and Lennon are to make new 
accommodations for those that 
rent. “We’re 24/7, too. We’ve had 
tango at 1:00 a.m … You provide a 
time, we provide access.”
As much as the studio is about 
cultivating a good vibe for those 
that stick around, there is an 
element of business to it. The 
studio adjacent to Openfloor, 
Créateur Studio, provides some 
guidance.
“The 
Créateur 
Studio 
supports Openfloor’s marketing 
and branding. We have these 
two studios that work together 
to empower people and their 
passions,” Prendi said.
Créateur Studio’s approach to 
marketing is manifold.
“We walk them through the 
early steps as we’ve developed 
this business and others, so we 
can give that support as well,” 
Lennon said. “We help them 
with marketing and curating 
their content for social media. 
We 
do 
some 
professional 
photography as well. The whole 
idea would be to support these 
local startups and give them 
whatever assistance they need.”
The 
business 
acumen 
of 
Créateur shines, then, in the way 
that its tenants are allowed to 
approach their students and the 
topic of wellness.
The eagerness of Openfloor for 
new business and opportunity is 
related by Lennon and Prendi’s 
entrepreneurial 
approach. 
Throughout our conversation, 
Prendi underscored how those 
who come to use the space are 
teachers and entrepreneurs.
“(Openfloor) 
is 
actually 
entrepreneurship,” Prendi said. 
“More than yoga, it’s a space 
(that) provides all the amenities. 
Not everyone wants to become 
an entrepreneur or start their 
own business, but with us, they 
can. Everyone that joins here 

has the passion to practice their 
art.”
While yoga classes do seem 
like Openfloor’s most conscious 
and deliberate projects, the 
flexibility of the space keeps 
everyone 
around. 
Siada 
mentioned how the freedom of 
the studio keeps things light and 
fun.
“The kind of students that 
come to Nak*d Yoga are people 
from the community, students, 
people who have practiced yoga 
for ages that want to come to 
a place and those don’t want 
to feel like they have to join a 
studio that promotes a cult.”
As 
mentioned 
previously, 
Openfloor’s 
concept 
has 
matured over a year and a half. 
By and large, most of its business 
comes from tenants that sign on 
for an extended period of time, 
but Lennon mentions a few one-
off events that were unique.
“There was a juggling class 
over the summer that was 
experimental … mixed with 
various other exercises that were 
off the cuff. (The hosts) brought 
pool noodles in and jousted with 
them,” Lennon said.
Throughout 
this 
process, 
Lennon and Prendi agree that 
journey has taught them to be 
resilient.
“Once our instructors start 
meeting 
one 
another, 
it’s 
stronger than doing it alone. In 
an industry like yoga or dance, 
it’s not always beautiful days,” 
Prendi said. “We’re trying to 
build that resiliency. Success 
does not come in one day. It’s 
about doing the right thing and 
we’re here to help.”
Lennon 
agreed. 
“We’re 
learning every day and trying to 
progress.”
The best way to approach 
personal health and wellness, 
then, is to calculate the costs and 
benefits of your current options, 
and spot the opportunities to 
innovate based on your own 
personal needs. Part of the 
brand of stylish wellness that 
has developed over the past few 
years is about conforming to a 
certain standard (Paltrow would 
gently call it “aspiring”), but it 
doesn’t have to be like that.
Some instructors, like Porter 
and Siada, agree the current 
brand of wellness impedes the 
vibe of a class and makes the 
space self-conscious instead of 
self-determined.
“The 
collaborative 
nature 
of our group is the kind of 
community is what we want 
to build. We don’t want any 
competition,” Siada said.
I stepped out onto State Street 
feeling refreshed, invigorated 
by the openness of the studio 
and the attitudes of Prendi and 
Lennon. A gym membership 
suddenly felt a lot like a marriage 
certificate — and why would 
I commit to something while 
I’m so young? Perhaps, like a 
healthy attitude about love, 
wellness should be thought of 
as an ongoing experience, not an 
objective.
“Everything 
else,” 
Siada 
said, referring to Nak*d Yoga 
as we were wrapping up over 
the phone, “extra branding or 
money, that’s all sometimes nice 
but unnecessary and, a lot of 
times — completely irrelevant.”

2B —Thursday, October 11, 2018
b-side
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

A different approach to feel good at Openfloor

The 
wellness 
industry 
is 
booming. Brands like Gwyneth 
Paltrow’s 
Goop 
and 
Jessica 
Alba’s Honest Company have 
made the act of being healthy, 
whatever that may mean to you, 
into both an experience and an 
aesthetic. An outfit consisting of 
a sweatshirt and yoga pants can 
be chic and stylish — it shows 
you’re taking care of yourself 
while also not taking yourself 
too seriously. A bare-faced look 
can work, too — show them how 
you radiate that healthy glow. 
The popularity of brands like 
Lululemon and Glossier reflects 
this trend toward the seemingly 
natural and unselfconscious.
Because there is no “right” 
way to be well, however, different 
brands can impose a multitude of 
standards on the public. Going 
to the gym Monday through 
Thursday in his old, white New 
Balances might be enough for 
your dad, but for a younger 
demographic, the optics are a 
little more important. Behind 
a trip to the gym is a planned 
outfit, followed by a smoothie, 
taken from a recipe on a wellness 
blog, and then maybe a shower 
and a couple of steps in a skincare 
routine.
For those who can afford it, 
being healthy is as easy as building 
that wardrobe or shopping for 
the right ingredients. For those 
who can’t, wellness is constantly 
just out of reach, hidden behind a 
high price tag or someone asking 
you to buy a fitness plan. Paltrow 
herself, in an interview with The 
New York Times Magazine, has 
said, “‘It’s crucial to me that we 
remain aspirational. Our stuff is 
beautiful. The ingredients are 
beautiful. You can’t get that at a 
lower price point. You can’t make 
these things mass-market.’”
Openfloor Studio, located on 
State Street, seeks to change 
that 
approach. 
Upstairs, 
between Totoro and The Getup 
Vintage, the studio is a wide, 
long, rectangular room with 
white walls. There are three air 
conditioners, three mirrors on 
the wall opposite the door and 
three window panes from which 
sunlight from the street pours 
in. It’s one of those perfectly 
nondescript spaces that you 
want to stand in: bright, open, 
bigger than it seems. When I 
arrive to talk with Zack Lennon 
and Gjergji Prendi, two of the 
founders of Openfloor, one of 
their renters is meditating alone 
with the blinds closed. I decide 
not to disturb her.
My 
initial 
impression 
of 
Openfloor was that it was a yoga 
studio only, but Lennon and 
Prendi are quick to refine my 
definition.
“The vision that we have 
is to build this ever-changing 
calendar of local events, local 
instructors and to provide a 
variety of classes in one space 
that are affordable for students 
and 
instructors,” 
Lennon 
said. “To have a variety, we’re 
pushing for this start-up idea 
for instructors, so if there’s a 

