Designing and decorating a luxury home gym: an essential guide — luxury home gym design concept by biofit

Full service gym design and install solutions

We have delivered a number of luxury home gyms for clients in Spain, Greece and Italy but even in the case of High Net Worth clients, the floor space dedicated to create a gym often equates to a small home gym design, meaning our role as home gym consultants is all about the details.

home gyms small spaces

Everything counts in large amounts when the small gym designs are just 10m2 - 50m2, there's no room for mistakes when it comes to home gym designs!

Our process is to first become acquainted with the client, the different gym users (mother, father, son, daughter, friends, house guests) and their respective training preferences, as well as any other stakeholders like a personal trainer for example.

We also consider their existing home gym ideas and at home workout space , if applicable, as well as the commercial gym(s) or studio(s) they train at.

This is all by way of painting a picture of their personal likes and dislikes, long before we put on our interior designer caps in other words, we are simply asking questions and listening, above all we are listening.

No home gym is about us as the gym designers, quite the opposite, our role is to put aside all ego and to provide neutral, unbiased advice in order to help the home gym client realize their home gym design goals.

We are essentially the bridge between their fitness wants and needs, and the reality of their future home gym or modern gym design.

How do I cREATE a HIGH END home gym WITH A home gym design consultant?

Typically a home gym is going to need more than a spare room but in some luxury home new build constructions there may be a less desirable spare bedroom in the floor plans that might otherwise be allocated to maids quarters, a cinema space or games room.

There is no real need for natural light in such instances although it never does any harm, just as a suitably made wall or high ceiling of at least 280cm ensures there's a faint hope of squeezing in a squat rack or pull-up bar, amongst other home gym equipment.

For information on leisure space design, not just gyms, see here.

luxury home gym design concept by biofit

What equipment do you need for a home gym?

That brings us to the equipment question - besides allocating a dedicated space and decorating the training space and walls accordingly (more on that below), the choice of gym equipment will play an oversized role in the overall user experience due to the amount of floor space it takes us.

So whether you prefer elliptical cross trainers that fold up when not in use, weights or a rowing machine that can be stored upright by a way, or an exercise bike with in-built virtual trainer screen providing spinning, strength and yoga content, every single detail is of crucial importance if you want a gym that will help you meet your fitness goals.

multi-family residences gym design in Texas by biofit

Designing a personal home gym vs a multi-family residential gym

If we are designing a home gym for a private villa in Mykonos or in the Spanish countryside for example, it is a very different brief to a 300-unit multi-family residential development gym where we have to factor in a vastly different set of users.

The opportunity therefore for us as gym design consultants working on a luxury home gym is to really go deep in personalization, customizing not just the interiors but also the gym equipment selection to align harmoniously with the needs of the client.

This equates to creating a training space and fitness equipment set-up that facilitates regular use in the long-term, not just coming up with a best solution for the floor plan and making sure there is enough space for a standard selection of gym equipment.

The whole point here is to leave out anything and everything that is not relevant to the client.

If they want enough space for a couple of place their yoga mat side by side making the most of the villa's sea view, then we'll make that happen, no matter what.

If they prioritize an infrared home sauna, a heavyweight sound system in the gym, or strength training on a multi gym machine, that equipment layout will likely need to adapt and flex according to the different family members.

Factor lighting into your gym design

Whether it be LED strip lights or a smart lighting system that follows the body natural clock to pump our white-blue light in the mornings and amber tones after dark, gym lighting is important to get right but equally doesn't necessarily need to be a key feature that absorbs excessive time and budget, especially if there is adequate natural lighting for example, from windows or the space already has ceiling lights installed.

A standing lamp or two in the corner can do wonders to warm up a space in the evenings, far preferable to harsh white overhead lights during an early morning home gym workout!

Paint the Gym Ceiling - black, white or exposed concrete

No matter how many home gym ideas we come up with, the ceiling almost invariably ends up being white, black or exposed concrete.

In new build constructions, a hung ceiling should be avoided if possible, unless adequate ceiling height is on offer.

