The Forum Health and Wellness Centre

Location

Honeysuckle NSW
Located within the heritage-listed Civic Railway Workshops in Newcastle’s Honeysuckle precinct, this adaptive reuse project transformed the former Permanent Way Store into a contemporary health and wellness facility for Newcastle University Sport.
The design preserves the building’s industrial character and generous internal volume through a ‘building within a building’ approach, allowing new structures to remain independent of the original fabric. This ensures minimal impact on the heritage fabric while clearly distinguishing between old and new elements. Internally, the layout provides large open spaces with distinct zones for fitness, wellness, and training. A mezzanine was introduced to accommodate specific functional requirements while maintaining the sense of scale and light within the original volume. Externally, new additions are expressed as contemporary insertions that respect the historic form and contribute to the evolving Honeysuckle streetscape.
The result is a dynamic, light-filled facility that balances heritage sensitivity with modern performance, reinterpreting an important piece of Newcastle’s industrial history for contemporary community use.