The old abandoned gymnastics club
The old abandoned gymnastics club

The old abandoned gymnastics club

The old abandoned gymnastics club

How to destroy art in one lesson

Montréal (Quebec), Canada

Abandoned in June 2014, the old movie theater had only a few decorative elements including the ceiling and its front to recall the original purpose of the building. It must be said that once closed in 1982, the intern architecture has been completely renovated to accommodate a second floor with a community gym.

That means that the first floor has been completely transformed. The bleachers have been trashed and the structure of the building was laid bare to re-divide the space. The result was such that there was no trace of the movie theater past on the ground floor. New premises were built to host the dressing rooms, a hair salon, workout rooms and more.

Today, the basement is flooded where stagnates a musty smell escape from the ten centimeters of water to your nose. Add to that the first floor who shows traces of mold here and there.

Upstairs, where a large gym has required a great gerrymandering of the Streamline Moderne architecture style of the building (late branch of the Art Deco style that emerged in the 30s but is often associated to the 1950s), we are found a few vestiges of that bygone era. Emmanuel Briffa, the interior designer responsible for the decor would have turned in his grave a few times if he had seen the result ...

Related content

The old general store in St. Brigide of Iberville
Sainte-Brigide d'Iberville, Quebec (Canada)

Closed for twenty years, the old general store do not look like a ship adrift, ready to collapse under the weight of years. I mean, not that much for a wood structure. 

Known as the Peanut, the history of the store goes back over a hundred...

Poor destiny for the Pagé School
Montérégie, Quebec (Canada)

When I was a kid, there was something mysterious to me about this place. I lived nearly twenty years in this village and I had visited this school only once when I was seven or eight years old. Built in the 1950s, it was a school for around...

Doel, the nuclear ghost town
Doel, (Belgium)

We are almost in the Netherlands, but also in the port area of the port of Antwerp in Belgium, first chemical port in Europe.

By the early 60s, the Scheldt marshes are doomed to extinction to be replaced by gigantic docks and the incessant...

The old scrap yard
Saint-Amable, Quebec (Canada)

The place has something to surprise you. More than 2,000 vehicles dating from before 1975 scattered in a vast wooded area. Wooded which has made a way through the rusted carcasses that are slowly covered with a vegetation that resumes its rights...