Equinox Loop will always hold a special place in my heart because it's where my journey with the…read morebrand began.
I grew up in the Chicago suburbs, and after graduating from college, my first city apartment was in Wicker Park. In 2007, I was working a couple of blocks away at One North Wacker and joined this club through a corporate discount. Looking back, it was one of the most consequential memberships I've ever purchased.
At the time, I was trying to figure out adulthood. Like many young professionals, I was learning how to balance work, health, ambition, and independence. Equinox became part of that education. I started modestly: a few studio cycling classes, 20 minutes on the treadmill, some stretching afterward, and the occasional steam room session. What began as a simple attempt to stay in shape became a lifelong practice, one that ultimately led to thousands of workouts, countless classes, and challenges that would have seemed unimaginable to the person who first walked through those doors.
The timing was significant too. I joined as the global financial crisis was unfolding around us. I was young enough to be somewhat insulated from its full impact, but old enough to sense that the world was changing in ways I didn't yet understand. Many people around me were experiencing layoffs, uncertainty, and losses that would reshape their lives. Looking back, I think Equinox became a refuge during that period. While the world outside often felt unsettled, this was a place built around routine, discipline, and self-improvement. That stability was more valuable than I understood at the time.
The club itself embodied everything that drew me to Equinox. It was clean, polished, and unmistakably urban. Chicago has always had great fitness options, but Equinox felt different. It was smaller, more design-conscious, and more connected to a broader world beyond Chicago. In a city that can sometimes be skeptical of ideas and brands that arrive from elsewhere, Equinox brought a more cosmopolitan perspective to the fitness scene. I thought that was a positive thing then, and I still do.
One of my favorite memories of this club has nothing to do with a workout. I'd finish exercising, spend time in the steam room, and then step outside into a Chicago winter evening. Snow would be falling. Steam would rise from my head into the cold air. The city would feel sharp, quiet, and alive all at once. For a few moments, everything seemed perfectly calibrated. I've experienced that feeling in other cities over the years, and it's still one of my favorite sensations in the world. It's the closest thing I've found to stepping out of a ski lodge and into the mountains.
This was never one of Equinox's largest clubs, but that was part of its charm. I still remember the small retail area near the entrance, the salad bar, the old gray "Member" T-shirts, and buying my first pair of Balega socks, a South African running brand I've continued to support over the years. I also appreciated that this location had both a sauna and a steam room, a combination that's uncommon across the Equinox portfolio today.
Over the years, I spent time at the original Chicago-area clubs as well, including 900 North Michigan, Lincoln Park, and Highland Park, near where I grew up. Since then, Highland Park has closed, and Equinox has expanded in the city with new locations in Fulton Market and Lincoln Common. Each club reflected a different chapter of the brand's evolution in Chicago. But Loop was my original Equinox. Whether it was the first club Equinox opened in Chicago or not, it was the first one I joined and the one that started my relationship with the brand.
As the pace of my life accelerated, that consistency became even more valuable. I moved between cities, changed jobs, traveled constantly, and experienced all the unpredictability that comes with adulthood. Through it all, Equinox remained a reliable point of return. No matter where I was, I knew what awaited me: a clean locker room, a familiar steam room, quality equipment, and a space designed to help people reset.
That may sound like a small thing, but it isn't. When your life becomes increasingly mobile and fragmented, familiar places take on greater meaning. Equinox became a kind of home base for me. It was where I went to clear my head, regain my footing, and pull myself back together before moving on to whatever came next.
I've now visited more than 20 Equinox locations across the country. Returning here years later felt less like visiting a gym and more like revisiting the starting point of a much longer story.
A great gym helps you build strength. The best ones become part of the architecture of your life.
For me, Equinox Loop did exactly that.
