About
MEET
Floriane
I hold two Comprehensive certifications (meaning I can teach on all the apparatus), totalling over 1,500 hours of study, observation and practice.
One from the Classical Pilates Centre in the UK (2019) and one from Authentic Pilates Canada (2021).
As a third generation teacher, my lineage can be traced straight to Joseph Pilates himself.
I keep my teaching fresh by taking a weekly private lesson with my mentor Kirk J. Smith and attending teachers’ classes and workshops with some of the most renowned Pilates teachers in the world (last year alone with Blossom Leilani-Crawford, Kathi Ross-Nash, Anthony Rabara, Saul Choza, Christina Gadar, Brett Howard, Noam Gagnon, Sarita Allen, Maria Earle, Cary Regan and Michael Johnson).
I love learning from different experts so as to better serve my students. A curious person by nature and a voracious consumer of health, psychology and movement-related books and podcasts, I consider myself a student for life.
I am interested in modalities that enhance movement, wellness and fitness, such as the use of cold exposure, red light therapy, massage therapy balls and Buteyko breathing. Where appropriate I like to incorporate the following into my Pilates teaching:
Indian Clubs swinging: I learnt the basics of this vintage movement modality under the guidance of Pam Warshay of Sage Fitness;
Face yoga (taught to me by Morgan Browning);
Last but not least, I am a SQUARE 1 certified practitioner (Levels 1 and 2). SQUARE 1 is a pain-free protocol to reset the nervous system back to its “factory setting” so as to achieve a better, more balanced performance.
Prior to my Pilates training, I was a university professor for over 20 years. The requirements for being an academic and a classical Pilates instructor are remarkably similar: you need an eye for detail, an insatiable appetite for knowledge, a strict but caring attitude towards your students and a good sense of humour.
When I'm not in the studio, I can be found singing with a women barbershop chorus, cross-country skiing, downhill skiing, snowboarding, mountain biking and hiking. Pilates makes all of these activities better, safer and stronger.
I am told my Franco-British accent confuses the heck out of Maritimers!
How Pilates came into my life
In 1945, Joseph Pilates published a pamphlet entitled Return to Life. My personal story may not be as inspirational as some other Pilates practitioners out there (I have come across several miracle stories), but return to life I certainly did.
I had always been an active youth, but after two decades bent over a laptop and books, followed by two C-sections and a big baby (carried on one hip for good measure), my body felt “off”. A niggling pain here, a sharp one there, injuries starting to happen in the silliest of ways… everything was starting to go South. A friend suggested I do Pilates.
The first class I attended was a weekday morning mat session and the clients were all seniors. "This is going to be a piece of cake", was my smug thought (I was, after all, a former gymnast and dancer, you see). You can guess how the story ends: the 70 year old lady next to me could easily perform exercises I was struggling with.
A bit of a wake-up call.
...perhaps one day I’ll just turn into Joe - here he is aged 57 and 82.
“If your spine is inflexibly stiff at 30, you are old. If it is completely flexible at 60, you are young.”
Joseph Pilates
There I was, old in my thirties, next to a young septuagenarian.
I am now a much younger forty-something who can do all the things she could do at 20 and some more besides. I hope my spine will be as flexible as that lady’s when I’m her age. Pilates has changed every aspect of my life for the better.
When you come across something this beneficial, you want to do more of it and you want to share it; so when the opportunity to do so presented itself, I didn’t hesitate to retrain. I am so glad I did.
“qui veut voyager loin, ménage sa monture”
“if you want to journey far, you must take good care of your horse”
To me, this French proverb embodies the spirit of the Pilates method.
In other words, if you want to last, you need to look after yourself.
Let’s start taking good care of your horse.