Community Physical Fitness Center
This project exists to introduce exterior suburban activities into an interior urban environment. With the introduction of these dynamic elements into this environment, the stage is set for opportunities that may otherwise not have existed. Large green spaces in an urban environment no longer seem alien when lying under floating basketball courts.
These green spaces are achieved by recessing one portion of the site and raising another. This recessed area then serves not only as a space for the community, but also as a natural entrance to the physical fitness center. The raised area, on the other hand, becomes not only another communal space but also serves as a roof structure for the pool.
To achieve these large open green spaces drastic measures had to be taken. Most of the building was shifted to one side of the site and then raised to provide the amount of space needed. Contained within a tall box, that reveals on the exterior the contents of the interior, is an extremely dynamic program. Where the program cannot fit in this box it explodes from it, cantilevering outward.
Located on the exterior of this box is a screen. This screen allows the inhabitants on the interior to look outward onto the communal spaces. The main purpose of this screen is to protect the glazed exterior of the structure from the sun.
Separated from the main programmatic massing is perhaps the most important component of the project: water. This element, in the form of a pool, serves as a southern border for the communal green space. Lowering the pool into the ground, and covering it with a green space, creates another park space for the public.
By placing the entrance / communal space between the water and the larger volume it becomes the unifying element that ties everything together. Lowering the green space to the level of the pool not only relates it more directly to the pool, but also creates a definite entrance to the facility and serves as a communal space for the community.
In conjunction with the green space and the main massing is another space, which is set up solely for the peace of mind of the inhabitants of the complex. It is a large, open, sound-proofed space that is located on the third floor of the main structure and becomes a quiet place to sit and meditate.
The use of steel in this project allowed a complexity unavailable with other materials. Large uninterrupted spans were achieved, as well as a complexity in circulation that creates an overall dynamic experience.