LES Mills Extreme, Wellington

Prior to refurbishment, Les Mills occupied this same site on Taranaki Street in Wellington for over 10 years but only on the upper four floors. While their activities encompassed most of the Hope Gibbons Annexe Building, they never had the desired ground-floor presence or impact at street level.

When the ground floor became available Les Mills approached Stephenson&Turner to create a high-visibility street entrance, reception and cafe area, thereby lightening up their entry space, as well as freeing up some much-needed gym space on the first floor.

The reception was positioned on the left-hand side of the main doors, as near to the main entry as possible to provide a line of surveillance and security as well as the essential ‘meet and greet’ function. The old main stair was relocated towards the rear of the building to ensure a good stream of traffic down the central axis past the reception activity and retail areas. On the right-hand side of the central pathway were placed the sales centre and café, the latter fronting onto the footpath over the maximum possible width giving it an outlook and identity of its own.

Customers now enter directly from the street under a new lightweight canopy, across the building frontage and into a vibrant and colourful high-energy “Exertainment” environment, where they are drawn through to the main stair which processes them upwards into the gym proper, where the real “unleashing” begins!

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