Projekt 42 is urgently searching for temporary premises for its community gym in Leith
A successful social enterprise gym is facing a desperate search to find temporary premises.
Projekt 42 is currently working on creating a new permanent home for its gym, which aims to tackle poor mental health in Edinburgh through activity, after securing funding earlier this year.
However the initiative now faces a desperate fight to find temporary premises until the new facility is finished after the lease at its existing base in Newkirkgate in Leith was terminated.
With nearly 3,000 members regularly using the gym, Projekt 42 is facing a race against time to secure a new temporary home, with the lease coming to an end on Sunday 5 August.
A large proportion of members are based in Leith and the social enterprise hopes to find a suitable unit that is still located in the area where it hosts its fitness classes and wellbeing education sessions - with the new purpose-built community gym and wellness centre due to open at the end of the year.
Projekt 42 founder Sara Hawkins, said: “We really are calling on local businesses, property owners and the council to help us find somewhere before our lease ends on 5 August.
“To date we have been focusing our efforts on fundraising for our new home on Halmyre Street, however, the curved ball of the lease termination has left us running around to find something suitable that we can use without having to spend thousands of pounds making it fit for purpose, when we only need it for a few months."
Hawkins set up the not-for-profit community gym in 2017 after being diagnosed with PTSD in 2012. She found that a combination of physical exercise, counselling and life coaching helped to improve her mental health and aims to help individuals across Leith enhance their mental wellbeing through the Projekt 42 programme.
The gym offers classes on a pay-as-you-go basis and memberships at a base rate of £22.50 a month, however is flexible in allowing people to join even if they cannot afford to pay. Alongside help to get fit. a focus is given to ensure that members can also improve their mental wellbeing, and Hawkins stressed she is keen to ensure that people are not left without support.
She said: “We don’t want to let our members down as there is an extremely strong community spirit at the gym, it offers so much more than just a place to get fit. We focus heavily on supporting people’s mental wellbeing too and want to ensure we can carry this on until Halmyre Street is operational.
“Due to the volume of users, we require a unit large enough to run fitness classes every day of the week for up to 30 members at a time, with at least one private room we can use for our one-to-one counselling and life coaching sessions. With the focus on improving mental wellbeing as well as the physical, we also have to bear in mind that the space not only needs to be accessible but is also welcoming for prospective users who might find it more challenging to make the initial approach.”
If you think you can help Projekt 42 or for more information, visit the social enterprise's website.
