Zander Institute of Mechanotherapy in Essentuki has celebrated its 120th anniversary

One of the most spectacular sights of the resort city of Essentuki for two hundred years has been a stylish and beautiful building at Resort Park that looks like a fairytale medieval castle. Inside the building you can see amazing mechanical exercise machines invented and built in the nineteenth century! And they still continue to operate and help people stay healthy.
In July 1902 Essentuki became the fourth city in Russia where a gym with popular at that moment mechanical exercise machines invented by Gustav Zander, the Swedish physician and inventor, was built.

Some say that exercise machines were brought to the resort by local Cossacks from Novgorod fair and they paid a great deal of money at those times – 20,152 rubles. The half-timbered (wood-framed) building was designed and constructed in just four months by architect Joseph Zelinsky.

After its opening, the hall of mechanotherapy made a splash among vacationers and immediately became one of the most popular health facilities at the resort. Zander’s Mechanotherapy as well as drinking treatment with the famous Essentuki waters, became one of the main procedures for treating obesity and Essentuki was jokingly called “Essentobesity resort”.

Now the building of the Institute of Mechanotherapy is a regional-level listed building. There are 64 original machines designed by Zander. They can be conditionally divided into two groups: passive that are activated by electric motors and active that are activated by a person who uses them. There are also orthopaedic devices for