Sebastien Lagree wish to make one factor clear: “This. Is. Not. Pilates.”
Signage on the West Hollywood location of the Megaformer Studio.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
The worldwide health entrepreneur is speaking concerning the Lagree Methodology, his patented exercise. You might be acquainted: About 50 SoCal studios at present license rights to make use of Lagree gear, a lot of that are in Los Angeles. Their door shingles boast his identify: There’s Lagree 213 in downtown L.A., Lab Lagree in Glendale and Reside Lagree in Brentwood, to call a number of. Peer into their home windows and also you’ll see machines that appear to be hulking, extra-large Pilates Reformers — so-called Megaformers — atop which L.A.’s fittest are shifting between platforms on a modular, sliding carriage, positioning their physique elements simply so to execute gradual however extra-strenuous squats, rows and lunges.
So, like, more durable Pilates, sure? No.
“It’s totally different,” Lagree says on the telephone from Shanghai, the place he’s assembly with health studios and producers of his machines. “Not Pilates. That’s a misconception I’ve been trying to fight for the past 25 years.”
To set the document straight, Lagree is keen to return to the start.
Together with his chiseled jaw, sonorous voice and bodybuilder’s body, Lagree could possibly be the love youngster of Arnold Schwarzenegger and Fabio Lanzoni. He grew up in Paris and, after incomes a grasp’s in enterprise from Seattle College, he moved to Los Angeles in 1998 to grow to be — what else? — an actor. To assist himself, he labored as — what else? — a private coach at a West Hollywood health club. His most well-liked mode of train was bodybuilding, however his work had him instructing Pilates on the Reformer, an train that was new to him.
Grasp coach Heather Perren demonstrates the Mega Professional at Lagree Health HQ and studio in Chatsworth.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
After periods, he says, shoppers would usually wish to do extra cardio. “Because they didn’t feel like they got a workout doing Pilates. I said ‘Is it OK if I modify the method?’ Because they’re not feeling anything.”
Lagree added hand weights and integrated compound health club actions like push-ups, squats, lunges and planks on the Reformer. Ultimately, he purchased 4 Pilates Reformers and commenced instructing out of his lounge. He’d been in L.A. simply three years at this level, however a lot of his college students have been Hollywood make-up artists, stylists and personal cooks to the celebrities and phrase received out. Quickly celebrities have been exhibiting as much as his dwelling studio. David Schwimmer, Gabrielle Reece, Molly Sims and Elizabeth Hurley all visited his West Hollywood condo earlier than he received kicked out.
“I didn’t have a license. It was all underground,” Lagree says.
In 2003, he opened his first industrial studio on Melrose Avenue — he known as it Pilates Plus — however says the Pilates machines “couldn’t handle the workout I teach.” He determined to design his personal supersized model of a Pilates Reformer, and in 2005, the Proformer was born. It had added cables in addition to platforms and foot bars on both finish, permitting customers to focus on completely different muscle teams such because the chest, triceps and shoulders.
“People just loved the Proformer,” Lagree says. “We got inquires to open studios, so I decided to license out the system. And it took off from there.”
However Lagree quickly felt the necessity to distance himself, altogether, from any affiliation with Pilates.
“In 2008 I changed the name because ‘Pilates’ was misleading — it wasn’t that.”
The Megaformer debuted in 2010. Whereas the Proformer was a hunk of metal that weighed almost 500 kilos, the unique Megaformer was 200 kilos lighter and got here shipped in two elements, so it traveled simpler. The design was simplified too, with a narrower carriage that had holes on the rear edge, offering higher stability in addition to various grip factors. The foot bar was redesigned into cut up deal with bars, permitting for much more versatile train.
Mega Professional machines at Lagree Health HQ and studio in Chatsworth.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
“The split handle bars, it allows you to do so many more movements,” Lagree says. “It changed the game.”
Over the following decade, demand for the Megaformer grew to become so intense that the only real California producer couldn’t make the machines quick sufficient. In 2019, the Lagree Methodology was named the fastest-growing health pattern within the U.S. by the exercise-booking app ClassPass. By 2023, exacerbated by post-pandemic provide chain points, there was an 18-month wait to obtain a machine. Lagree has since moved the manufacturing operations to China and Vietnam, lowering the back-ordering home windows.
All through all of it, the Megaformer has remained the star of the enterprise, a behemoth on the heart of probably the most intense non-Pilates, Pilates-adjacent train on the market.
