01
Breath
The breath is the metronome.
Every movement begins on the exhale. We teach the lateral, ribcage breath first, before any spring is touched, because without it the rest of the method is choreography.
A private Pilates house. Yorkville, Tribeca, Mayfair.
Est. 2016 · The classical method
Strength, quietly.
LITHE
Yorkville · The Reformer Room
We teach the classical method, slowly. Six people to a room, never more. Apparatus built to the original proportions. Teachers who trained for years, not weekends. A house, not a gym.
LITHE was founded in 2016 on one idea: that Pilates, taught the way it was written, is the most precise physical education a body can receive. Everything else in the house follows from that.
The method
Six principles, taught in order.
Joseph Pilates called the work Contrology. A century later the principles are unchanged; only the rooms are quieter.
02
Concentration
One thing, fully.
There is no music in the rooms and no mirror you can see yourself in from the reformer. The attention goes inward, to the one place the work is happening.
03
Centre
Everything moves from the middle.
The powerhouse, as it was originally called: the deep abdominals, the back, the pelvic floor, the glutes. Limbs are expressions of the centre, never the other way around.
04
Control
The spring is not in charge.
Momentum is the enemy of the method. A movement is only complete when it can be stopped at any point and held. We use lighter springs than you expect and we move more slowly.
05
Precision
The right place, the right order.
Each exercise has a shape and a sequence, refined over a century. We teach the shape until it is yours, then the sequence until it is no longer a sequence.
06
Flow
Then, the whole thing at once.
When the first five are present, the session becomes one long movement. This is the point of the work. It takes most members about a year to feel it, and then they never lose it.
Then, the whole thing at once.
The apparatus
Every piece in the house is built to the original proportions, in maple and steel, with springs calibrated by hand. The spring is the teacher; we only interpret it.
The spring · turn it
Footwork · Yorkville
- Reformer
- 20 across the houses
- The foundation. Carriage, springs, straps and footbar; the body learns to meet resistance without bracing.
- Cadillac
- 5
- The trapeze table. Roll-downs, leg springs, hanging work. The most versatile piece and the one members fall for first.
- Tower
- 14
- A cadillac's vocabulary in a smaller footprint. Spring work standing, kneeling, lying.
- Wunda Chair
- 8
- The hardest piece in the room. One pedal, two springs, no excuses.
- High Chair
- 3
- Standing and seated leg work with a back. Rehabilitation-adjacent programmes live here.
- Ladder Barrel
- 4
- Extension, side bending, the stretch the spine forgot it could do.
- Spine Corrector
- 12
- A small barrel for the thoracic spine. Used in nearly every private.
- Mat
- Every room
- Where the method was written. Taught as its own discipline, never as a warm-up.
Three houses. One room at a time.
Each house is a building we found and mostly left alone. The rooms are small on purpose.
Faculty
Seven teachers across three houses. Each trained for years in the classical lineage before teaching a single session here.
Membership
Three ways to belong to the house. All of them begin with the Foundation.
- Eight group apparatus sessionsSix to a room$420/ month
- Four private sessionsOne to one$780/ month
- Unlimited group sessions and two privatesAll three houses$1,450/ monthMost rooms
Where everyone begins
The Foundation
Where every member begins, regardless of experience. An assessment, the vocabulary of the apparatus, the breath, and a place in the right room. Nobody joins a group session before the Foundation is complete; it is the reason the rooms are quiet.
$890· five private sessions
“I came in with a back that had been rebuilt twice and a lot of opinions. Eighteen months later I have one opinion, which is that nobody should teach this any other way.”
01 / 03
From the journal
Notes on the method, written by the faculty. Slowly, like everything else.
14 August 2026On lighter springs, longer holds, and the first year of feeling nothing happen.2 June 2026The lateral ribcage breath, why it is taught before anything else, and how to practise it at your desk.21 April 2026Five positions, one spring, and everything you need to know about how you stand.
Begin with the Foundation
Five sessions. Then the rest of your life.
Write to the concierge, choose a house, and a senior teacher will hold five private hours for you. Nothing to buy first.