Blog

I was invited to meet with Martine Dedek, Studio Evolve Founder and Owner, who asked Wallyhood to do a spotlight on the studio. They have recently celebrated their 19th anniversary at their current location, 3333 Wallingford Avenue N, between Pablo y Pablo and the Varsity Inn.

Martine has more than 25 years of experience in the bodywork field. Her studio caters to women over 40 (men are also invited to join) and promotes small class sizes, typically up to five per class. With a staff of 12, including Martine and Studio Practitioner and Educator Jill, they can personalize sessions on an individualized basis. Their mission is about strength, flexibility, and aging well for active folks who want to keep doing the things they love.

Martine explains how she evolved her experience into founding her studio:

As a somatic bodyworker and movement instructor, I found over and over again that my clients who had been living with discomfort for years, or even decades, could heal or significantly reduce their pain through biomechanically correct movement and gentle bodywork using the Pilates, Gyrotonic, and SPRE Bodywork systems. And they did not have to push themselves to the limits of exhaustion to do so.

But so many gyms and fitness studios are built on the “no pain, no gain” philosophy that tends to alienate beginners and can burn out even the most experienced exerciser.

That’s why, in 2006, I opened Studio Evolve and chose to offer Pilates, Gyrotonic, and SPRE Bodywork in a primarily private session format – to build a truly inclusive fitness community that offers multiple complementary modalities and serves people of all ages.

For those of us not familiar with these three types of workouts, here is a primer. Martine and team would be happy to discuss them in more detail.

PILATES

Balanced Core Strength

We know building core strength is essential and you’re ready for expert guidance. The beauty of Pilates is that it can be customized for literally any body – from injury rehabilitation to training as an elite athlete. We’ve got just this one body for our whole lives, caring for it ensure that you can keep doing all of the things that bring you joy.

GYROTONIC

Spiraling Flow

Discover the fluid movement of The Gyrotonic Expansion System. This unique movement method opens energy pathways, stimulates the nervous system, increases range of motion, and improves strength. It supports injuries, stretches overworked areas, and weaves together your strength and flexibility.

SPRE

Somatic Bodywork

Your body is speaking, and you’re worth listening to! Let’s figure out together what you and your body need in a multi-optional, relational way. There’s never just one cause of pain, and sometimes where we feel the pain isn’t the whole story; but we already look at you as a whole system.

Martine continues:

Pilates and Gyrotonic are functional movement practices that focus on strength, mobility, and alignment.

That means that with regular practice, you’ll get strong in ways that support your body as you move through the world, which will help ease pain and prevent injury as you age.

At Studio Evolve, we don’t apply “one-size-fits-all” fitness formulas to our students. Instead, all of our practitioners adapt the modalities they practice to the actual humans in front of them, in private sessions and small group classes.

This customized, functional approach to building strength and improving alignment is extremely effective at reducing pain.

In fact, clients have told us that they had been prescribed painkillers or anti-inflammatories for their chronic pain and were potentially heading towards surgery when they decided to try Pilates!

Studio Evolve is planning an open house sometime in the late fall or early 2026 (date TBD), which would be a great opportunity to check out the studio, meet the staff, and see for yourself how they provide services to keep the community fit. In the meantime, feel free to reach out to Martine for a consult.