A stream of skinny people toting messenger bags bang through a busy single door in a corner of Brooklyn near the Atlantic-Pacific transit hub. It’s tucked away in a neighborhood that has yet to feel the frontal assault of gentrification. Two blocks away rent prices triple, but on this side of the busy avenue, people still occasionally park on sidewalks and drink 40′s free of hassle from the police.
The busy door opens into the former New York Daily News parking garage, now converted into a massive rock climbing gym called Brooklyn Boulders. The paper lost the need for its parking garage years before they could blame the rise of the internet for dwindling business, and the spot was used to park Ryder rental trucks and store backstock for a massive 99-cent store before a trio of young men signed a 10-year lease on the space and started putting up overhanging sheets of plywood and colorful grips.
Clouds of chalk dust hover over the crowds on busy nights, and route setters have arranged a multi-colored galaxy of plastic holds into hundreds of boulder problems and top-roped routes. Two bouldering areas stretch across half the space, while a boxy stalactite drops out of the ceiling and top ropes and quickdraws for lead climbing hang across the back of the gym. Beyond a replica of the Brooklyn Bridge’s tower, another 16,000sq ft of climbing space is under construction. The rare wall not covered in holds features a multi-coloored paint job from a group of local graffiti artists. Brooklyn Boulders ordered hundreds of cans of Belton Molotow Premium spray paint from Germany and set the artists loose in the space, creating a vibe that reflects its urban surroundings.
Climbing gyms come and go in New York. The Manhattan Plaza Health Club offers a rooftop climbing area with crowds that rival subway cars at rush hour. The City Climbing Club set up space in an uptown YMCA, but a renovation cost them the space and the Club disbanded until the Y reopens and rents to them again. Brooklyn Boulders is the only gym in all five boroughs dedicated solely to rock climbing.
The founders of Brooklyn Boulders—Stephen Spaeth, Jeremy Balboni, and Lance Pinn—met while attending an East Coast business school. Spaeth is a lifelong climber who introduced Balboni and Pinn to the sport, and after college the group decided to move into the climbing business in Boston. They floated business plans, sought financing, and began looking for a space. In the meantime four climbing gyms popped up in the Boston area, and the trio turned their eyes to New York.
Spaeth’s family company, Spaeth Designs, creates the Macy’s window displays that tourists flock to in Christmas, blocking the sidewalks like they’re witnesses to a crime scene. The company operates a 20,000sq ft production studio in Manhattan that houses massive CNC routers and carpentry tools. Taking advantage of the shop’s downtime during the year, Spaeth and his crew added indoor climbing walls to the family company’s business ventures.
On a slow afternoon during the early phases of construction, Spaeth suggested that Pinn find a hammer and pound some T-nuts into the back of the wall so they could save on labor costs. Pinn hammered away at what he considered an efficient rate, and an hour later he’d only managed to cover one board of plywood. Any reasonable slacker faced with hard work looks for ways to lighten their load, and Pinn turned to Facebook for help. Months earlier he’d started a page called New York Needs a Climbing Gym that found fans faster than the Suicide Girls. He put up an offer on the page: Come see our gym, drink free beer, eat free pizza, and if you hammer in a few T-nuts, we’ll give you a free day pass once we’re ready to open. Eight people arrived the first week, 30 the second, then 35, 40, and 60, until so many were swinging hammers that they were in danger of unionizing.
Brooklyn Boulders staffs four full-time route setters who each put up 30 to 35 routes per week. The payroll also includes four full-time managers and about 50 people who are willing to clean bathrooms and vacuum floors 3 hours per week in exchange for a free gym membership.
The cleanliness of the bathrooms occasionally resembles the frat house that Spaeth, Balboni, and Pinn left behind not long ago. Some of the texture on the walls has worn off around holds, and occasionally the chalk clouds get as dense as L.A. smog. Regardless, the gym and its clients are as welcoming as climbers at your favorite crag. The locals are friendly, the music eclectic, and it has a homey feeling that other New York gyms have never been able to achieve.
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[...] fancy you.” No explanation is offered for why these activities make people more attractive. Climbing gyms are certainly great places for women to meet single men, since gyms are typically packed with [...]
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