Arch 9, Water Lane
A joinery shop with the roof left on
Kilo opened in September 2017 in a brick arch off Water Lane that had been a joinery workshop for forty years and a scaffolding store for six. Holbeck is a mill quarter — flax first, then engineering — and the arch came with a five-tonne gantry rail still bolted to the ceiling. We left it there. It is useful.
Nadia put four platforms down the north wall because that is where the floor is thickest, and six racks along the south. That is still the layout. The building has taken 1,240 kg of calibrated plate, a monolift and about nine hundred members, and the only structural thing we have changed is the extraction.
There are three coaches, no receptionist and no sales team. If you email, one of the three will answer it. If you turn up, one of the three is on the floor — we have never opened the doors unstaffed and we do not intend to.
- Opened
- 2017
- Floor
- 4,100 sq ft
- Members
- 312
- Coaches
- 3
- Class cap
- 6
Nobody gets stronger in a hurry. The job is to make the next twelve weeks boring and the twelve after that possible.
Nadia Okonjo · head coach
Inside the arch
The floor, on an ordinary Tuesday
How it is run
Four things we have decided
The cap is six, and it is not negotiable
A coach can watch six bars. They cannot watch fourteen. When a session is full it is full, and we would rather add a session than a seventh person — which is why the timetable on the home page shows what is left before you book rather than after.
Every price is on the website
Including the ones that are not flattering: the minimum term, the notice period, and the total you would be committed to if you joined today and left at the earliest moment. We looked at nine gyms while working out how to present this and seven of them published no price at all. That is not a competitive advantage anyone should have to hand us.
You cancel the way you joined
In the app, by email, or at the desk. We do not ask for a reason, we do not require a phone call, and we do not have a retention script. Thirty days' notice on the rolling memberships, and that is the whole of it.
We will tell you when to stop
Coaches here write deloads into the block rather than waiting for you to ask for one. If you turn up injured we will change the session, and if it is not ours to treat we will say so and give you two names — we are strength coaches, not clinicians, and the difference matters.
Asked often
The awkward ones
I have never lifted. Will I be the worst person there?
Probably not, but it would not matter. The foundation block exists entirely for people who have never held a bar, it runs to a fixed start date twice a month, and everybody in it is in the same position. Most people spend the first two weeks on an empty 20 kg bar and some spend longer.
Is it a powerlifting gym? Do I have to compete?
No. About thirty members compete, in powerlifting or weightlifting, and the rest never will. The programming is general strength — squat, hinge, press, pull, carry — because that is what works for both.
Can I just use the gym without any coaching?
Yes. Open gym is £42 a month, rolling, and it includes the racks, the platforms and the ergs. There is a coach on the floor in every staffed hour and you are welcome to ignore them entirely.
What happens if I get injured?
Tell the coach. We will change the session that day. If it needs treating we will refer you on — there is a physiotherapist two arches down and a sports-medicine clinic on Great Wilson Street, and we will talk to either of them directly with your permission. We do not diagnose and we do not treat.
Can I freeze my membership?
Up to three months a year, free, for any reason. Email us the dates. A freeze pauses the minimum term rather than extending it.
Is there parking, and can I get there by train?
Eleven free spaces in the yard and free on-street on Water Lane after 18:00 and all weekend. Leeds station is a nine-minute walk via the Dark Neville Street underpass. Bike racks are inside the arch.
Have a look at it first
Come in during a staffed hour and walk round. Nobody will ask you for a card.