Bordeaux – A Reformer wind is blowing over the Gironde capital! This machine which allows you to practice Pilates is so popular that several studios have just opened while other clubs are adapting their offer to this new demand.
Group classes on Reformer are popular! At least four new studios offering Pilates classes on Reformer have opened in Bordeaux in a few weeks. Something new in fitness? No way ! Pilates and Reformer were created by Joseph Pilates just over a century ago. Pilates, like Reformer, works the postural muscles in depth with slow and precise movements.
Based on breathing and posture, Pilates combines different disciplines including yoga and martial arts. Adapted to a machine, this method is practiced on a horizontal frame on which a rolling cart is fixed, with a whole system of springs and straps.
A recent craze
In Bordeaux, several studios have been practicing it for several years, such as Studio Gaïa (hypercentre), Bordeaux Pilates d’Origine (Chartrons) or SH Pilates (Jardin Public), Stéphanie Héraut’s studio. Faced with growing demand, they have adapted their offer: “It has been 13 years since I opened my studio which combines Pilates and Reformer,” notes Stéphanie Héraut, “and I have noticed enormous enthusiasm since Covid. Perhaps because the classes take place in smaller groups” (his studio has four Reformers).
Just as with yoga, purists advocate authentic Pilates, which requires complete training in this demanding discipline.
Aricha Antomori opened Black Milk Pilates a few months ago, in the city center of Bordeaux, where she offers around twenty Reformer classes per week. Faced with success, she has just launched her second location: the Black Milk Studio which also offers Pilates and barre, as well as the Lagree method, on megaformer, invented by Sébastien Lagree, a Bordeaux native living in Los Angeles! This method of muscle strengthening, more intense than reformer, allows you to sculpt the body.
Aricha Antomori has opened a second location, the Black Milk Studio. © DR
Top athletes
With its spring system, Pilates on Reformer adapts to all levels and is very popular with high-level athletes. This is the case of Yoann and Marina Jalinier, both former professionals, in the French roller hockey team, who opened the Pilates Club (Le Bouscat). “This American brand has grown considerably and has 1,100 studios internationally,” comments Yoann Jalinier. We discovered the Reformer in Los Angeles and wanted to open a studio in France as a master franchise (one buyer per country). » Their Pilates Club, which opened in November, has 12 machines and personalized practice based on classes (flow, basic, cardio sculpt, etc.) and levels.
-It was also abroad, and more precisely in Australia where she lived for several years, that Éva Fouquet discovered the Pilates Reformer. Back in Bordeaux, she decided to open Soda Studio (Saint-Genès) with Cédric Lapeyrade. This former professional judoka who became a sports coach was quickly won over by the Reformer: “It is a unique device that allows you to perform a wide variety of muscle strengthening, stretching and posture improvement exercises.”
Neat places
It is located in a completely renovated old garage, offering a welcoming place, with a boutique café area at the entrance, a footbridge to access the changing rooms and the coaching room which offers boxing, muscle strengthening or cardio training. The bright studio, with rounded decorations, brings together 12 machines: “We used the concept of the soda bubble for excitement” laughs Cédric Lapeyrade during a visit to the place.
Among the latest studios to have opened their doors, the Parisian brand The New Me, which has 13 studios in Paris and its surrounding area, has headed to Bordeaux (center) for its sixth address in the provinces (with Rouen, Marseille, Rennes and Lyon). The studio, nicely decorated in tones of ecru and old pink, is also a living space with a practice room under vaulted ceilings with exposed stone, a cabin with cosmetic products from the Caudalie brand, a boutique area and a café. offering all kinds of lattes.
The Parisian brand The New Me has headed to Bordeaux. © The New Me
Wall & Sling au Jardin Public
However, many studios offer complementary disciplines. Stéphanie Héraut, trained in pilates and Garuda (which combines pilates, yoga and tai chi) has developed a dual method: wall & sling. She thus equipped her studio with 8 stations to practice it. “The wall part fitted like the reformer with straps, trapeze and springs, allows for traction, resistance and support at the same time,” she explains, “while the floor part allows for self-enlargement of the spine.”
Du Wall & Sling au SH Pilates © D. R.
