Mixed changing rooms in gyms: what we know and what we don't

Mixed changing rooms: what users say

A mixed changing room is not, according to several replies in the thread, a room with naked men and women under the same showerhead. Several forum members argue that it is a shared area with lockers and benches, with closed individual cubicles where each person changes and showers alone. The confusion is so common that first-time askers imagine just the opposite, and that gap between what is believed and what is assumed explains much of the fuss.

What exactly is a mixed changing room

When a gym chain shows its facilities and mentions individual and mixed changing rooms, the new customer is none the wiser. The manager opens doors, points to lockers and doesn't clarify much. And the new member decides whether to sign up without fully knowing what they've bought.

An individual changing room is a cubicle: you go in, change, shower and leave. According to this reading, a mixed one would be the common space that these cubicles open onto, with benches and lockers accessible to anyone, regardless of sens. The mixing would be in the corridor, not in the shower. There, according to users, the doubt would be resolved.

Can a woman come in while I'm showering?

According to that explanation, in a well-designed mixed changing room, no: the shower would take place inside a cubicle with a door and the moment of nudity would not be shared. Another matter is the usual communal showers, the open row without screens. There, bodies are on display, and that's why the question is not idle.

Some argue that a gym advertising 'mixed and individual showers' is describing exactly that: some with doors and others the old-fashioned way. The confusion would stem from the name, not the practice. A forum member who has been through mixed changing rooms at national water polo or swimming competitions sums it up wryly: there, everyone had already seen everything. Another says that a neighbour of his did ballet and that the changing rooms there had always been mixed.

Families with children and the non-binary argument

A forum member points out that one of the most common uses has nothing to do with ideology: the father or mother who goes in with a small child to help them change. According to his description, these would be family spaces solved with cubicles, not with benches in view of everyone.

Another interpretation circulates in parallel: that these spaces are designed for people who do not identify with either of the two traditional changing rooms. It is defended as a practical solution by some; others call it an unnecessary concession and predict that, in the end, only a very specific type of customer will use it.

Nudity in the changing room and why many prefer the cubicle

The underlying discomfort is not the mixing, it is coexistence. One user says he is fed up with colleagues who walk around naked and show off in the men's changing room, and not always in neighbourhood gyms: also in well-known chains.

Those who have experienced that discomfort from the other side describe years of looking away, fixing their gaze on eyes and talking non-stop to avoid misunderstandings. Hence several users directly ask for individual showers.

Outside Spain the mixing is less exotic: it is noted that in Finland there are mixed saunas and even a Danish TV programme dedicated to taking the shame out of nudity. In some London hostels, toilets and showers are shared without further ceremony.

In the thread there is no data on how much individual cubicles are multiplying, but several users demand that they become standard. The mixed changing room, according to these replies, would be the common area it always really was.