ADAPTIVE REUSE GYMANSIUM . OSO CLIMBING
32°48'00.2" N 96°50'16.1" W
Reconciling the nuances of climbing fan and urban professional demographics provides opportunity to reestablish this site as a catalyzer of local culture amidst the changing uses of this industrial area.
BRIEF
This site was selected based on it’s capacity and location advantages in facilitating the client’s first gym concept, a multi-functional hybrid fitness destination that is convenient for Dallas’s fast-paced central urban population and grows the sport of rock climbing.
The site is situated in an industrial pocket neighborhood bounded on three sides by a winding river strand which was Dallas’s original major river prior to its engineered relocation south of the site in 1928. The building, built in 1968, was part of post-1928 large-scale development projects leading into downtown.. The building became an anchor in the industrial neighborhood by providing photographic materials to professionals in the area. As a result, the neighborhood is now home to an informal guild of photographers and creative professionals who occupy the surrounding warehouses built successively thereafter. However the building’s urban identity as the ‘groma’ of the neighborhood has nearly been lost though degenerating tenant viability and threatening demolitions due to migrating industries and local land consolidation.