The Herald, Sharon, PA Published Monday, September 1, 2003

Alter moves to church

Center offers yoga, dance and more

By Joe Pinchot
Herald Staff Writer

D. Abbey Alter is adjusting from life in a cavernous building with oddly placed doors and plenty of steps and to a much smaller one with stained glass windows and a pulpit.

But it's been a good adjustment.

Ms. Alter is moving from the Walnut Street Lodge in Sharpsville to the Walnut Lodge Yoga and Movement Center in Sharon.

Ms. Alter bought the Walnut Street Lodge in 1994 and started holding classes there in 1995. She later sold the building but kept on holding classes and performances there.

But, she decided that, with a new owner's plans for other occupants, to look for a new home.

She found it in the former Christian Science Church on South Irvine Avenue at A Street.

"I like that it's just me in the building and it won't be broken up into other things," she said.

The church was most recently office space, and some remodeling had been done. Ms. Alter pulled up the rugs to expose the hardwood floors, and hopes to open up a balcony for a coffee bar and overhead seating area.

In terms of programs, "It's going to be pretty much what we're doing at the lodge," she said. "We're really going to try to keep that little niche we have in the Shenango Valley," which she described as promoting the arts and health through movement.

Latching onto studies that show that people involved in the arts have better brain function and are better in more academic areas, such as math, Ms. Alter said her offerings and the arts in general make people more understanding and empathetic of each other, and helps them connect with each other.

"It's such a struggle anymore, the performing arts, but I don't want to let go of the struggle because of the alternative," she said.

The lodge, with Ms. Alter and Jill Neiss teaching, will offer classes in dance, yoga, meditation and theater, and will host performing arts events, not necessarily by Walnut-associated performers.

"I want to open it up to people who want to do things," she said. "I'm shooting for one public performance event a month."

The former church sanctuary will probably hold up to 50 people. For dance concerts, the dancers will dance right up to the audience, she said.

Ms. Alter teaches Ashtanga yoga, which she described as a vigorous, athletic form, and plans to use ropes with inversion slings for "all kinds of upside down stuff."

She couldn't do that in Sharpsville cost-effectively because of the height of the ceilings.

With clean-up work under way, the lodge will offer free yoga classes at 6 p.m. Sept. 9-11, and an open house at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 12.

Regular classes begin the week of Sept. 15

For information about Walnut Lodge Yoga and Movement Center, call: 724-346-4746.

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