It is the mind itself which shapes the body. That was the view of German-born writer, inventor, and physical trainer Joseph Pilates, who through his illustrative life, founded an apparatus-led approach to exercise. One that emphasised the power of the mind and breath in balancing the body. It was the ethos that Pilates was founded on, and Sydney-based Bernadette Fahey is one of the teachers with a dream to keep it alive.  

With a much-talked-about studio launch earlier this year offering Pilates, yoga, breathwork and meditation, the owner and principal teacher of the eponymous Body by Berner is warm and welcoming on a Wintery Thursday.

 

Her Sydney studio is inviting, and what strikes you almost immediately is the delicate interplay of natural light, bold art, and playful pops of colour. Mats are in formation for her next class, and neon hand weights are grouped in curious piles on the polished concrete floor. There’s a Mediterranean-inspired feature wall adorned with objects and books; a visual feast that delivers on form, function, texture and tone. 

 

Perhaps the piece-de-resistance are the sweeping views over North Bondi, that make you feel both uniquely connected to the buzz below and intentionally removed from it. “I’m really proud that I did the design and interiors for Body by Berner completely by myself,” she tells us. “My mother is a property developer and I’d often furnish the apartments prior to their sale both as a passion and a help to mum. I honed my eye for design at a young age.” 

Her studio has struck a chord with Sydney’s A-List, amassing significant social clout in just a few months. And yet, it’s a story that almost never was. It was 2020, and the former PR Director was living and working in New York leading campaigns for fashion brands. A routine visit home to Sydney – and a certain pandemic – changed her path. “I was feeling uninspired and burnt out, but I was thinking I’d stay in New York for the future. I was back in Sydney to renew my US visa while COVID appeared, and I made a decision to stay.” 

 

It turned out to be a serendipitous one. The time in lockdown allowed her to reconnect with her love of movement and encouraged soul-searching on where she saw herself next. “I was conscious about it being something that incorporated my passion for movement. I meditated on it for a few weeks and one morning when I was running, I had this deep ‘knowing’. It just overcame me that wellness was my next career path, and that Pilates would be my foray into this,” she reflects.

That same day she enrolled as a student into Polestar Pilates – the international authority in industry education. She was galvanised by the opportunities ahead of her, and enlightened by the methodical movements that left her feeling energised, not exhausted. 

 

 

 

It wasn’t long before she was holding small classes at her home in Tamarama, as a certified Pilates Mat, Reformer and Yoga teacher. Holding classes in her living room, to be exact. “That was actually the design inspiration for the studio,” she reveals. “I wanted to create a space that didn’t feel like a typical fitness studio…that makes you feel like you could be working out in someone’s home. A place that would bring together my passion for spirituality, design, and fashion,” she says. The studio now offers several classes a week, each distinctly uplifting and unique. They’re unified and underscored however by a shared love of movement, a respect for all body shapes, sizes and abilities, and an unflinching belief in the power of the mind-body connection. 

As any business owner knows all too well, doubts arose along the way. Would her studio stand out enough to meaningfully compete? Would people like her approach to Pilates, and the pace of her classes? Bernadette tells us it was an innate trust in the process, and a little bit of inspiration from one very famous founder, that allowed her to navigate these moments. “There is a line that Steve Jobs once said about ‘connecting the dots’ and how all the things we do in life and in our work will connect into the future. This has always stayed with me. To have the trust that the little things lead to the big things,” she says, ruminating on the 2005 Stanford University speech.

 

So what do her days look like now that she’s ‘made it’? “I typically wake up at 5am, meditate, have my coffee and will be at my studio at 5:45am ahead of my first client. After training clients for four to five hours, I take a mid-morning break, where I’ll shower, eat breakfast, or train myself.

“Around 12pm, I’ll catch up on emails, business admin, those types of things. By 4pm, I’m back into training clients and will wrap by 7pm. I like to have an early dinner and be in bed by 9pm. My days are demanding, and I need my sleep,” she says with resolve.

Ironically, her days are not all that much more relaxed than her life in New York, it seems. But they are far more rewarding, and that’s all she’s ever wanted, and more.