our story
the people behind the brand.
Hello, we’re Nicole & Vivian and we are the owners of SO.
Our story started in early 2020 when Vivian and I met under the most unconventional situation ever. Both based on the North Shore in Auckland, Pilates in early 2020 was not the craze it was, and diversity in the Pilates profession in New Zealand is even more unheard of. Bonding over our shared love of Pilates, and its benefits to the human body, Vivian asked ‘Hey, do you want to do this together?’ and I went ‘Sure!’, SO Fitness (now commonly just known as SO), was born.
Our humble beginnings began in late 2020 teaching Mat Pilates in community centers and other people’s gyms/studio, often for free. Our beginning years was hindered by the Covid Lockdowns, and quickly coming to the realization that our dreams would need a brick and mortar space. Fast forward to early 2021, a idea to take up a sublease in Auckland city that we previously disregard in 2020, came up again, and all it took was one look at the place, a desperate grab at success, to say yes and to invest in our savings into building our first studio. Our idea at the time was to build a boutique pop up studio, during covid times, to see if we had a chance to succeed during such uncertain times, and being a business that started from scratch, it also meant pulling favours in from family, getting knee deep first in renovating the studio (Vivian painted our floor and I painted the bathroom).
the space before we renovated it.
investing in our mirrors.
before our reformers arrived.
We were due to open September 2021, with pre-sales already live in August, and then the never-ending August lockdown happened in 2021, which honestly, was great in the beginning, because our machines were still floating somewhere at sea on it’s way to New Zealand, but when 2 weeks, dragged to 4, to 6 and more, the stress started coming in. The uncertainly and constant changes, drove us crazy, but you adapt the only way you know how. We dove into live IG workouts, I started writing what would become our first manual of The SO Academy’s courses, and we filmed tiktoks that made us go viral a few times. Then it came the opportunity to do outdoor classes. We hesitated for a while, as the effort was large, and the uncertainty of how long we will be doing outdoors was putting us off. We were lucky enough to land a space at The Cloud, overlooking the harbour, and our previous investment with our MoTr (portable reformers) suddenly became a life saver.
carting 11kg x 8 machines every day was a core memory.
December 2021 came our time to open once the restrictions lifted., Vivian and I were teaching 40+ group classes, private sessions along with our other full time jobs. Looking back, we are still unsure how we did probably 60 hours weekly in contact with clients every week, and working 7 days a week for a good 4 months. All we knew that we wanted it to work, so we just did. In April 2022 came our first batch of The SO Academy trained Instructors. After a full month of training daily, these group of girls became part of our SO Fam and played a huge part in growing SO from the early days to what it is today.
By April 2022, one thing was also clear. We were at overcapacity. You would have to book in a minimum of one week in advanced to get a spot. It also came a decision for us to make, if we were going to keep doing it, or call it after a year of pop up studio. The obvious answer was to keep going. We loved our community, and we also saw how much more lives we can touch, and the presence we can build for the young, female, people of colour population in New Zealand. Then came the search of our first proper headquarters. We were on a tight timeframe. Our sublease ends in September 2022, the city was recovering from the impact of covid, and we also had a tight budget. By July, we were honestly shitting ourselves. Thankfully, a space that we passed on before, had come back with offers to build the tenancy to our dimensions, and we jumped at the opportunity. They then had one month to knock down and renovate everything, and we honestly had a very underwhelming expansion announcement. With covid, delays and manpower issues, I remember the week before we were meant to move, Vivian was away in Wellington completing her RAD qualifications, and I was trying to sort all the paperwork and business things that back then was way past my paygrade. Many, many mental breakdowns and one minor car accident later, we got the news that our move was confirmed for the week after, and we closed the studio for a long weekend, and proceeded to move and train in the new studio before our opening week.
Fast forward to life at 2 Princes Street, if you've been with us since the start, you would have seen us grow from 6 machines, to 8, to 10 in the main studio, kitted out our private room to have all Pilates Equipment, launch our Teaching Branch - The SO Academy, grow our team to almost 20, go online with our free educational content on YouTube & Podcasts, and go full force into our Pilates Merch & Accessory Line. You would see Vivian take her steps into Motherhood, and welcome the first SO baby.
Why SO?
SO was founded on the basis of inclusivity, and over the shared love for pilates.
When you think Pilates Studio or Pilates Instructor, we’re probably not the people you would think of. We’re not all crazy flexible (well, Viv is), or fitness toned junkies. We think life should be a balance, Pilates and Fitness should be done for the right reason, and should be done well. Our studio strives to break down the barrier of intimidation to try Pilates, because we love it, and we want you to love it too.
Our Instructor and education courses are open to anyone to take a shot at starting a rewarding new career, and contains combined wealth of knowledge from Vivian’s national gymnastic team and ballet teacher career, my Physiotherapy career and our years of Pilates Practice. Pilates needs to be performed well to have any effect, and we’re here to upkeep the quality of Pilates Teaching.
Our merch is designed in studio, by us, to fill a gap of quality Pilates merch in the market. We love cute Pilates fit, starting from grip socks to crop tops, and we want you to have access to them as well.
The most important factor of all, SO is build to provide that community for those who find it difficult to fit in, or to make adult friendship after school and uni. Our biggest joy is when we see our clients become friends after doing classes, and making that Pilates and brunch/coffee after a real thing.
The Journey is still going for us, and we will never have been here without anyone of you, from the start, or from whenever you found out about us, and make us your Pilates brand of your choice. Thank you for being there for us.
loads of love,
Nicole & Viv.
Journal written by Nicole.