What if the gym was more than just a place to sweat through a workout? A new generation of “super-boutique” gyms is challenging the fitness market by offering environments where you can take classes and chase a new personal best but also run work meetings, eat in healthy restaurants and stock up on athletic gear in concept shops. It’s a shift that’s aimed at a new generation of people for whom fitness is a way of life and central to their social lives.

“Classic gyms have no vibe,” says Alexandre de Vaucleroy, the 32-year-old co-founder of Animo Studios in Brussels, the latest super-boutique to flex its muscles in this emerging sector. “Crossfit doesn’t always come with good facilities, while places such as Barry’s only do one kind of thing.” A former analyst at management consultants Bain & Company in London, De Vaucleroy teamed up with Antoine Derom, a business and economics graduate who had previously founded a dating app, to launch Animo in 2020. This four-floor site – their biggest yet – opened in March.

“We always wanted more from the gyms that we went to,” says De Vaucleroy, clutching a flat white as we sit in the Animo café. He and Derom spent much of their spare time exercising and saw a gap in the market for something more ambitious than what was on offer. “We wanted to add food, recovery and a social aspect,” says Derom.

Animo feels a little like an all-inclusive holiday resort for fitness enthusiasts. In the lobby, there’s a shop selling sports kits, a coffee shop and protein-shake counter. Upstairs is the gym, which balances an industrial aesthetic with lush plants and is drenched in natural light from the numerous windows. Then there are separate studios for classes offering workouts such as Reformer Pilates and rooms used by the on-site physiotherapists. Down two flights of stairs, you’ll find saunas, steam rooms and ice baths, plus a beauty salon and spa offering facials and massages. It’s the gym as a destination.

Its opening was the culmination of five years’ work and is perfectly timed to mine a rich and evolving fitness market. Gym use is rising, with more than 100 million people in Europe expected to have a membership by 2030 (though that figure will include many who pay a fee but fail to get up from their couch). Some 77 million Americans were signed up to a gym or studio in 2024, up 20 per cent from 2019, according to global trade organisation the Health & Fitness Association. But it’s findings such as those of McKinsey & Company’s 2025 report on the $2trn (€1.71trn) wellbeing industry that show where the money really is. The management consultancy concluded that millennials and Gen Z consumers consider wellness to be a “daily, personalised practice” rather than just a matter of “occasional activities or purchases”. Animo leans into this trend.

“Everything is here so it saves me time,” says Dali Jelassi, a 40-year-old member who works in education technology. “I can get a massage, use the sauna and have lunch.” Earlier, he also had his VO2 max test, which shows how much oxygen your body can use during intensive exercise. “I don’t have to go to a therapist somewhere else and it’s easy to try new things,” he adds.

De Vaucleroy uses a term that he believes sums up the Animo offer. “We are a Social Wellness and Performance Club,” he says. Indeed, he and Derom have even trademarked the phrase. “It’s about responding to the way that people want to live their lives now.”

Since the height of the coronavirus pandemic – when many people took part in “couch-to-5K”-style initiatives – the fitness boom has snowballed. Marathon participation, for example, is now at an all-time high and concepts such as Hyrox, a gym-based competition launched in 2017, are now part of a global fitness movement.

After our tour, De Vaucleroy and Derom lead us back to Animo’s café, a calming space filled with boucle sofas and armchairs. It’s 12.00 on a Monday and members are eating açaí bowls and basil-topped fruit salads served on stainless-steel tableware, while tapping away on their laptops. Flat whites and matcha lattes come in handmade ceramics; protein shakes are served in glasses. “It’s about giving members a better experience and value for their money,” says De Vaucleroy, as he sticks a fork into a lightly peppered, beetroot-dyed egg. The business shares a kitchen with Seven, a Brussels all-day café that’s on the ground floor and is open to the public.

The path to Animo has not always been easy. In 2019, De Vaucleroy and Derom each invested €50,000 to launch Animo and a year later unveiled a studio for classes. After just 45 days, however, it was forced to close because of lockdown restrictions. “Our bank accounts were absolutely wiped out but we hired out our spin bikes and delivered them to people’s apartments,” says Derom. “We did what we could.” While many traditional gyms were shuttered and never reopened, things turned around for Animo in 2021. People were desperate for real-life experiences. “As soon as we reopened, we were very busy,” says Derom.

To launch a more ambitious space, they needed to raise funds. “That was always the goal but there’s no way that two [then] 27-year-olds could bootstrap a project like this,” says De Vaucleroy. “We had to prove our concept first.” The pair raised €1m from various sources. This money helped them take on a new site, a multistorey car park that the duo transformed into their state-of-the-art premises. In its first five months, the club has signed up 1,500 members who pay between €209 and €249 a month.

Among them is thirtysomething brand consultant Marine Lambert. As she picks up an iced Americano, she tells us that she likes Animo because the classes here are “very difficult”. She proudly pulls out an Animo water bottle from her Animo tote bag. “I was given the bottle after 100 classes,” she says. “I got the bag after doing 200 classes. It made me feel special and appreciated.” After 1,000 classes, Lambert received a gift box, which also includes a hoodie.

Gyms have traditionally been function first, with unflattering lighting and ugly machinery. Animo, however, is furnished like an upscale hotel, with a custom scent that wafts through the air, vases of fresh flowers and plenty of modernist furniture. There’s also a fridge that’s filled with eucalyptus-scented facecloths. It’s far nicer than most offices – and possibly many members’ homes.

The duo have created a space that aspires to be a little “sexy” and borrows lessons from the world of hospitality. De Vaucleroy’s CV includes two years as the head of brand for a global luxury-hotel portfolio and the influence of that time on his way of running Animo is clear. “Staff members are instructed to remember faces, names and orders,” he says. “That’s really important. For some people, that 30-second ‘Hi, how are you?’ might be their only real-life interaction that day.”

Animo’s social focus is central to the operation. One member, Jelassi, tells Monocle that he met about 90 per cent of his friendship circle through Animo since it first opened. This is especially important in a freelance economy, in which many people don’t have regular colleagues. It’s partly why members use the café as an on-demand workplace.

In the gym, I spot a member wearing a black tank top emblazoned with the Animo logo. It’s part of an own-brand line that includes dual-layer shorts for men, bras and leggings for women and unisex Pilates socks. “Our socks business is insane,” says Derom. “We sell 500 pairs a month.” The Animo kit is sold alongside shorts from On Running, Normatec compression boots from Hyperice and Swedish laundry detergent made especially for gym kit.

De Vaucleroy and Derom have big dreams for Animo, with their sights set on Paris. For now, pay a visit to the Brussels location, where visitors can buy a €70 week-long “discovery” pass. Been there, flexed that, bought the grippy socks.