Should I try Pilates? What's the best Pilates studio in L.A.?

Sonny Koch stands with legs outstretched while holding both arms up to his chest

By Alyssa BereznakWellness Editor

April 19, 2025 6:30 AM PT

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Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. I’m Alyssa Bereznak, the wellness editor at The Times. Here’s what you need to know to start your day:

Pilates is a safe and effective form of exercise for all ages and body types. We chose the best studios in Los Angeles for you to try.
Trump’s tariffs could blow a hole in California’s economy.
These are the 21 best new cookbooks of spring 2025.
And here’s today’s e-newspaper

Spring into movement

At first glance, Pilates looks easy. At least, that’s what I remember thinking in my early 20s when I signed up for a class. You get to lie down, I thought. How hard could it be? The answer to that question, dear reader, arrived through a web of soreness that extended across the long-ignored muscles in my abdomen, butt and thighs the following morning.

I had mistaken a serene workout environment for an unserious one. But the “militaristic precision” of Pilates, as Times contributor Jackie Snow describes it in our recent guide to the best Pilates studios in L.A., is exactly what makes the exercise such an excellent method of targeting the body parts we compromise at our desk jobs.

Pilates’ many accessories, despite their resemblance to torture devices, are designed to work your entire body, maintaining your skeletal alignment and ideal range of motion for a low-impact, full-body workout. It follows that Pilates is an accessible form of exercise for a whole range of ages (including seniors) and body types. It allows you to be easy on your joints but — I cannot emphasize this enough — not your muscles.

Two women pose while stretching their legs and standing.

As is the case with any new form of exercise, expert supervision can be the difference between an effective workout and an unfortunate injury. Which is why we descended on Los Angeles to evaluate the facilities, instruction and vibes of the countless studios that dot our streets and boulevards.

The resulting 26 businesses we highlight in our new exercise guide series L.A. Circuit keep their class sizes small, and therefore provide personalized adjustment suggestions. You can feel confident that any of our picks will be a safe place for you to, like me, realize that Pilates is not as easy as it looks.

If you happen to be an especially dedicated athlete in need of an even tougher challenge, try Lagree. (Just don’t call it Pilates.) And if all this sounds a bit complicated, there’s always yoga. Either way, I hope this helps give you a movement road map as we ease into spring.

The week’s biggest stories

Side by side photos of Gov. Gavin Newsom and President Trump .

California could lose millions from Trump’s tariffs. Newsom plans to sue

California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced a lawsuit contesting President Trump’s executive authority to enact international tariffs without congressional support, which he likened to the commander in chief taking a “wrecking ball” to America’s global reputation.
California Democrats are struggling to put together a state budget given the unpredictability of the levies.

L.A. County Sheriff’s Department spent $458 million in overtime last fiscal year

1,461 of the agency’s roughly 10,000 deputy jobs sat empty by March, and an additional 900-plus were held by people out on leave.
Department data show deputies worked more than 4.3 million hours of overtime last year.

Chart shows overtime payment totals by fiscal year since 2020-2021for LASD staff.

A mysterious week for wildlife

A 50-foot gray whale washed ashore in Huntington Beach on Friday. Nonprofit workers say the young adult female showed no signs of physical injury.
Shocked by this week’s earthquake, zoo elephants formed an ‘alert circle’ to protect their young at San Diego Zoo

Get ready for the L.A. Times Festival of Books

Our annual book festival is next weekend! Admission is free. RSVP here.
Here are the 30 best nonfiction books of the last 30 years.
Want to escape reality instead? (I know I do.) Here are the 30 best fiction books.

More big stories

A California homeless man won $2.4-million from a wrongful termination lawsuit, but he’s nowhere to be found.
Championship blues: Dodgers games used to be affordable family entertainment. No more.

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This week’s must reads

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This little-known earthquake fault has been quiet. But it can unleash devastation across SoCal. Below California’s famed beaches, mountains and metropolitan areas lies a sinister web of earthquake faults — some so infamous that their names are burned into the state’s collective consciousness. While not a household name like the San Andreas, the Elsinore fault is part of a larger seismic zone that experts fear and believe more people should know about.

More great reads

This professor studies dictatorships. He helped convince Harvard to stand up to Trump.
I’ve been married 13 years. Why is vacation sex suddenly so fleeting?
Adult pelicans are falling victim to toxic algae bloom. Now their babies are starving too.

How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to essentialcalifornia@latimes.com.