Power of Pilates started with my own recovery and a form of exercise that changed the way I moved and felt. Nearly 20 years later, we have two studios and a brilliant team, but the reason I started teaching — and the way I believe Pilates should be taught — has never really changed.
My story with Pilates didn't begin in a studio — it began after a major setback. From the age of 25, I lived with severe back pain and, at 29, I became temporarily paralysed and needed emergency spinal fusion surgery.
Recovery meant learning to walk again in a body brace, using crutches and spending months rebuilding my strength. During that time, an exceptional NHS physiotherapist named Dan introduced me to Pilates. It was a turning point.
Over the next six years I kept practising, learning and getting stronger. Pilates had made such a difference to me that I wanted to share it with other people. In 2007, I qualified as a Pilates instructor and began teaching locally.
In the beginning, Power of Pilates was simply me teaching wherever I could — church halls, gyms, community centres, offices and private sessions in people's homes around Reading and Wokingham.
The business grew gradually, mostly through word of mouth. People came to a class, enjoyed it, felt a difference and told someone else. That is still one of the things I'm most proud of.
In a local newspaper interview in 2008, I said that my next ambition was to open my own studio. Eventually, that became reality in Lower Earley, where we could create a space around the way we wanted to teach.
Reformer was part of the studio from the early days too. Long before today's Reformer boom, we were already using the equipment alongside our Mat teaching and private sessions.
Read the original 2008 interview →
From the start, I wanted classes to be small enough for people to receive individual attention, because every body is different. Nearly 20 years later, that still matters just as much.
What I love most is seeing what Pilates gives people — whether that means feeling stronger, moving more freely, getting back to something they love or simply enjoying their body more.
Today we have a brilliant team of instructors with different strengths and experience, and as a BASI Host Studio we also support Pilates teacher training. But one thing hasn't changed: we are still learning too. In Pilates, I don't think you ever stop.
Today we teach Mat and Reformer Pilates seven days a week across our Lower Earley and Crowthorne studios.
Power of Pilates has been voted Best Pilates Studio in Berkshire in 2025 and 2026, become a BASI Host Studio and been featured on BBC Radio Berkshire.
I'm incredibly proud of how far we've come, but what matters most is that people still come back year after year, recommend us to friends and trust us with their movement.
Nearly 20 years on, we're still teaching, still learning and still loving what we do.
