Yoga show 2010, London

James D'Silva, Yoga Show 2010, London

Had a fab Sunday at the Yoga Show at Olympia, London, it ran over 3 days and although exhibitions at Olympia tend to be manic and over crowded (I remember a dance exhibition that I went to back in the 90’s, wow too many dancers and dancers’ mothers in too small a space) it was a great mixture of everything yoga under one roof!

My real main reason for going was to try out Katy Appleton’s class and also James D’Silva, both well known in the western yoga world!

After a pretty stressful early morning dash across London, I’m sure knocking down some children and tourists off to meet the Queen in the process; I arrived 2 minutes before the start of Katy’s Morning Heart Flow class (thank you London buses!?!). There was a great turnout and vibe in the room with keen yogi’s positioning their mats circular and inwards towards Katy who was looking yogi fantastic with frangipani’s in her hair and a huge smile. The class began focusing on slowly building a rhythmic breath to centre both our body’s and minds with a keen focus on Prana, breath and vitality. Anyone who thinks they won’t break out into a sweat in a yoga class or there’s a chance you might fall asleep has obviously never taken a Vinyasa Flow class!!

Katy’s style is clearly inspired by Vinyasa and Bhakti Yoga (the heart essence path) as each Asana (pose) flowed wonderfully and helped keep the up-beat tempo that the class took. Katy (who I’m sure you may have noticed by now is my new yoga crush!) trained as a ballet dancer and danced with the English National Ballet before becoming a yoga teacher and the flow of her class and focus on structure, alignment and precision, enabled me to see a definite dance quality that yoga can have.  I don’t obviously mean that we are all in search of looking like swans but in terms of fluidity, passion, placement and conviction, there are similarities.

The class ended with a relaxation session with some live music, and some Sufi poetry read by Katy. It was honestly one of the loveliest yoga classes I have ever done, the energy in the room from 100 people upon their mats focused and in unison with Katy’s wonderful, passionate tone, left me feeling elated and invigorates. I definitely took a deep sigh of disappointment when the 1hour and half session was over!

I managed to have a quick look around the main hall with some 100 exhibition stands ranging from Jewellery (yes you apparently need gorgeous jewellery to truly connect to your inner Chakras!!) to Yoga Schools and retreats, Yogamatters, OM Yoga Magazine, Julie Mango, Yoga Pages, Yogiwear, Independent Yoga Network to name a few… There was a bit of a Buzz Lightyear rush to grab the clothes in the bargain buckets at some stands, not very calming and some very questionable outfits worn by attendees!!

I managed to get to the front row for James D’Silva’s GARUDA Matwork Technique open class which fused Pilates, Yoga and Dance with influences from Feldenkrais and Alexander Technique (took me right back to my days dancing!) A huge focus on the strength of our core, breath, fluidity and although space was tight it was really great to try out another class, so different from the first.

It was all in all a great day, luckily I forgot to get out cash before I went in otherwise I could have ended up spending a fortune on gorgeous clothes, books, dvd’s and Jewellery that I really wouldn’t have needed but of course would have left me looking quite the part!! It just proves that its always possible to bump a fair bit of commercialism into anything!!

I did finish the day though feeling truly inspired by the variety of people that yoga attracts and it made me all the more passionate about trying as many different styles of yoga that I can, deepening my knowledge. I just need to win the Lottery now to take a couple of years out of life and travel to some Indian Ashrams and Gurus in Bali in search of life’s greater meaning and merge my eternal self with some cosmic bliss (as wacky as it sounds!!). I made it home with a smile on my face (albeit a stressful journey on London Transport) to a pretty lush roast dinner and glass of well deserved red!

Categorised in: Yoga, Yoga Styles

This post was written by Laura Avery