@superyogapalace
So many East Dallasites are crazy about fitness that successful workout studios have found their homes in almost every corner of the neighborhood. These women run some of the area’s most exciting studios, and each business owner has her unique path to triumph in the fitness industry.
Jessica Jordan, Super Yoga Palace
Love the life you choose, keep yourself feeling brand new
—The Polyphonic Spree
Jessica Jordan performed these lyrics and has made them the mantra of her yoga studio. Not many people can say they’ve toured with a famous rock band, started a family, waited tables and opened a successful business all from the heart of East Dallas — but Jordan can. Jordan’s journey to owning yoga studio and integrated wellness facility, Super Yoga Palace, was not always smooth.
The last thing she expected while touring in 2007 with The Polyphonic Spree, a choral symphonic rock band formed in Dallas, was for the band’s record label to drop them without warning. The devastating blow led Jordan to wait tables at neighborhood staple, AllGood Cafe.
“One moment you think you’re at the height of your music career, then all of a sudden, you’re serving,” Jordan says. “I knew I couldn’t wait tables forever. I had two young kids.”
With her penchant for yoga, the healing arts and her perpetual desire to create, Super Yoga Palace came to life in Deep Ellum. Even with the 2008 economic downturn in full swing, Jordan opened her business.
“I had to keep myself inspired,” she says. “I needed something that would make me excited to be human regardless.”
Super Yoga Palace eventually moved to its Garland Road location, where the studio offers yoga school, entrepreneurship lessons for instructors, classes, workshops, essential oil education, massage, counseling and more.
In the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, Super Yoga Palace transitioned into a virtual studio that offers two classes per day, with an active website and Instagram. Some in-person activities still take place, like lunar gatherings and socially distanced sunset walks at Winfrey Point.
“My vision has always been bringing together a global community, and we can definitely achieve that in the digital world,” she says. “It’s always been about the people and about feeling well. We can do that from anywhere.”
@barmethodwhiterocklake
Ally Collinsworth, The Bar Method White Rock
A church basement is not an ideal place to offer workout classes. But Ally Collinsworth wanted to bring The Bar Method to the East Dallas community, so she had to start somewhere.
“I pulled out a big map of DFW and even did population calculations, but I kept coming back to East Dallas,” she says. “I just knew this had to be the place.”
After a few months in the basement, Collinsworth finally gathered enough followers to open a studio in 2017.
Collinsworth’s relationship with Bar Method — a workout that combines ballet with core conditioning, Pilates and yoga — began nearly a decade ago when she took a class at another Dallas studio. As a former dancer, Collinsworth enjoyed barre fitness so much that she started training to become an instructor less than a year after her first class. She taught at the Plano studio for five years before starting her own in Lakewood.
“Our instructor training is what really sets us apart from other fitness studios,” Collinsworth says. “Certification lasts four to six months because there’s science behind everything, even behind what we say and where we stand.”
The East Dallas studio has functioned as a safe haven not only for dedicated clients, but for Collinsworth too. Right when her location opened, she went through a tough divorce.
“My No. 1 priority was for this place to be joyful and to be welcoming to all types of bodies,” she says. “For some women, this is the only hour they get to themselves.”
Sitting on the carpet of her prized studio, Collinsworth points to paper heart cutouts pasted to the front windows.
“These hearts represent all of the people who have stuck through the recent hard times with us,” Collinsworth says. “I’m telling you, man, East Dallas is so loyal.”
Almost too loyal. Collinsworth remembers her friend nearly giving birth in a barre class.
“The class was at 6 p.m. and her water broke at midnight,” Collinsworth says. “I was in the delivery room with her the next day, and she had such a strong core from taking classes that she only pushed for 30 minutes.”
@studio6fitness
Elizabeth Lindberg, Studio 6 Fitness
When Studio 6 Fitness owner Elizabeth Lindberg started her investment-banking career after graduating from the University of Texas, she never imagined she would enter the fitness industry.
“The fitness industry can be as cutthroat as investment banking,” Lindberg says as she remembers her time with Morgan Stanley, Citibank and Proctor & Gamble.
In 2012, Lindberg turned her fitness passion into a business. She flew to California to train with Sebastien Lagree, whose Pilates-inspired cardio and strength training, known as the Lagree method, is popular with celebrities like Michelle Obama and Kim Kardashian West. A few months later, Lindberg brought the popular method from the streets of Hollywood to Preston Hollow, where she opened her first Studio 6 Fitness location.
“Before I went to California, I went through a divorce and knew I needed to work, but I still wanted to embrace being a mom to my twins,” Lindberg says.
She reached out to Lagree with her proposal, and he responded with an invitation to come train with him.
“I thought if it didn’t go as planned, at least I would come back in great shape!” Lindberg says.
Her business plan definitely worked. In the past eight years, Lindberg has opened four Studio 6 Fitness centers that offer the Lagree method. The newest location debuted in Lakewood in 2018, which Lindberg calls her youngest child.
“My studios are like my kids,” she says. “Lakewood is my baby, while the other ones are toddlers or older. It’s fun to see them all grow up at different stages and change.”
