Sprinturf will host its second annual Healthy Spaces Council February 23 to 25, 2026, in Chattanooga, Tennessee, alongside PlayCore corporate. The working session brings architects, engineers, and general contractors together for in-depth discussion on the future of sports field design and construction.
The council convenes at The Waymark Chattanooga. The format is invitation-only and intentionally small, designed for in-depth working sessions rather than vendor presentations. Attendees include principals from architecture and engineering firms with active athletic-facility portfolios, general contractors building recreation and play spaces, and senior staff from PlayCore and Sprinturf.
What the council is
The Healthy Spaces Council was established to bring the people who plan, specify, and build athletic and recreational spaces into the same room as the people who manufacture and install them. The agenda is built around the questions that show up across every project type: how planning timelines have compressed, what owners actually need from a warranty, how programmatic demand has shifted, and what sustainable manufacturing looks like in practice.
The 2025 inaugural council was held in Chattanooga, TN, and convened a select group of architects, engineers, and general contractors. The 2026 program returns to Chattanooga to continue that conversation.
Who is attending
The 2026 attendee list reflects the people who actually carry projects across the finish line. Among the roles represented:
- Principal architects and senior project leads from firms with active athletic-facility design portfolios.
- Engineers specifying surface systems, drainage, and base construction on recreation and play projects.
- General contractors building recreation and play spaces.
- PlayCore corporate leadership coordinating across the parent company's recreational design programs.
- Sprinturf operations and product development staff from Daniel Island, Dadeville, and Chatsworth.
Working session format
The council uses a working-group format rather than the vendor-pitch structure familiar from industry conferences. Each session pairs owner perspective with manufacturer and design perspective in the same conversation. Outputs from each working group are documented and circulated to attendees within four weeks of the council closing.
Topics on the 2026 agenda include:
- Compressed planning windows: what design teams actually need from manufacturers in months three to six of a project.
- Warranty validation in the field: 8-year limited warranty terms and the 16-year cohort of warrantied fields with zero fiber failures since 2010, and what that record tells the buyer side.
- Sustainable manufacturing in practice: domestic extrusion, end-of-life recovery, and what owners are now asking in RFPs.
- Programmatic load and surface life: how multi-program facilities are scheduling around field rest cycles.
- Cooperative purchasing pathways: the practical experience of using Sourcewell and BuyBoard in 2026.
Why Chattanooga
The Waymark Chattanooga is intentionally chosen as a working-session venue, not a conference hotel. The space supports small-group work and offers easy access to two regional installations available for site visits. The choice of location continues the council's preference for settings that put the work, not the agenda padding, at the center.
We started the council because the most useful conversations in this industry happen between owners and manufacturers, and they almost never happen in a single room. Chattanooga in February is our second swing at fixing that. Sprinturf Council Programming
What comes out of it
The council produces a working document each cycle. The 2026 council outputs will be published to attendees in March and summarized publicly on this site shortly after.
About the Healthy Spaces Council
The Sprinturf Healthy Spaces Council is a working group convened annually to bring designers, builders, and manufacturers into productive conversation about athletic and recreational space design. The 2025 inaugural council was held in Chattanooga, TN. The 2026 council returns to Chattanooga. The 2027 location will be announced in the published recap.
