leISURe MANAGeMeNT
PEOPLE Sharapova – who’s spent her life training on the pro tennis circuit – is bringing this experience to her fitness facility designs
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM
We want to create partnerships with hotels, resorts and country clubs to design inspirational fitness spaces Maria Sharapova, co-founder, sharapova/meis design
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aria Sharapova has joined forces with sports architect Dan Meis to start a new design venture creating inspirational health, fitness, sports and wellness facilities for the hospitality sector. The pair are in talks to create branded experience-led training venues for sports clubs, hotels and resorts that will help budding and professional athletes reach their peak performance. They’ll provide design services, operational consultation and licensing advice for a wide range of facilities – from spas focused on wellbeing and recovery from injury to largescale tennis resorts and individual hotel fitness rooms. “The concept all goes back to an idea I had a few years ago,” Meis told Health Club Management. 10
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“While sports architects are really good at thinking about how sports venues affect the fans, we don’t always think about the players’ perspectives. “I was following Maria on social media and the idea came back to me, because I saw she had a strong sense of design. “I reached out to collaborate and from the start, she talked about how she’d grown up playing tennis, but always found the training facilities where young players spend so much of their time aren’t particularly inspirational. So that became our starting point.”
Inspiring fitness facilities Meis said that the duo are considering what inspires athletes to train to become world-class, “and how architecture and design should play a role in that – the same way a uni© cybertrek 2018