Pilates Instructors

Jenny is a Balanced Body Certified Pilates Instructor trained by Master teacher Lesley Powell of Movement’s Afoot, and studied with Kelly Kane at Kinected, who is also located in New York City. Jenny is a licensed Buff Bones Instructor, which is a medically endorsed full-body movement system for Bone and Joint health. She also hold certifications in Pilates Through Pregnancy to treat any and all peri-partum conditions, Pilates for Rehabilitation: Therapeutic Exercise, TRX and has a Pole Dance Level 1 and 2 instructor certification through elevated.

Originally from Tucson Arizona, with a dance and vocal performance background, Jenny received her BFA in Musial Theater from NYU. She spent time performing in NYC, in tours and regional theater as a member of Actors’ Equity Association and assisted Radio City Rockette Summer Intensives. She also taught Pilates to Juilliard students and worked as a Pilates teacher on staff at Movements Afoot under her teacher Lesley Powell for eight years.

Jenny is in her eighth year working at KIMA and KNOSIS and loves all the learning opportunities it has to offer. Not only does she enjoy working alongside specialized physical therapists and bodyworkers daily, but also attends many of the continued educational courses offered to employees on the latest cutting-edge research. She is passionate about teaching and truly enjoys helping people get out of pain, learn about their bodies and improve their fitness with Pilates.

Molly has been teaching Pilates in NYC since 1998. As a young pre-professional ballet dancer, Molly was taught Pilates by her ballet teachers as a way to keep herself conditioned, whether she was injured or correcting muscular imbalances, to achieve perfect form. After graduating SUNY at Purchase College with her BFA in Dance, she completed her intensive private certification with David Seth Fink. She then continued her training with Lesley Powell and Doris Pasteleur-Hall at Movements Afoot.

Her pilates expertise is honed from over two decades of teaching. Molly has just as many years of study as an Iyengar yogi, and continuously searches for pearls of wisdom from physical therapists, acupuncturists, her yoga teacher Carrie Owerko, and other body gurus. Her holistic philosophy involves specific attention to precision and detail. A bespoken session takes in the student's strengths and weaknesses by discovering the most efficient way to re-pattern their movement and encourage bodily awareness. With simple biomechanics, corrective

injury prevention, and playfulness, the range of Molly's experience allows her to custom design specific exercises for her clients, liberating them from their habits and pain patterns, and awakening them to their potential. She is influenced by a lifetime study of diverse movement, and strives to inspire joyful mindfulness.

As a senior Pilates instructor, Mariia has a genuine love for movement. Certified by Polestar Pilates, the gold standard in the industry, she focuses on post rehabilitation and athletic performance. She has worked with a diverse client population and has a passion for injury prevention. She loves teaching alongside physical therapists, preventing pain and helping her clients understand their bodies in new ways. Mariia has completed Anatomy Trains and Slings Myofascial Training.

She constantly continues the development of her skills and practices what she teaches. She strongly believes that the main purpose of Pilates is the efficiency of movement that one can leverage in their everyday life by learning new movement patterns. Mariia aims to bring this philosophy into every class she teaches. She reminds us “It is the smallest details that make a movement efficient and a body more functional. Whether your goal is to become a faster runner or to alleviate your back pain, Pilates can help you get there with small but significant adjustments”.

Yuu's style of teaching Pilates integrates strength, flexibility, balance and coordination to help clients achieve their maximum potential. She helps her clients to move forward at their level and work with any limitations they may have based on their total body history. Her preciseness and intuition help her improve posture, prevent injury, and maintain and improve clients post-rehab condition. She is passionate about searching and identifying what is preventing one's body from moving efficiently to be pain free, enabling clients to optimize their physical and emotional wellbeing.

Yuu is originally from Kyoto, Japan where she began her classical ballet training at the age of 6. While she was still training, performing and teaching small children ballet, she joined the Musical company, Kyogei, and toured all over Japan until she moved to the United States.

Yuu received BA in Dance from Hunter College and was certified in Pilates from the Physicalmind Institute in 2001. She has been teaching Pilates ever since. Yuu has studied Kinesthetic anatomy with Irene Dowd, Sherry Studenberg and Lisa Love as well as Iyengar Yoga, the Alexander Technique, Yamuna Body Rolling, the Eric Franklin Method and Thai Body Work to enhance her Pilates teaching and to prevent potential injuries for dancers. Yuu was a senior Pilates trainer at Movements Afoot for 10 years and trained with Lesley Powell while she performed regularly as a contemporary dancer.

Yuu has been a senior trainer and movement educator/creator at the Physicalmind Institute since 2007 where she works with company founder Joan Breibart and the institute clinical advisor Marika Molnar (the owner of Westside Dance Physical Therapy). Yuu models for Institute videos, helps craft their certification manuals, teaches workshops, and helps oversee and tests for teachers seeking Pilates certification. Over the last 10 years she has been involved in creating movements not only athletic and physical but also therapeutic for new Institutes Products. Yuu has been a big part of specialized exercise programs such as Standing Pilates, Circular Pilates (3D motions), Pilates for dancers, Bone Up (Osteoporosis), Pre/ Post Natal, and Forward Head Syndrome. Yuu has an international presence in the field of Pilates through her workshops in Japan to introduce Institute products and train Japanese Pilates practitioners and teachers.

In 2008, Yuu began studying BMC (Body Mind Centering) with Bonnie Cohen and started her training of Dynamic Embodiment Movement Therapy with Dr. Martha Eddy after she experienced several miscarriages and Infertility. Somatic Movement helped Yuu to deepen her knowledge and understanding about her own body as well as her clients. Throughout the training, Yuu was especially interested in Somatic Psychology and inspired by embryology and the beauty of our Endocrine system. Yuu's journey of understanding true somatic health continues while she enjoys the challenge of being a mother of two pre-teen kids and performing as a professional Kabuki dancer (traditional Japanese dance).