall teal carpet—pervades the skylit gym in Shenzen, China, alongside art deco-esque curved walnut-veneered walls and built- ins inspired by Noah’s Ark, which nod to the port city’s shipbuilding history.
Kviberg Sports Arena + Ice Hall by Wahlström & Steijner Arkitekter
Under a wavy, sedum-planted roof, the 130,000-square-foot stadium in Gothenburg, Sweden, is timber construction through and through. A pine-slat ceiling, ash-parquet flooring, birch-plywood walls, and massive supportive glulam-pine arches measuring 1 1⁄2-by-5-feet wide not only achieve open space without obstructive columns but also permeate the handball court, ice rink, and spectator stands with the pleasant scent of wood.
