ABOUT ME

About Kelly Porter and Barre Roots

So, in 2019 I decided to open my own barre studio, calling it Barre Roots. It was to be a place where men and women of all shapes, sizes, and walks of life would workout, benefit from the physical aspects of barre, where everyone felt safe and a part of a community. I had grand plans for an elegant brick and mortar studio in Nashville.

But in 2020 the world shut down, and I had to get really creative. I started teaching outdoor classes in parks, I would host pop-up barre classes at local breweries, I would do "lunch and moves" via zoom for various corporations during the pandemic. I also started teaching private barre classes out of my house, and then I started a regular outdoor class schedule and taught in our backyard (since we lived on five acres.)

However, our son was three years old, and the entrepreneurial lifestyle was not conducive for our family at the time, so I put Barre Roots on pause. Life took some crazy turns, and we moved to Fort Myers, Florida at the end of 2021 to help open an athletic performance center where college football players train in hopes of them getting drafted. The center also trains the everyday athlete, like me.

But that itch to get Barre Roots integrated into Southwest Florida was there, and in March of 2023 I started barre Roots again. It has been so awesome to see how welcoming this community is, and I am excited to see what the future holds. Having a new lens on business, and where I'm at in life now, I am excited to help provide functional strength and movement to the community.

Barre Roots started as an alternative to therapy.

OK, maybe that's a stretch. Maybe it isn't. But when I was 22 I was living alone outside of Philadelphia, and was at a pretty low point in my life. I was seeing a therapist once a week to help me deal with a great deal of anxiety.

There was a barre studio next to my therapist's office. But at that point in my life, you NEVER would have found me in a gym. My anxiety was too much. But every week I would look through the window of this barre studio, see the ladies in there who all looked so happy, and the workout didn't look too crazy, so I wanted to give it a try. I talked a coworker into going with me for the first time, and I was HOOKED. I went back every day that week.

It wasn't long before I swapped my therapy sessions for barre classes, and I never looked back. Barre helped me not only get control of my physical health- but, most-importantly, it helped me build confidence. I decided to become a certified barre instructor because I wanted a deeper understanding of the workout, and that furthered my obsession with barre and my connection to it.

When my husband and I moved to Nashville in 2016, I tried to find a barre studio near me, but I couldn't find one where I felt I really fit in. Barre unfortunately gets a bad rap for "only being a workout for people with expensive workout clothes, and who are built like Barbie dolls, and who always look perfect." I am far from that.

Certifications

Exhale Core Fusion
Bootybarre
Pre/postnatal barre exercises