All about Classical Pilates
The early years…
The history of pilates starts with Joseph Hubertus Pilates, its inventor.
Joe Pilates (short of Joseph Pilates) was born in Germany in a town called Mönchengladbach in 1883. His mother was a naturopath. His father was a prize-winning Greek gymnast. Both of his parents greatly influenced Joseph’s later interest in therapeutic fitness.
As a young man, he had many medical problems. These included rheumatic fever, rickets, and asthma. He was so sickly, in fact, that his parents were told he may die as a child. Defiantly, however, Joseph did not give up or wallow in his illness.
At five years of age, Joseph lost sight of his left eye, apparently due to bullies wielding stones at him.
As a young adult during World War I, Joseph Pilates was living in England and making a living as a professional boxer, personal trainer, and even as a human statue in the circus. In 1914, the British authorities eventually brought him to an internment camp, along with other German citizens, for the remainder of the war.
During his time at the camp, Joe spent time observing animals, such as cats, and how they stretched and moved about to stay limber. He saw how men at the camp could lose strength easily if they had nothing to keep them active. He began to teach floor exercises (what would later become known as “the Mat Work”) to these men in an effort to keep up their strength and morale. The exercises included abdominal work, leg and arm work, balancing exercises, and spinal movements in all planes: flexion, extension, side bending, and rotation, as they were based on the German gymnastics Joseph learned as a child.
While Joe did develop his matwork in the internment camp, it is not likely that he developed ideas for any of his apparatus there. Some people like to speculate that he was inspired by the beds in the camp and the springs under the mattress and that he took the springs from under the beds and attached them above to create exercise apparatus. However, this is untrue. The beds in the camp did not have springs under the mattresses, especially since it was wartime and metal was not being used for bed springs in internment camps. Not to mention if he took the springs off the beds, the mattresses would have fallen to the floor!
After WWI and he was released, he returned to Germany and continued training people with the exercises he developed in the camp at his boxing gym. It is at this point in Germany when we first see signs of his apparatus ideas, such as advertisements for The Universal Reformer, as well as his first patent filed- The Foot Corrector.
At age 42, Jo decided to emigrate to America, where he planned to further his career in physical fitness, open a gym, and apply for more patents.
On the ship to America Joe met his future life partner, Clara. Clara was a school teacher suffering from arthritis in her hands. It is said that Joe gave her a few exercises to help her hands and she soon became pain-free.
Clara was so sold on his technique, she joined him in New York City where they patented his pieces of exercise equipment, starting with what Jo called, “The Universal Reformer”. They opened up a gym together at 939 8th Avenue. The focus of the gym was boxing and “Contrology”- the name Joe gave to his exercise technique. He continued to teach the mat work he had developed in the camp, and created additional, similar exercises on the Universal Reformer and the other apparatus he invented.
The studio featured much of the Apparatus designed to enhance his rehabilitation work. It soon became very popular, particularly with the dance community, as it offered a chance to improve technique or recover from injury. Word spread quickly and many celebrities of the day visited his studio. These included dance legends such as Ruth St. Denis, Ted Shawn, Jerome Robbins, George Balanchine, and Martha Graham, as well as the actor Jose Ferrer and the author Christopher Isherwood. Originally 60% of the clientele were men.
In 1932 Pilates published a booklet called 'Your Health' and followed this with another called 'Return to Life Through Contrology' in 1945. Through these writings and his students, his method was passed on after his death in 1967 at the age of 83. During his lifetime this method of exercise was called Contrology. It was only after his death that it became known as the Pilates Method.
How Pilates became a movement
A unique thing about pilates exercises has to do with teacher training and the organic way in which students became teachers, especially at the inception of the pilates method in New York.
As Joseph’s fitness method began to take off in the city, New York professionals quickly found their way to the studio. In fact, the studio’s proximity to Broadway meant that many dancers, choreographers, and performers soon took up the practice and began to share a pilates connection.
These professionals would later go on to become the first generation of Pilates teachers and instructors. Joseph himself taught them, and in the 1980s, these teachers began to form their own studios and pilates power gyms. They also trained their own students who would also become teachers.
In this way, the pilates method fanned out in the New York area and especially among dancers and choreographers.
How Pilates is Evolving
Through the years the Pilates Method has gradually evolved and integrated current bio-mechanical thinking, including utilizing modern pieces of equipment. However, the roots of the technique are steeped in the philosophy and movement patterns designed by Joseph Pilates many years ago. Today his core method is still taught, as well as an evolved form integrating modern anatomical and bio-mechanical thinking by teachers of the Pilates Foundation.
The popularity of the Pilates Method has spread steadily since the day when Pilates first opened his studio. Pilates has now become a worldwide phenomenon with millions of people practicing, and the numbers continue to grow due to its effectiveness and adaptability. There are many variations relating to the principles of Pilates ranging from those that he himself pioneered in the early 1900s to the contemporary approach that incorporates a modern understanding of fitness, anatomy, and biomechanics. The essential principles however have over the years been simplified, so that anybody of any age, aptitude, or fitness level can benefit. Pilates is more than a passing exercise trend. Many of our top sportsmen and athletes use Pilates regularly in their training regimes, but it is now increasingly popular with older clients, particularly those of retirement age. Postnatal women are encouraged to include these exercises after childbirth when they are looking to re-strengthen their abdominal muscles and restore body shape. It has of course attracted many celebrities who now swear by this method. Jennifer Aniston, Courtney Cox, Gwyneth Paltrow, Rod Stewart, to name but a few, are among the stars who practice Pilates.