MARBLEHEAD — After the fitness studio was closed for two years due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Towne Barre has been reopened by Stefanie Borneman.
Borneman said that Town Barre was founded by Michelle Kenyon, who ran the studio for roughly seven years.
The pandemic forced the studio to turn to virtual classes, and it began to struggle. Kenyon was forced to close it in 2020.
The idea to reopen came to Kenyon this past October in a dream, Borneman said. She said Kenyon sent a message into an old group chat explaining she had dreamed that Borneman reopened Town Barre.
“I kind of just was playing around and I was like ‘Well, maybe we should just go get a drink and talk about it,'” Borneman said. “By the end of the night, I was the new owner of Town Barre.”
The studio has been up and running under her ownership since December, and Borneman said it offers many different workouts. All of them, she added, are focused on musical beats.
“You’re moving essentially to the beat of the song, so they’re really uplifting and fun,” she said. “But we offer barre, we offer sculpt, we do kick and sculpt, mat barre, which is our sort of like a Pilates style class all on the mat … and yoga sculpt.”
Borneman said reopening Towne Barre was “crazy,” but she received a lot of positive feedback when it was announced on social media.
“People from not only Marblehead but from Swampscott, Salem, and Lynn are chiming in saying ‘Finally, you know, we really need something like this back in the community,’” Borneman said. “That was really nice to hear, it was reassuring.”
Kenyon also helped Borneman a lot in the reopening process.
“Anytime I have questions or I need support with something, she calls me right away and helps me,” she said.
Some changes were made to the actual studio, including a whole new color scheme.
“I just asked myself, ‘Wouldn’t it be so cool if we created an all pink workout studio?’” Borneman said. “Like pink walls, pink equipment, pink decor – that’s empowering and feminine and welcoming, because I’ve never really seen anything like that, and so that’s what I did.”
Borneman said that between getting married in April, being a full-time school counselor at Marblehead Veterans Middle School, and reopening Towne Barre, she has been kept very busy lately.
“I’m so busy, but I could not do this without my team, clients, and this community,” Borneman said. “The support they’ve given me is beyond anything I could have imagined.”
