Learn about our yoga studio here. Place can be transformative, especially when it exists in service of something larger than the self. Atlas Yoga Studio is a little more than the typical yoga studio. We offer amazing classes for all skill levels, but our goal is deeper than that. We've built a transformative space of retreat, refuge, and incubation where we encourage, empower and equip yogis of all levels to tap into their latent capabilities, and stoke the fires of their deepest sense of purpose, both on the microcosmic and macrocosmic scales. Our driving force is to serve others, as they grow to serve the world.
Atlas is a global network of seekers who look beyond dogma to explore deeper spiritual possibilities; forge new understandings of self and other; and pioneer new paths for change. People find us from all around the world and journey to our space to connect, learn and grow - to become the change that we wish to see in the world. Our students are encouraged to explore and realize their potential through direct experience, education and ongoing dialogue. Together, we're working towards the realization of a peaceful, just, creative and sustainable world, asking hard questions and facilitating deep connection, conversation, freedom to fail and space to grow and change. We sponsor socially responsible projects in our community and beyond through donations of space, time and training. We provide personal, spiritual and socially transformative programs for our community and beyond.
Our Style - the samasa Yoga method
Yoga means unity, or the integration of all parts of the self—body, mind and spirit—through physical postures, breathing techniques, mental focus, somatic education and other yoga technology. Our community of knowledgeable and dedicated staff and teachers are committed to sharing a integrative yoga experience.
With a team of talented teachers we offer yoga teacher training, yoga therapy training, and yoga classes and therapy and workshops for all skill levels. At Atlas Yoga, we integrate many styles of yoga including the Samasa Yoga Method developed by Denise, Ashtanga, Kripalu, Iyengar, Vinyasa, Sivananda, Tantric Yoga Traditions (including Yoga Nidra and mudras). We offer a broad variety of meditation techniques and the training to become a certified meditation teacher.
Find a class that fits your schedule, lifestyle and budget. We offer a range of classes from beginner to advanced, as well as private yoga therapy with expert teachers. We offer a variety of ongoing workshops, trainings, retreats and pop-up yoga events.
At Atlas Yoga Studio we often referred to as yoga teachers’ yoga teachers and we make it easy to start your yoga practice with us or deepen an existing one!
There are so many amazing benefits of yoga that we're excited to share with you, including:
gaining flexibility, mobility and reduced pain
reducing stress, lowering anxiety, reducing the effects of depression
recovering from an injury and trauma
maintaining overall health and wellness
Yoga means unity, or the integration of all parts of the self—body, mind and spirit—through physical postures, breathing techniques and mental focus. Our community of knowledgeable and dedicated staff and teachers is committed to giving you a complete yoga experience.
Find a class that fits your schedule, lifestyle and budget. We offer a range of classes from beginner to advanced, as well as private lessons with many teachers and workshops.
The best way to begin a yoga practice is with our comprehensive Beginners Series. Learn basic yoga poses and methods of breathing, as well as some of the history and lifestyle of yoga, in a class that meets at convenient times 2 times a week for a month.
We offer a variety of classes at our studio throughout the month - please check out our schedule. Here's a breakdown of what you can expect in each class.
Samasa Yoga
Cultivates strength, flexibility and relaxation through awareness of alignment and mindful actions of the body. Inspired by Kripalu yoga and influenced by Iyengar, Sivananda, Shiva Ray, Somatics, Flendenkrais, Alexander Technique, pilates, physiotherapy, cranial sacral method and much more.
Samasa Vinyasa Flow Yoga
incorporates yoga postures from the teachings of Krishnamacharya and the Ashtanga Style of yoga in a flowing or vinyasa style, allowing for a comfortable introduction to classical yoga asana or an opportunity for yoga practitioners to focus on details. This is a challenging practice class, we move from posture to posture and you will break a sweat. Great for beginners who are physically fit or who have experience with regular exercise.
Restorative Yoga,Fertility, PreNatal, PostNatal, Yoga Nidra, Yoga for Healing Trauma, The Atlas Children’s workshop, meditation, mindfulness …
Acknowledgment
We acknowledge that our studio started out on the Haldimand Tract, the land promised to the Six Nations that includes ten kilometers on each side of the Grand River. We acknowledge and thank the history and legacy of the Anishinaabe, Haudenosaunee, and Attawandaron (Neutral) peoples, and extend our thanks for being able to gather, learn and grow as a community here.
We stand with Black and Indigenous people in solidarity, collaboration, mutual support and resilience. We commit ourselves to confronting, challenging, and uprooting the powers of racism and colonialism at all levels of our personal, social, and collective spaces.
Lineage Acknowledgement
An integral part of all classical schools of yoga is their lineage, or a tracing of their roots from teacher to teacher to teacher. The importance of a lineage to any tradition is that, due to the interplay of different perspectives brought together by generations of teachers, the teachings automatically encompass subtle breadth and depth—a merging of awakening minds. The presence of lineage guarantees a transmission of the most essential and subtle experience of yoga, which otherwise can be missed in the shadow of the ego.
