Longfellow Welcomes Virge Yoga to Durham Innovation District

Yoga studio joins Durham’s growing fitness scene

Durham is getting a plethora of new fitness studios. The latest in a string of new fitness studios coming to downtown is Virge Yoga, set to open Jan. 2 at 200 Morris St. in the Durham.ID development.

Owner Jodi Myers called Durham the “city of medicine,” making it the perfect place to launch her new studio. She wanted to be downtown in a walkable area that was close and convenient for her future guests.

“As I have been teaching and practicing yoga throughout the Triangle, it became very evident that there was a void for accessibility and affordability in the yoga world in downtown Durham,” she said. “People wanted somewhere to walk and really have access to high-quality wellness and yoga at an affordable rate, and it was just the perfect time to launch our brand, the Virge Yoga brand, right in the heart of the Bull City.”

Virge joins two other fitness studios, the cycle studio Revel and the Pilates-inspired studio Solidcore, as new tenants coming to downtown. Plus, Yoga Off East recently expanded to a larger space at the American Tobacco Campus.

Fitness retail is bucking the trend amid a number of food and beverage closures in Durham this year.

Myers, born and raised in North Carolina, has been a practitioner of yoga and Pilates for most of her life, but did not start teaching yoga until 2018. She noticed that as the yoga industry kept growing and franchising around the country, it became “watered down, and really started losing the essence and the beauty of what the art of yoga is.” With Virge Yoga, she wants to bring the practice “back to the basics.”

Virge Yoga will host hot power vinyasa, heated sculpt vinyasa and non-heated gentle vinyasa. The 3,000-square-foot space has two separate yoga studios as well as showers, changing areas and free Wi-Fi. A separate amenity is a bar for guests to purchase coffee, smoothies or other nonalcoholic beverages. Myers hopes the beverage bar will encourage guests to mingle before or after classes and engage with each other.

“Another trend that I had seen in the yoga world was people running into the studio, dropping mats and running out very rush, rush, rushed and never taking a moment to connect with their fellow yogis, to connect with each other,” she said.

The studio has been under construction for nearly five months. New City Design Group is the architect while Partners in Construction is the general contractor. Myers has hired 15 teachers and has a leadership team of three other full-time employees. She funded the new studio privately but did not share the cost for the buildout.

An unlimited monthly membership at Virge Yoga costs $109, while four classes per month costs $64. Virge also offers a variety of class pack options as well. So far, 100 members have committed to unlimited monthly memberships.

Myers is open to future expansion in the Triangle.

“We do have other people, other communities, that are knocking on our doors asking for Virge locations as we speak, and so we will investigate one or two other locations in the near future in the Triangle,” she said.

Article Courtesy of Triangle Business Journal: https://www.bizjournals.com/triangle/news/2024/12/25/durham-virge-yoga-studio-health-fitness-membership.html