Wandering Ruah, a Pop-up Yoga Studio, has Closed its Doors but is Already Planning a New Pop-up

Jenna Lehner and Cami Gore from @wandering_ruah instagram

Wandering Ruah, a pop-up yoga studio in College Park, Maryland, opened its doors for the month of November.

The studio, located in the Domain apartment building near the Robert H. Smith School of Business, offered hot yoga classes taught by a variety of instructors. All of the instructors were 200-hour certified and are continuing to practice while they teach, according to Jenna Lehner, a manager of Wandering Ruah and Ruah.

Lehner, a senior business management major, began as a manager at Ruah, the home studio of Wandering Ruah, in Annapolis, Maryland. She’s been practicing at Ruah since 2014, and “thought it would be a fun idea to open a pop-up studio in College Park,” she said.

Lehner co-opened the pop-up studio with Cami Gore, a sophomore journalism major, who completed her 200-hour certification over summer 2019. She completed the certification in vinyasa yoga with an emphasis on yoga for social justice, according to Gore.

“Ruah is interested in bringing yoga to as many people as possible. This means making it affordable, accessible and available. We priced classes as low as possible and made sure our teachers had the ability to teach to all levels,” Lehner said.

A drop-in class at the Wandering Ruah was $10, compared to Numi Yoga’s $18 drop-in class rate and Orangetheory Fitness’ $20 drop-in class rate.

The hot yoga classes that the Wandering Ruah offered allowed students to get into poses they usually might not be able to achieve without the heat, according to Gore; two of the classes provided were wandering into WARM and wandering into HOT. Both of these classes are vinyasa flows in a hot or humid room to permit deeper poses to be performed.

Anne Ziolkowski, a sophomore accounting and finance major, usually goes to the free yoga classes for students offered at Ritchie Coliseum. At one of the classes taught by Lehner, Ziolkowski was informed of the Wandering Ruah’s opening and was eager to try it. She went to one class, a class called wandering into HOT and enjoyed the class.

“I think it’s a lot better [than Ritchie Coliseum] because you get the studio environment, and it’s very affordable. The times they had available made it easy to fit into my schedule,” Ziolkowski said.

Yoga focuses on breathing in connection with posing, so it can give students that sense of relaxation they all crave, according to Gore.

“Yoga taught me discernment, how to breathe, how to control my anxieties and how to take care of my body,” Lehner said.

Due to the success of the studio, Lehner and Gore hope to bring the Wandering Ruah back to the College Park area in the future.

“Cami and I are working on our next Ruah pop-up as we speak and can’t wait to bring more mats to mother earth!” Lehner said.

Follow @wandering_ruah on Instagram to stay connected about their next adventures.