Prong Two: The Virtual Studio

The Virtual Studio actually has two halves

• The first half is the Online Virtual Studio where I teach live-streamed Classes & Privates via Zoom, to people near and far.

I started this during Covid (like pretty much every other movement/fitness teacher), kept at it when we moved & while the shed was under construction.

I’m still at it.

I really enjoy the connections I've made so staring at my screen each week in several Zoom 'meetings' actually makes me really happy. 

• The other half of my Virtual Studio is my Video On Demand Library. Inside the library are classes and workshops available to rent. It's an affordable and convenient way to practice Pilates.

There are Mat Classes and Small Equipment Classes of various levels that will put you through your paces. I've filmed some groovy classes if I do say so myself.

I’m slowly adding workshops (okay, right now there’s only one in there!)

Me in action, teaching via Zoom, using my arm to demo what the legs should be doing:

Prong Three: The Blog 

I started my blog as a followup to a year-long challenge to send a long-form email to my small (but gradually growing) email list every week. I accomplished that project and in year two I made the decision to put my thoughts out to a wider audience, hence the blog.

This is my way of reaching more people to share my take on life which is that basically, it's good to put some thought & time into living a healthier life and that you need to move your body every single dang day.

(headsup - there are digressions galore)

Truthfully my favourite thing about the blog is hearing from a reader that something I wrote resonated with them - yeehaw!

I named the blog Pilates + Life + Health which in my teeny mind gives me the license to talk about pretty much anything that takes my fancy.

A brief (but more extensive?) history:  

Dragonfly Pilates & Movement started in name only when I used to fantasise about having my own studio. At the time I lived in an old house with a falling down garage and as I looked out my bedroom window I would envision a beautiful two car garage with a bespoke Pilates studio built above it.

I have no idea where the name Dragonfly came from, maybe because they used to flit around my garden? (my tagline for years was, 'take flight', but now I’m leaning into “Wingspan”?)

Fast forward several years and my family moved continents and hemispheres to Australia and I knew it was my chance to open up my very own studio. From the outset I was pretty sure I wanted it to be home-based (and after a short time trying to negotiate the commercial real estate scene the decision was clear). 

The first iteration of Dragonfly Pilates & Movement was in our rental house. The studio was in one of the extra bedrooms which was so small my reformer barely fit inside on the diagonal from corner to corner. Like a very tight toilet stall you had to be positioned “just so” to close the door. There's also a funny story about having to dodge a flying gecko skeleton that shot out of the wall a/c unit the very first time I turned it on, but that bedroom's where I started out with my first couple of private clients.

Next up we bought a house and literally moved down the block. (that move's a whole other story about my sometimes impetuous, forceful, but always seems to be traveling when the actual move is happening, hubby)

Dragonfly Pilates & Movement studio #2 was in the single car garage that the previous owner had decided to tile. We whacked up an air conditioner unit, but kept the metal roller door, and I moved my equipment in.

It was a very cosy place - four bodies was all it could hold and even that was pushing it. The best part about that space is that I still have clients that started with me there! 

Studio version #3 was just a bit bigger that the single car garage. It was underneath my next house so the main negative was that the ceiling was very low (& it would occasionally flood).

Here I could fit six people, again very cosily; things were constantly folded or rolled up and rearranged to accomodate both classes and private clients but for over ten years it worked.

I discovered Aerial Fitness during this time and hired a friend to build me an outdoor rig for two hammocks and when the weather cooperated there was no place you'd rather be than hanging out, looking up at the trees, and listening to all of the crazy North Queensland birds.

I loved that studio because it had a beautiful outlook to a ginormous rain tree in our back yard, but mostly I loved that space for the many wonderfully beautiful souls it brought up through the gate at the back of my carport and into my life. (Lucky me, some of them are also still with me as clients & friends!)

So, finally now Dragonfly Pilates & Movement studio #4, aka the Schtudio, is open.

It was a bit of a slog to get it finished but it's beautiful!!

It's much bigger than any of my other studios (though still not large by any means) and is more purpose built which means my Aerial Hammocks can hang inside and my Reformer rarely needs to be folded away.

I’m so looking forward to growing my community (as well as myself) with this new incarnation of Dragonfly Pilates & Movement.

xBec