In an ideal world, we'd have a generous 300cm ceiling height to play with in a home gym design.

For the ceiling, conscious that we have to manage a budget even for luxury home gym clients, we tend to keep it simple when it comes to the ceiling treatment.

Invest in a few pieces of artisanal gym equipment

Work In Use - home gym equipment, made in USA

Fitness equipment manufacturers like Technogym or LifeFitness are available around the world, making them ubiquitous and a 'safe bet' but there's very little personality on offer.

A home gym provides a unique opportunity to step away from the usual gym equipment giants in favor of smaller, more artisanal gym equipment manufacturers.

One such example of artisan gym equipment we discovered recently is Work In Use, based out of Rhode Island on the US East Coast.

This capsule collection is especially suitable for movement-based training, calisthenics and natural fitness practices.

It's all aesthetically easy on the eye and, interestingly, made to order - the polar opposite of a Technogym product.

As such, even just a couple of pieces by a brand like this can make a the difference between an anodyne home gym design and a home gym that stands out from the crowd.

Ensure ventilation and heating are practical for gym use

Ventilation is an obvious one but a home gym without adequate air flow rates will likely not be somewhere any of us will want to spend considerable amounts of time, especially if there is going to be more than one user at a time, or a spin bike for long endurance cycling sessions for example.

Natural ventilation works perfectly well assuming the outside temperature and air quality allow it at all times of year. If not, consider an indoor air purifier and/or a humidifier, if the full 'air conditioning home gym' scenario isn't available to you for whatever reason.

How to choose the right gym equipment?

Any home gym training space is going to require some combination of cardio equipment, strength equipment and space for movement, mobility, yoga and so on. Those are the three basic building blocks.

Clearly, one home gym owner or luxury mansion gym owner may have a particular passion for cardio equipment such as a manual treadmill, a spin bike, rower and ski-erg alongside each other in the gym design (!) or the opposite, with nothing but dumbbells, weights, barbells, discs, medicine balls and a squat rack.

Yet others may dream of a home yoga studio with a few hand weights, pilates balls, exercise mats and resistance bands.

There is no one size fits all solution to a good workout so home gym design as a process is inevitably iterative, finding our way through slowly, piecing the puzzle together with proposals including weights, yoga equipment, cardio equipment, functional training accessories and so on until we hit upon the perfect mix for the client.

ecore performance beast gym tile in navy blue

Select a gym flooring tile

Gym flooring can go a lot further than recycled black rubber crumb tiles, in fact we prefer avoiding that particular type of home gym design solution as we cannot be sure the tiles don't contain toxic binders holding the crumb together.

For the sake of indoor air quality inside the home gym, we focus instead on trusted, eco friendly gym flooring brands such as Ecore or Zandur.

For more on the importance of gym flooring in gym design see our dedicated article here.

Add some personality with Gym Design Details

Most home gyms and in fact many commercial gyms can look broadly similar: black rubber gym flooring tiles, whitewashed walls, black equipment from a major brand like Technogym or LifeFitness, mirror walls and perhaps a few vinyls on the walls too.. but basically that is as far as the gym design ideas go!

Pot plants are a no-no in a commercial gym as they'll almost inevitably be knocked over or broken by members eventually, a home gym is very different though as the owner tends to take far greater care when picking up and replacing weights, for example.

This opens the door to introducing a few air-purifying plants in the corners of room - as far as home gym ideas go it's a relatively affordable intervention and plants of 100cm-150cm can really brighten a room, assuming there is enough natural light to support photosynthesis.

Coloured gym flooring is another option, as is a feature wall with biophilic wallpaper or simply a painted wall colour in a bright, uplifting tone. Given the modest dimensions of most home gyms, a little decor like this can go a long way!

See here for our article dedicated to wellness spaces and leisure space design to compliment a gym - indoor basketball courts, yoga rooms and meditation rooms.

Further Reading

Designing and decorating a luxury home gym: an essential guide by Biofit luxury home gym designers