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Pilates has taken the world by storm (or as it seemed to me) as the new “wellness workout.” By now, it feels like the second most practiced in its kind, only after yoga. But did you know, Pilates has been around since the 1920’s? Pilates may be a form of exercise, but it’s effects can be felt in all mind, body and spirit.

“The Pilates Method of Body Conditioning develops the body uniformly, corrects posture, restores vitality, invigorates the mind and elevates the spirit.” -Joseph Pilates

I’ve tried mat pilates before, but with the rising number of pilates studios and the promotions that come with them, I thought it was about time I tried the oh-so-mighty reformer pilates. Below is my experience as I started my pilates journey in July 2024.

The Search:

Out of the dozens of results I got from searching “pilates near me,” I went through numerous websites to see which one to try out. For me, the most important factors were location, price and hours. Although I do enjoy going to smaller studios where I can get more of a personalized class, I knew that most reformer pilates classes were either one-on-one or in small groups (<10 people per class), so I mainly focused on looking for businesses that had a number of locations spread out around Japan. That way, I could take a class while I am on the road too!

“I choose you!”

After a few days of looking around, I decided to try out Zen Place Pilates. Zen Place Pilates has a total of 135 locations in Japan (as of July 2024.) Although a majority of their locations are in the Kanto region, they also have at least one location in most of Japan’s major cities including: Sapporo, Sendai, Osaka, Kobe, Hiroshima and Fukuoka. One down side for me is that they do not have any locations in Southern Kyushu (which is where my permanent address in Japan is.)

Another thing that seemed good about Zen Place Pilates is that they offered so many different package options. The cheapest option started at around 10,000 yen per month all the way to the most expensive option at around 37,000 yen per month.

As for the hours, different locations have different hours, but most of them open between 8:00-9:00am and close at around 7:00-9:00pm. Which is longer than some other places I’ve looked into that were only open for five hours a day, or for the few hours that classes were being held.

My first class:

Zen Place Pilates @ Musashikosugi

Zen Place Pilates asks you to come in 20 minutes before your trial class to change, take a tour around the studio and have a chat with one of the staff members about the advantages and some overlooked effects of starting pilates. Frankly, I thought “the talk” was a little cult-like and didn’t know what to say when I was asked for an opinion on their presentation, I could tell that they were honestly trying to build a positive-minded community around pilates and it was important for them that I understood that pilates could bring more benefits than what can be seen or felt physically.

My first reformer pilates class was a group flow class. Although it was a group class, there were only a total of two of us. Me (trying it out for the first time), and one other lady that had taken reformer classes a few times. Lucky me, I got to experience almost a private-like class as my first experience.

Our teacher, Arisa explained that the flow class is essentially the basics and went over each movement very slowly and focused on teaching us which part of our body was supposed to be used in each movement. I could feel the seemingly simple and slow movements hit some parts of my body that I’ve never noticed before.

For example, I felt a muscle under my glutes tighten and it felt like it might cramp or even pop, and that’s usually where the instructor tells you to stay where you are. I’ve been trying to work out my lower body at the gym, so some of the leg movements made my body, as well as the entire reformer machine shake, but Arisa assured me that it means I’m doing it right and it’s working the right muscles. And that is exactly what I needed to hear.

Post-Class:

After class, the instructor tries to get you to sign on to a package then and there. I went in thinking of joining anyway, so it wasn’t a problem for me, but if you went in just wanting to try it out, it may feel uncomfortable to leave after listening to their talk.

I signed up for the RG4 plan for 15,400 yen per month. This package gets you four reformer group classes per month. I also got a bundle of 40 tickets for a little over 100,000 yen. These tickets can be used to take any other classes including mat classes, additional reformer group classes and one-on-one classes.

Getting into the flow

Several days after my first class, I took two one-on-one classes where I was able to get my instructors watch my every move and tell me what I was doing right and wrong. For the most part, my fundamentals were good since I have done mat pilates in the past, but I always get called out on tensing up my body too much.

With that I was able to get into a flow of going to the reformer group classes one or two times a week. So far I have taken classes at the Musashikosugi, Motosumiyoshi and Yokohama branches. The clean and simple vibe is very similar at all of the locations but it is interesting to see the different type of instructors that you can take classes from at each location. I think because they are quite a large company with many branches across Japan, it would be fun to take classes outside of the Kanto area as well.