new student here that recently 
got certified in yoga and wants 
to start their own movement. 
This gives them the opportunity 
without signing a lease or signing 
their life away.”
The space, however, did start 
with a yoga emphasis.
“It was a blank slate,” Lennon 
said. “We got the space before we 
had the final business plan sorted. 
We had a full yoga schedule and 
that put the vision of Openfloor 
in the wrong direction.”
Part of redirecting the vision 
of Openfloor involved putting 
an emphasis on classes outside 
of yoga. Currently, its monthly 
schedule 
includes 
Tango, 
Bachata and Kizomba dance 
classes, on top of a regular 
schedule of yoga classes taught 
by a group of instructors called 
Nak*d Yoga.
Kara Porter, a member of 
Nak*d Yoga, spoke about her 
experience at Openfloor.
“It’s 
a 
very 
mellow 
atmosphere. You can just tell 
the vibes are different,” she said. 
“Other studios, you show up and 
everyone has Lululemon and 
crazy expensive stuff. There’s 
a lot of pressure. There’s a 
complete release of pressure (at 
Openfloor). It’s really nice.”
Another member of Nak*d 
Yoga, Ruby Siada, joined The 
Daily in a phone interview to 
speak about her time developing 
the group within the community 
of Openfloor. Siada emphasized 
how Nak*d Yoga’s donation-
based approach to the art assists 
the way that she teaches.
“You could have a class that’s 
filled and only make it out with 
$20, or have a class of two and 
come out with $100,” Siada 
said. “It’s very variable, but the 
amazing thing is it allows you 
to meet people where they’re at 
instead of forcing people to come 

to you. The opportunity to spend 
$0 to have yoga be a part of their 
life is huge.”
Nak*d Yoga’s approach to 
wellness, 
then, 
is 
markedly 
different from most health and 
wellness centers. Most gyms 
or studios requires purchasing 
a 
package 
or 
membership, 
which for some 
impose 
a 
price 
on 
wellness 
before they even 
engage with it, 
and thus builds a 
barrier. With the 
pursuit of profit 
comes 
branding 
and 
marketing 
strategies, which 
isn’t to say that 
Nak*d 
Yoga 
isn’t building a 
business. Rather, 
it’s just that the 
group’s business 
doesn’t 
come 
before the space 
and the practice. 
The 
walls 
of 
Openfloor studio 
are a stark white, 
and the only thing 
that comes close to branded 
merchandise is a small table that 
is covered in class schedules and 
business cards. Otherwise, the 
space is begging for something to 
take place.
“The entire point of Nak*d 
Yoga is to strip yoga to its 
roots, so we don’t realy have 
merchandise, 
membership 
fees, walk-in fees, contracts or 
continuously pushing ourselves 
onto people,” Siada said. It 
also 
facilitates 
collaboration 
between teachers and tenants 
instead of competition. “We 
have some people working full-
time, others working in their 
professions, 
we 
have 
some 

students. Our decisions are very 
much influenced by different 
perspectives. It’s pretty cool for 
our studio. We’re all on the same 
status level, though — we have no 
lead teachers or anything.”
It’s that freedom of the studio 
that Siada finds important to her 
practice.
“You 
can 
take 
the 
space 
and 
use 
it 
to 
create 
whatever 
atmosphere 
you 
want, 
whatever 
vibe you want,” 
Siada 
explained. 
“It is one of those 
things, you know, 
if the studio is run 
by the right people 
then the practice 
that comes out of 
it is going to be 
the practice you 
want. There’s no 
ego involved in 
Openfloor.”
Prendi echoed 
Siada’s feelings.
“Our 
motto 
is ‘The floor is 
yours,’” 
Prendi 
said. 
“Everyone 
that has an idea can use our 
space to come and start their 
idea with as much support as 
we can provide. As a concept, 
we’re not trying to narrow it 
down to one thing. We do know 
that some people just want to do 
yoga here, and Openfloor is just 
a starting point. We try to build 
a community vibe around here, 
because usually (patrons) follow 
the instructor, not the studio.”
The 
community 
vibe 
is 
essential at Openfloor. Lennon, 
Prendi, Porter and Siada all 
emphasized the escape from ego 
that comes with the create-your-
own-pace attitude of Openfloor. 
Prendi mentioned how eager he 

JACK BRANDON
Daily Film Editor

Prashanth Panicker / DAILY

Prashanth Panicker / DAILY

BSIDE LEAD

While yoga 
classes do seem 
like Openfloor’s 
most conscious 
and deliberate 
projects, the 
flexibility of 
the space keeps 
everyone around

