New Sports Center Honors Fallen Israeli Handball Star Roee Peled

A new sports and education center named "Ro'im" (Shepherds) for excellence has been established in Rishon LeZion, Israel, in memory of Roee Peled, a former Israeli national handball player and coach. The facility, designed by V5 Architects led by Guy Canaan, integrates a large sports hall, study areas, and community spaces. It was conceived to fulfill Peled's wish before his death to create an initiative that would provide opportunities for children and youth to excel.

The project evolved from a plan to enclose an existing covered basketball court into a comprehensive center. The new 2,400-square-meter building features a main hall designed primarily for handball, with retractable partitions allowing it to be divided for basketball, training, and other sports. The center also includes activity rooms, some suitable for classrooms, therapy rooms, small study spaces, offices, and changing facilities.

The architectural design incorporates symbolic elements reflecting Peled's legacy. A "broken" strip of windows along the main hall's facade represents the "great break" of his passing, while also allowing natural light into the space. The exterior is clad in light trapezoidal sheet metal with incomplete geometric patterns in blue, light blue, and gray, intended to create a civic center accessible to all city athletes. A separate, darker mass houses study and administrative areas, distinguished by a series of irregularly spaced circular windows of varying sizes, which architect Guy Canaan likens to a ball in motion.

Internally, the sports hall maintains an exposed steel structure and visible building systems, with a wooden floor and court markings. The circular windows in the study rooms frame views of the outdoors and bring in natural light. The center's design emphasizes movement and functionality, aiming to provide a holistic environment where sports achievements are linked to education and learning.