Jade Davis brings a wealth of knowledge to Vital Body Pilates

Jade Davis teaches Pilates at Vital Body Pilates Studio inside the Orpheum Theatre in Fairfield. (Andy Holman/The Union)

FAIRFIELD – Jade Davis has been practicing Pilates since she was 9 years old, and she shares her years of wisdom with clients at her Fairfield business, Vitalbody Pilates.

Pilates is an exercise method created by German gymnast and bodybuilder Joseph Pilates, and Davis is originally from the UK and trained under Alan Hardman, who brought Pilates to the UK.

Davis founded Vitalbody Pilates Method in 2008 while living in the UK and running three studios. After studying at the prestigious University College London, she came to MIU to complete her studies in physiology and sustainable living. It was in Fairfield that she met her husband, Jayden Lane, who works at Overland Sheepskin.

Davis never expected to open a Pilates studio in Fairfield: She had planned to complete her PhD in biophysics at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and then return to the UK, but the pandemic put her plans on hold. During her PhD, Davis taught Pilates to a few clients.

“People started finding out about me and coming to my house for Pilates, and I felt bad and couldn’t say no,” she says. “I opened a little studio here and started working with clients one-on-one, but it quickly got busy and I was working with six or seven clients a day.”

Davis said Pilates is a labor of love and she couldn’t stop doing what she loves. She teaches a class for over 55s six days a week, which has become one of her most popular classes.

“We didn’t intend to focus on the 55-and-over group, but that’s why the classes filled up,” she said.

Davis said Pilates is quite different from yoga, another exercise regimen, because it involves weight training.

“In yoga, you really only use your own body weight. In Pilates, stretching is only a small part of it,” she said. “The main focus is restoring flexibility to the heart, lungs and tissues. It’s often said that yoga is about flexibility, while Pilates is about mobility – balancing muscle strength to allow for a range of movements.”

Davis has used Pilates to recover from several serious injuries, including one where her hamstring “ripped off the bone” and another where she suffered whiplash and spinal injuries after a car accident.

Davis had been in so much pain and unable to walk since injuring her hamstring at the age of 19. She was forced to take time off from professional dance school and was introduced to Alan Hardman through physiotherapy. She trained with him twice a week for a number of years. She also underwent osteopathic medicine but it wasn’t until she started Pilates that her condition was fully cured.

“It hurt to lift my head because of the whiplash,” she said. “I didn’t want to get up because it was so painful to lift my head. Then I did Pilates. [the pain] He left.”

Davis’s shop is inside the Orpheum Theater and is accessed from the west side of the building along North Second Street. She plans to add a second instructor to Direk Koksal’s studio, who will soon begin practicing as a Pilates instructor. Mary Cox teaches yoga at the studio, and Tiffany Eklund runs boot camps in the mornings. Davis has two large studios, one dedicated to Pilates and one dedicated to mat and movement.

“If possible, I try to get people to come in for a private session first,” she says. “I also have some people who are members and come in for a 20-minute session every month, where I look at their joint movement, their bone balance, and create a program that’s right for them.”