Sculpted fitness studio in Mount Sinai focuses on Pilates, circuits, mom-friendly workouts

Against a backdrop of burgundy, brown and beige, personal trainer and group fitness instructor Sara Colletti-Youmans leads classes through grounding breaths before the strength work starts.

"I always say, 'Ignore the person next to you,' " Colletti-Youmans, who opened the Mount Sinai fitness studio Sculpted in June, said in a phone interview last week. "You are the only person in the room, you are the only person on your mat, find the pattern that works for you, and then lock into it."

But sometimes, class participants share their mats: One class format invites mothers to bring their babies along.

"Sculpted Mama is just like my Sculpted Flow class, just the BYOB — bring your own baby," said Colletti-Youmans, 37, who lives in Sound Beach with her husband and their 16-month-old son.

What started in early June as a three-month pop-up at 176 N. Country Rd. in Mount Sinai is there to stay, said Colletti-Youmans, who recently signed a lease on the space. A St. James native, Colletti-Youmans spent over a decade living in the Hamptons and running a concierge fitness company there before moving from Sag Harbor to Sound Beach and opening her own brick-and-mortar studio.

In July, Cushman & Wakefield senior director Melissa Naeder told Newsday wellness and fitness businesses were "definitely on an uptick." Citing data from commercial real estate platform CoStar, Naeder said businesses in this category represented about 30% of new retail leases on Long Island last year.

Last year, 69.6% of Americans took part in at least one fitness activity, said Jenny Karn, senior director of the Sports & Fitness Industry Association, in an August email. 

"Fitness activities continue to be the most widely participated category among the seven activity categories tracked by SFIA," Karn said.

In the fitness category, Karn added, Pilates is "one of the fastest-growing activities."

The Mount Sinai studio is in a shopping center with a pizza place, hair salon and children's birthday party venue, Colletti-Youmans said. 

"Every time I would pass it with my husband," she said, "I'm like, 'That's where I want the studio.' Because it's the cutest shopping center you literally have ever seen."

There, she offers four class formats. Sculpted Flow fuses functional movement and contemporary Pilates, she said. Sculpted Burn is similar, but involves more athletic conditioning and sometimes a room warmed to 75 degrees. Sculpted Circuit is a full-body circuit training class.

Each class is built on three pillars, she explained.

"We activate, we isolate, we flow," she said.

Historically, humans have had "really no choice but to be active," said Srishti Sadhir, an assistant professor in the Department of Anthropology at Stony Brook University.

"Ninety-five percent of our existence has been as hunter-gatherers," said Sadhir, who studies maternal health from an evolutionary perspective. "So people were active at all stages of their lives. That includes moms who are pregnant, who are postpartum, who have children."

Classes like Sculpted Mama offer the opportunity for mothers to get or remain active.

"That's so great, access-wise, that you can bring your child to classes like this," Sadhir said. "Often there's spaces that are available for the mom, but then not necessarily available for the baby."

Strength training — especially of the pelvic floor — is particularly important postpartum, said Sadhir, who noted she is not a clinician. 

"A lot of muscles have gotten super relaxed over gestation and birth," Sadhir said.

In each class format, Colletti-Youmans and her instructors teach three exercises and create a flow for one song. Then, they do it again. The theme for September is rotation, she said, so classes are centered around concepts like internal rotation and spinal mobility.

Classes are available via ClassPass or through the Sculpted studio's website, where the first single class is priced at $25. For repeat clients, a single class costs $32, according to membership pricing listed online. For $30, a client can attend class and bring a friend with the "Bring a Bestie" two-pack. A monthly unlimited membership, which includes access to in-studio and virtual classes, is listed at $239.

As she continues to train her Hamptons clients virtually, Colletti-Youmans has opened her own studio in hopes of creating a community. She is hosting mixers for mothers, she said, and has equipped the studio with a changing table, a MamaRoo baby swing and a collection of baby-friendly snacks.

"Two girls came to class and were just chitchatting and discovered they literally, their babies' birthdays were the same day," Colletti-Youmans said. "They were in the same hospital on the same day. And they just met randomly."

She notices regulars standing outside, talking.

"I had girls recently standing in the parking lot for the entire next class," she said. "I was like, 'I need chairs.' "