Sebastien Lagree and grasp coach Heather Perren display the Mega Professional.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
Lagree experiments continuously, tweaking his train technique and machines. He says he has amassed 200 patents. Along with the unique Proformer, there’s additionally been the EVO and EVO II, the Supra, the Miniformer and Miniformer Professional, the Microformer and Microformer Professional — the final 4 meant to maximise house.
The Megaformer, too, has gone by a few dozen iterations, a dizzying alphabet scramble that features the M1, M2, M2S, M3, M3S, M3K, M3K+, M3X, M3E, M3. Every options design tweaks. A change in spring location in a single mannequin, for instance, permits customers to transition between workouts sooner; extra holes within the platform or carriage of one other mannequin enable customers extra anchor factors to grip whereas exercising.
“The machines evolve with the method to further distinguish us from Pilates,” says the corporate’s neighborhood relations director and senior grasp coach, Heather Perren. “Lagree is a science-backed method, a live method.”
By all of it, the Megaformer has remained the star of the enterprise, a behemoth on the heart of probably the most intense non-Pilates, Pilates-adjacent train on the market. How completely different, actually, is it from a Pilates Reformer?
Each machines use carriages and spring stress — the springs are simpler on the physique’s connective tissue, making train low-impact. However that’s largely the place the similarities finish. Pilates, which was invented for rehabilitative functions and which focuses on core power, flexibility and stability, is usually low-intensity; the Lagree Methodology is high-intensity. It combines power coaching, cardiovascular train and muscular endurance, with workouts carried out at a really gradual tempo, so muscular tissues expertise extra time below stress. Lots of the workouts are accomplished kneeling or standing up. It’s commonplace to see members sweating and huffing, their limbs trembling, on the finish of a set.
Springs on the Mega Professional.
(Stella Kalinina/For The Instances)
“It’s like if Pilates and bodybuilding had a baby,” says Natalie Grimsley, proprietor of Plankhaus in Santa Monica, which teaches the Lagree Methodology in addition to mindfulness workshops.
I finished by Lagree’s West Hollywood studio on a latest afternoon and was struck by the dimensions of the Megaformer. It’s an enormous contraption, like a Pilates Reformer on steroids. It’s greater than 10 ft lengthy and weighs 395 kilos (by comparability, the extra petite Pilates Reformer usually weighs as much as 150 kilos.) The carriage’s panels are numbered, so you’ll be able to exactly place your ft and arms to execute workouts appropriately. Place your knees on 0 and your arms on 1 and three, for instance. Now you’re within the correct alignment to do a modified plank.
A bit intimidating? Sure. However I gave the exercise my finest shot. Nonetheless, it was so intense at factors, I didn’t make it by your entire 50-minute session. Deep home music crammed the room, which was dimly lit and bathed in lavender gentle. About 20 girls, a lot of whom appeared like aspiring actors, knelt on the numbered panels, whereas hinging on the waist and pulling a cable to execute a tricep press. They moved surprisingly slowly and intentionally, and the train received more and more troublesome. We’d been forewarned: A purple neon signal by the toilet glowed “It’s Not Pilates It’s Lagree.”
“Sliiiiide, ignite your core, use your butt cheeks,” teacher Sam Rabon stated. “Slower, deeper, a little more intention!”
“It’s a total package, very effective,” Rabon advised me after class. “We were standing up a lot — definitely not Pilates.”
Two days later, my thighs and glutes nonetheless ache.
Lagree now has 4 of his personal studios in L.A., in West Hollywood, Brentwood, Studio Metropolis and Santa Monica, and one in Miami. Seven hundred licensed studios — in 45 international locations — pay $3,990 yearly to make use of the Megaformer and train the strategy (that doesn’t embrace the price of shopping for or leasing the machine).
“But there are so many copycats out there who don’t want to pay for the license,” Lagree says. “They buy copycat machines that don’t work as well and call it Pilates. ‘Oh, it’s Pilates, but more intense.’ That’s where the confusion is coming from, the people in the gray area.”
It’s not like Lagree hates the P-word — he thinks Pilates is efficacious, particularly for restorative functions.
“I’ve always promoted the benefits of Pilates,” he says. “I tell people you’ll get the best results if you mix and match Pilates and Lagree.”
Then he sighs closely, including: “They’re just different — we’re not Pilates.”