Atlas Yoga Studio and School follows the multiple traditions of Swami Kripalvanandaji, Amrit Desai, T Krishnamacharya, TKV Desikachar and K Pattabhi Jois. We are an hatha and ashtanga based yoga studio, founded Denise Davis-Gains in 1999. The Atlas Yoga Teacher Training Program was started in 1997 by Denise Davis-Gains.
The Ashtanga Vinyasa lineage, like any living lineage, is a hybrid of yoga methodologies and philosophies, which converge clearly in the teachings of the early Upanishads and blossom later in the practices of Hatha yoga and Tantra. The internal forms of Ashtanga Vinyasa yoga—using bandha, mudra, drishti, and ujjai breathing—are the pinnacle of Tantric technique, which are also brought to light in the broad clarifying context of Patanjali’s yoga philosophy and the nondualism of the Upanishads. This traditional approach is recognizable in Hindu and Buddhist contemplative traditions as well as in the direct experience of the practitioner.
The Ashtanga Vinyasa lineage of practice, as taught today, comes to us directly through the teachings of T. Krishnamacharaya and K. Pattabhi Jois who collaborated in the 1930’s as teacher and student to develop the flowing form and series of postures we call Ashtanga Vinyasa yoga. Their work, derived in part from the internal principles of vinyasa found in the ancient Indian text, the Yoga Kurunta, draws together the potent threads of yoga asana with traditional Indian philosophy, pranayama, and meditation, so that integrated movement, form, and awareness invite the student into the present moment. Through teachers such as Richard Freeman, David Williams, David and Doug Swenson and many somatic practitioners the Samasa Vinyasa Style of Yoga was born and continues to evolve.
Accessibility + Diversity
Our physical space
We currently sharing space in Galt at the Park Hill Studios, in the Dolcetta Studio 20 Park Hill Rd East and at Goodness Me on Hespeler Road - both in Cambridge. We are also still offering a full schedule of live-online yoga classes. a Sign up for our newsletter to be informed of upcoming changes.
We are now on the 3rd floor and there is a freight elevator for accessibility. Please contact us and make arrangements for it’s use.
gender neutral, individual washrooms and space to change there
Since the Pandemic we encourage you to bring your own props in class: yoga blocks, towels, bolsters, blankets and yoga straps - we will have some limited access to props but for hygiene purposes it is ideal to bring your own.
Financial accessibility
Scholarships to our trainings and workshops for those who identify as Residing in countries with third world economies, Women, Black, Indigenous, people of colour, 2SLGBTQIA+ and differently abled.
Sliding scale prices for our classes, free first class
Free community class options
Live stream options
Social enterprise
During the Pandemic we offered Free Unlimited Access to online live and on-demand yoga and meditation for Frontline Health Care Workers - and we continue to support our Frontline Health Care Workers with affordable programming, workshops designed with them in mind and staying abreast of the political issues that they face in job security, quality of life and overall wellness.
Free Unlimited Access to online live and on-demand yoga and meditation for Military Deployed and their Families always.
Donations to all charities who ask for silent auction items (foodbanks, shelters, service organizations, schools, fund raisers and more)
Scholarships to all of our programs.
Mentorship Programs
Employee students in work-study and internship experiences locally and abroad.
Downtown Galt in Cambridge, Ontario
Meet Denise
Founding Director, Atlas Studio
Through a lifetime of spiritual pilgrimage, Denise a mixed blood woman of Native and European descent, has learned to move gracefully and appreciate music, she enjoys a good story and was blown wide open when spirit, movement and sacred music met on the yoga mat in 1993. Denise has developed the accessible, trauma sensitive, therapeutic, somatic, Samāsa style of yoga which is routed in Kripalu/Ashtanga styles of yoga and influenced by the many styles of yoga that she explored in her early career as a yoga teacher. Denise walks a shamanic path towards wholeness & integration as a healer, yoga teacher, mentor and leader.
Denise’s journey towards yoga began with her studies in philosophy at Memorial University of Newfoundland. She has since acquired degrees from York University, Ryerson University and Wilfrid Laurier University. She has studied Sanskrit at McMaster University and writing at Naropa in Boulder Colorado. She has been teaching the movement arts since 1984. Denise brings a playful and grounded awareness into her classes while emphasizing presence and non-judgment. Her roots are in Kripalu and Ashtanga yoga, dance, fitness, creative movement and the juicy mystery of life. Denise has taught yoga to people from all walks of life ranging from palliative care patients to at risk youth, from movies stars to political figures, from seniors to cirque de soleil performers. Teaching and especially training teachers and yoga therapist is her gift. Denise is registered at the 500hr Gold Level with the Canadian Yoga Alliance and is a Certified by the International Association of Yoga Therapists as 1000hr Yoga Therapist. Denise writes for main stream Yoga publications, such as the IAYT Journal, is frequently interviewed by major yoga magazine and podcasts such as the Yoga Journal Magazine and Women’s Health Magazine. Denise is considered an expert in the field of trauma informed yoga, yoga therapy and meditation.