Berkeley Ironworks

I love this place for climbing and working out. There are some good yoga teachers as well. My favorite thing is the natural light—there’s so much of it compared to any other gym I’ve ever been to. Good people too!

Experience with this gym has been great. The staff are approachable and knowledgeable, and the culture amongst climbers is friendly. I appreciate that they mix up new routes every other months or so. Definitely my favorite gym in the bay area.

This place is the best! I love the gym. It has everything you need for regular gym workouts from weights, work out machines for isolation, treadmills and bikes. They offer spin classes, yoga, boxing, and many different classes applying to climbing. Into classes, intermediate classes focused on indoor, outdoor , bordering and getting into V5s. This gym also has the best workout stations for people training specifically for climbing with hang boards and weighed harnesses. With a great community and staff whats no to love !

Signed up and prepaid for an intro to climbing class. I'm an experienced active boulderer who has toproped in the distant past, but needes a refresher on belaying. Only evening lesson all week, only day I could make it. I arrived late after experiencing bike trouble on the way. Was told they can't let in anyone 5 minutes after start time. I explained that I had prior experience. My last time being taught to belay, it took about 10 minutes, and this class is over an hour. Utterly inflexible -- claimed it would disrupt the experience for everyone else to let me in, something I don't buy for an instant. And that the 5 minutes thing is a gym rule. Asked about private lessons. None available. I reviewed the website, checkout flow, and receipt afterwards. No record anywhere of this policy. If there had been fine print about this, I'd be quietly upset. Since they're isn't, I've been ripped off -- 1 star review. My money may have been refunded, but my time is gone forever. To add insult to injury, I was not allowed to sit inside anywhere after as I processed what happened.

Ironworks gave up my spot in a class when I was two minutes late, saying that "it's in our contract to give up your spot if class starts and you aren't there ". Which means there's actually no grace period for classes. The choice to use "contract language" to justify an unrealistic and business-over-people rule reflects Touchstone's final evolution to Corporate Shill Entity. It really feels like this gym is just trying to squeeze more money out of folks by charging for a service and not providing.