Where: Equinox, 568 Broadway, New York, NY

Stephanie Culen: A Casual, Bejeweled Yogi

Stephanie has a great presence in the yoga studio. She's chipper, sweet, and oozing with yoga-cool. The class was definitely spritual (we dedicated our practice, cupped our intention between palms, and reached forward to "offer" ourselves to the universe or whatever) but Stephanie's attitude towards the whole thing was casual and light-hearted. Just pimpin' my heart out to the universe. You want some of this? I'll give you a piece. I'm spiritually promiscuous. No big.

On Stephanie, the superficial.

• Dripping with pretty yoga beads, Stephanie was very stylish. She was also packing metal with a huge beautiful teardrop-shaped ring. 
• She donned long black spandex yoga pants and one of those "is it a long shirt or a short dress?" type garments. As she hustled in through the door to greet us, she was also wearing one of those chunky cute-but-has-no-buttons-so-who-on-God's-green-earth-can-pull-this-off sweaters.
• I would describe the woman herself as slender, but well nourished.
• She's one of those people who you stare at the whole time, fascinated, and at the end of the class you're still not sure what she looks like.

On the teaching style.

• Stephanie's style is very informal, matter-of-fact, and colloquial. It feels like she's having a conversation with you, except she's the only one who knows what we'll talk about next.
• Stephanie has a cool talent: she can hop seamlessly between the group dialogue and indvidual dialogue with students. 
• For example, as we sat down at the beginning, Stephanie sighed "let's begin!" to the full class. Glancing over at me (front row, awkwardly close to her mat) she flashed a big smile and chirped, "hi!"...Somehow, it was totally natural that she had addressed both the group and an individual in the same breath.
• Ms. Culen isn't one to make sweeping statements or use dramatic voices. Her class is completely planned, but her style is casual and easygoing. You get the sense that she's the same person in and out of the classroom.
• She's a buzzer. No to to be confused with buzzard. She buzzes around the room, commenting, fixing, and generally appearing to be having the time of her life.
• I saw her adjust others, but she never touched me. :(

On the class.

• 3 oms to start.
• 0:00 - 0:07 intro meditation.
• 0:07 - 0:50 medium flow vinyasa.
• 0:50 - 1:15 class slowed significantly; balancing poses, stretches, a few more vinyasas thrown in here and there. 
• 1:15 - 1:27 sivasana.
• 3 oms to finish.

Overall, it was a great class, though I could have used a little more action (or, just make it a 60 minute class and cram all of the same stuff in, shortening sivasana/meditation). Said the New Yorker.

A minor constructive criticism:

Stephanie instructed us many, many times to "inhale" and "exhale". However, the commands were not realistically timed. Sometimes the inhale would last 5 seconds and the exhale would last 20; Stephanie didn't seem to be keeping track of how much time had passed.

In sum:

a very enjoyable class. I like the lady, I like the style. Great for a hangover, or after a long day.

From Stephanie’s website: Stephanie Culen has been practicing yoga and movement for over 20 years and has been teaching yoga since 1999. She has been teaching exclusively at Equinox since 2002. Stephanie is a certified Hatha Yoga teacher through the Himalayan Institute, a certified Power Vinyasa Yoga teacher through Baron Baptiste, a certified PreNatal Khalsa Way® teacher through Golden Bridge Yoga and is a registered experienced yoga teacher with the Yoga Alliance. Stephanie was named New York City’s best yoga teacher by New York magazine for two consecutive years in 2003 and 2004, and one of New York City’s “Power Women on the Rise for 2006? by New York Moves magazine in October 2006. She was also selected as one of NYC’s “most centered” teachers by Page Six Magazine in 2008. Stephanie's inspirational and therapeutic teaching style offers students an empowering mixture of fun, sweat and heart. Her classes are a freestyle vinyasa blend that bridges mind, body and spirit with ease and poetry and are choreographed to music that ranges from Bob Marley to Classic Rock to Chill and Alternative tunes, as well as traditional Yoga Vibes. For the fitness-minded, the steady paced sequence of postures means added strength, flexibility, and a stronger core. For the spiritualist, there’s always something to chew on in her class.

Find out more about Equinox at www.equinox.com

Find out more about Stephanie Culen on her website 

Find Stephanie on facebook 

Follow Stephanie on twitter 

Check out Stephanie’s video channel here  

Read more about Stephanie here and on Alignyo

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