The more flexible one becomes, the easier it is to Rockette-kick volleyballs into space and limbo past height restrictions on children’s carnival rides. Achieve premium pliancy with today’s Groupon: for $25, you get a five-class pass to trampoline-yoga classes at Shen Tao Studio (a $60 value). Trampoline-yoga classes run Monday through Friday from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m., with an additional class on Tuesday and Thursday from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m.
At Shen Tao Studio, former contemporary dancer William Hedberg strengthens figures through the fluid movements and playful engagements of trampoline yoga. Trampoline yoga fosters a relaxing environment that thrives on physical improvisation while the use of training apparatuses provides a deeper limb-loosening experience. As each yogi and yogini bounces atop an individual trampoline, a trained instructor guides sweat factories through a one-hour series of choreographed stances and modern yoga vocabulary, incorporating breathing techniques from Kundalini yoga. As rhythmic drums beat in the background, the bounce machines' wavering bottoms create a constantly-shifting floor to challenge students' cores, causing the body to rebound like a toad searching for his princess during a speed-dating session. The studio’s calming, minimalistic space includes 12-foot-high ceilings to create an open arena for minds to expand, bodies to balance, and the artistic process to ferment into million-dollar ideas.
Shen Tao Studio
The founder of Shen Tao Studio, William Hedberg, named his business after a Chinese phrase evoking the wisdom acquired from studying the mind and body. His own studies began with an investigation of dance, gymnastics, athletics, and martial arts. William integrated his findings into a series of movement classes and a line of custom-built training equipment designed to leave you with “the simple experience of your own body." The studio's classes, workshops, and rehabilitation therapies lean on these minimalistic, modular structures to strengthen the mind-body connection in a playful style.
Shen Tao Studio holds its group and personal training sessions in a spacious studio with picture windows and hardwood floors unhindered by columns or cardboard cutouts of Star Wars bounty hunters. The space’s 14-foot ceilings amplify crystal-clear sonics projected by a Bose audio system.