You may have noticed the corner of Church St and Vine St on Murfreesboro’s downtown square looks a little different. What once was an empty building with a black coat of paint now features a pink-and-white striped wall (that you’ve probably seen photographed on social media.) Inside these striped walls are barres, bikes, and a community that is flipping the idea of a “boutique fitness studio” completely upside down.

Garage Barre (now “Garage Barre + Bike” since the addition of indoor cycling) first opened its doors in 2016 in an actual garage, hence the name. Co-owners Lacey Garrett and Kirby Dudley transformed Lacey’s garage into an Instagram-worthy, pink dream of a fitness studio. They noticed a trend in the world of boutique fitness, that having a perfect body, wealth, and an elite social status were requirements. Along with this, came judgmental glances, body shaming, and a sense of not being enough. Barre studios in particular had this stigma and came with a hefty monthly membership fee, but otherwise barre is an amazing full-body, low impact workout that infuses ballet, yoga, and Pilates to lengthen and strengthen muscles.

Lacey and Kirby desired to make barre fitness accessible to people of all shapes, sizes, fitness levels, and backgrounds in a culture that cultivates a sense of community and belonging. Their dream was a fitness studio where being strong was valued over being skinny and community was valued over competition. They envisioned a class where you actually talk to and laugh with the person on the mat (and now bike) next to you, and you didn’t have to be fit or have on $100 leggings to walk through the door. One night they put their passion to paper and came up with a plan to make this a reality.

Within 6 weeks of opening their doors, Garage Barre had outgrown the garage and needed a bigger space, eventually expanding a total of 3 times before landing at its current home: the corner of Church Street & Vine Street, across from the city’s library. Garage Barre + Bike has grown from offering 12 weekly barre classes to now 52 barre classes per week, ranging in times from 5AM to 8PM. With the stereotype of barre now being broken, they decided to continue their mission by also changing the competitive nature of indoor cycling studios, which were spreading like wildfire in big cities (i.e. Soulcycle), but hadn’t yet come to Murfreesboro. It was the perfect high intensity yet still low impact cardio workout to pair with barre, but once again seemed reserved for only perfect bodies in sports bras all lined up in a row and with a price tag far outside of most budgets.

So they decided to rebrand as Garage Barre + Bike and open Murfreesboro’s first indoor rhythm based, full body indoor cycling studio. They ordered 27 top of the line indoor cycles, including, of course, an Instgrammable pink bike for the perfect Biker Babe selfie. They flew in a master indoor cycling trainer from GritCycle in Southern California to train their team of high energy, people loving instructors. As of July 1st, they offer rhythm based, emotionally driven indoor cycling classes that incorporate upper body choreography creating an experience unlike other cycle studios where the focus is on changing the number on your power meter and your stats displayed on a leaderboard, comparing you to everyone else in class, creating an atmosphere of competition and failure if you don’t measure up. Instead, they wanted a space where people could come sweat it out and feel empowered, even if they need to sit in the saddle the whole time and where they leave the weight of the world behind at the door, losing themselves in the beat of the music.

At Garage Bike, you ride with your tribe in a dim, candle-lit room, and pedal away from any self-doubt or insecurity. As one rider notes, “Bike is my self-care, therapy, and alone time wrapped into one. No matter what crap I come in with, I leave feeling strong, powerful, and capable.”

Since Garage Barre + Bike is local, not a corporate chain, they can live up to their mission of making it accessible to everyone. You can become an unlimited monthly barre and bike member for less than what most boutique studios charge for barre or bike alone.

Ultimately, beyond the barre or the bike, Lacey and Kirby want one message to resonate from their cute, pink-striped building: there’s room for everyone at the barre and everyBODY can bike. To them, everyone who walks through their studio door is always a VIP, no matter what.

To sign up for classes, download the Garage Barre + Bike app for iPhones or Android or visit garagebarreandbike.com.