Go With the Flow at Kinetic MKE
Milwaukee’s most innovative movement boutique features both Pilates and GYROTONIC® methods.
Kinetic MKE
With walls that are lined with greenery, spacious windows, and sun-kissed bamboo floors, Kinetic MKE of Riverwest encompasses both energy and tranquility. Within the space lays multiple specialized machines that do not work against you, but rather, act as a movement partnering system. The goal is to make you healthier, and happier with how your body moves.
The studio’s equipment is a playground for its users to explore and discover the extent of their body’s strength, vitality, and flexibility/range of motion. Kinetic MKE is the only studio in Milwaukee to offer and practice both the Pilates and GYROTONIC® methods, allowing members to find their body’s potential through mindful movement.
The GYROTONIC® Method was developed by Romanian-born ethnic Hungarian Juliu Horvath, who suffered a series of debilitating injuries during his dance career. As a form of rehabilitation, Horvath created a “yoga for dancers” method that his students found extremely beneficial. As his classes grew, so did the diversity of necessary movement, thus creating The GYROTONIC Method® and its specialized equipment and floor work, which is used at Kinetic MKE.
Each piece of equipment is highly adaptable to fit each user’s unique physique and ability. Completely customizable, the machines are adjusted for height, arm and leg length and range of motion (making it ideal for specialized considerations like scoliosis and post-rehabilitation). The GYROTONIC Method® encompasses exercise sequences that are composed of spiraling, circular movements that flow together seamlessly in rhythmic repetitions with corresponding breathing patterns. With this flowing movement approach, joints are able to move through a natural range of motion without jarring or compression. Balance, agility, strength and flexibility are strengthened, thus opening energy pathways.
Kinetic MKE
“GYROTONIC® borrows elements from not only yoga, but tai chi, swimming, gymnastics and dance and creates its own unique style, and original method” says Kinetic MKE co-owner and long-time Riverwest resident Trey Fry.
Fry is one of the most extensively trained movement educators in the Midwest. Dance had been a long time passion, education, and career, but like many, he suffered a career ending injury. Already a long time Pilates & Yoga practitioner, he became a certified Pilates instructor in 2003. Fry was introduced to the GYROTONIC Method® in 2014 and after a year of practice, he realized some of his Pilates students might actually benefit more from the GYROTONIC Method® to recover and advance. He had many clients with scoliosis, and GYROTONIC® proved to be more much accommodating, adaptive, and showed quicker, more positive results.
“Traditional fitness does always accommodate for our evolutionary design and function, or the potential of the human body,” says Fry. “We are three-dimensional beings in a three-dimensional world and our movement/fitness training should reflect that. Everything’s gotten so sagittal & frontal…compounded by our heavy use on tech and devices.”
With this in mind, the goal of Kinetic MKE is to assist in opening the joints and the surrounding soft tissue to help return the body to a dynamic state of health. With practice of full, three-dimensional movement, muscle function increases as well as quality of life.
“GYROTONIC® is so subtle in helping whatever your issues may be,” says co-owner Meg Hopkins. “As well as where your opportunities are.”
Kinetic MKE
The instructors at Kinetic MKE are certified in both the Pilates and GYROTONIC® methods, as well as various somatic and therapeutic movement & bodywork methods. They offer client-centric services, varying the practice for each body. GYROTONIC® practice is a one-on-one (private) or two-on-one session (duet), and Pilates has both one-on-one (private), two-on-one (duet), and a specialized small group training (semi-private) unique to the Midwest that returns the training back the roots of how Mr. Pilates ran his NYC studio! This way, instructors are able to give intimate detailed instruction to completely customize each member’s practice making their work and approach unique to Milwaukee. Due to this highly customizable practice, Kinetic MKE can work with almost anyone, from post-rehabilitation couch potato to weekend warrior, from general fitness/health/conditioning to the most highly trained athlete/dancer.
“We are not a factory,” says Fry. “There is no conveyer belt…no formula for how each individual body works. We are here to accommodate each personal body history, movement history and goals in order to create a lifelong transformational movement/fitness program.”
Kinetic Mke offers each prospective new student a complimentary initial studio visit, where a studio tour is given, and Trey meets personally to discuss movement/body history, goals, and how they can create a unique program for you and what that might look like. Going forward, there is a discounted three-lesson “Welcome Package” to get your feet wet and see just how incredible the practices at Kinetic MKE are.
On their website, the trainers write and update a blog to help teach and inspire new members and ongoing members and to help educate the public about their practices. Kinetic MKE welcomes everyone from teenagers to seniors into its studios and its staff are willing to work with anyone from professional golfers to tennis players to yogis or even grandmas who just want to play on the floor with their grandchildren. They are also an education hub for Pilates and movement teachers regularly offering workshops, educational and networking events.
“We just want to help people find a movement practice they can fall in love with,” says Fry. “If people are happier in their bodies, they’re happier in their lives, and it radiates out into the world.”
Kinetic MKE
