An exterior thermal pool will wrap around the south, west and north terraces of a new spa planned for Calgary's Beltline.
That's likely to be the feature that gets the most attention: a heated outdoor pool in the middle of the city, surrounded by the Calgary skyline, including in the middle of winter.
Forum Thermal is targeting a late 2026 opening.
What's being built
The 18,000-square-foot thermal spa is planned for the corner of 5th Street and 10th Avenue SW. Forum says it will include six pools, three saunas, two steam rooms and the wraparound exterior thermal pool.
This isn't a traditional spa built around massages and scheduled treatments. The main experience is a thermal circuit: moving between heat, cold and rest over a couple of hours.
You might spend 10 or 15 minutes in a hot pool or sauna, cool down in a cold plunge, rest and then repeat. Having several pools and saunas matters because it gives visitors more places to move through instead of everyone waiting for the same facility.
Forum hasn't yet released the temperatures or details of each pool.
Why the location matters
The spa will sit in the Beltline at 5th Street and 10th Avenue SW, just west of downtown.
The Beltline had 25,880 residents in 2021, and thousands more people work within walking distance. That's important because Forum doesn't have to operate like a mountain Nordic spa where visiting means planning a day trip.
Someone living downtown could potentially walk over after work, spend a couple of hours in the thermal circuit and head home.
The location is also roughly a kilometre from Scotia Place, the new arena and entertainment district being developed east of the site.
Calgary is getting a lot more thermal spas
Forum isn't arriving alone.
SKA Thermal Spa already operates downtown. Everwild, which has a Nordic spa in Canmore, has announced new locations in Banff and Harmony, west of Calgary.
The Alexander Spa Hotel is also under construction in Canmore. The adults-only hotel is expected to open in early 2027 with more than 13,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor spa space.
Canmore Hotel Opening 2027: Inside the Adults-Only Alexander Spa Hotel, Rooms and Cost
What makes Forum different is that it's being built as an urban experience rather than a mountain getaway.
And Calgary's weather may actually help.
Sitting outside in a heated pool when it's -15°C has a much stronger appeal than doing the same thing on an ordinary summer afternoon. The outdoor pool isn't something Forum necessarily has to shut down when winter arrives — winter could be when it's most interesting.
The big question is price
Forum hasn't announced pricing, and that could determine whether this becomes an occasional experience or somewhere Beltline residents visit regularly.
Nordic-style thermal experiences elsewhere in Canada commonly cost somewhere around $70 to $120, depending on the property and package, but Forum hasn't said where its pricing will land.
It also hasn't announced whether it will offer memberships.
That's particularly important for a downtown location. A membership could turn Forum into something people use regularly after work or on weekends. A higher single-visit price would make it more of a special-occasion experience.
What we still don't know
There is no exact opening date beyond late 2026, and Forum hasn't released admission prices, memberships, hours, session lengths, age restrictions or capacity.
We also don't know whether massage and other treatments will be offered, whether guests will need timed reservations, or whether walk-ins will be possible.
Those details should tell us much more about what kind of place Forum intends to be.
For now, the headline feature is straightforward: an 18,000-square-foot thermal spa with six pools and an outdoor heated pool wrapping around three sides of a building in the middle of Calgary.
If Forum can make that outdoor experience work through a Calgary winter, it could become one of the Beltline's more unusual new attractions.
Sources:
Forum Thermal; Everwild; Alexander Spa Hotel; City of Calgary, Beltline Area Redevelopment Plan; Calgary Chamber of Commerce.
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