A day after the U.S. government declared an end to the three-year national pandemic emergency, a Center City institution signaled its emergence from a hibernation nearly as long.
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The 110K SF Sporting Club at the Bellevue is scheduled to reopen in July after a wholesale renovation initiated at the end of 2020, the Philadelphia Business Journal reports. The facility has been closed since the pandemic began, with the exception of a two-month period in October and November 2020.
The revamped Sporting Club will have multiple swimming pools, a short-term babysitting room, a barbershop and a grand entrance on its first floor, along with locker rooms with saunas and steam rooms, PBJ reports. The second floor will contain a basketball court, three pickleball courts, two squash courts and six studios for fitness classes like yoga and Pilates. It will also have golf simulators, a putting green and an event space.
On the third floor, the club will put another multipurpose fitness studio next to 12K SF of fitness equipment, and the fourth will contain a two-lane indoor running track, PBJ reports. The fifth floor and roof won't reopen with the rest of the club, as plans for various entertainment uses for the roof deck haven't been finalized.
The five-story club shares an address with the historic Bellevue building at 200 South Broad St., with the two buildings totaling 885K SF. The original Bellevue is split between 273K SF of office space, a 172-room hotel and a small indoor mall containing 55K SF of retail at its base.
Lubert-Adler Real Estate Funds purchased the two-building property in late 2021 with plans to spend $100M on renovations to the Bellevue, PBJ reports. Those plans include a wholesale conversion of the office portion to multifamily, an update of the hotel and a redesign of the retail portion to be more open and include multiple restaurants.
The Sporting Club will reopen to a very different Center City than what stood around it in February 2020. Multiple office buildings between the Bellevue and City Hall, two blocks to the north, are in dire financial straits as the financing and leasing markets are dismal for all but the newest buildings in urban cores nationwide.
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