How do you want to feel?
Restore yoga in Asheville
Rest deeply. Yin, nidra and sound.
Restore gathers the slowest, most supported classes in the city: yin, restorative, yoga nidra and sound baths. You spend most of the class lying or sitting on props, holding a few shapes for a long time or simply listening. Effort is close to zero; attention does the work.
19 classes coming up at 1 studio.
What Restore does for you
You get permission to stop. Bolsters and blankets take your weight, so your muscles can soften and your breath can slow down on its own. Many people leave feeling heavy in a good way, quieter and a bit more spacious. It is a counterweight to a week of screens, bikes and U-Bahn platforms.
It suits you if
- your week is loud and your body feels wired
- you want to practice without performing
- you find stillness hard and want help with it
- you are coming back to practice after a long break
Read the full guide to RestoreWhat a class is like, your first time, history and the words you will hear
What a class is like
Classes usually run 60 to 90 minutes, often in the evening, with dimmed lights and sometimes candles. In yin you hold floor shapes for three to five minutes, in restorative you rest in fully supported positions for up to twenty minutes, in nidra you lie still and follow a spoken guide, and in a sound bath you listen to gongs or bowls. The facilitator speaks softly, adjusts props and keeps time. You will not sweat, and you rarely talk. Expect blankets, bolsters, blocks, eye pillows and a warm space.
Your first time
- Wear soft, warm layers and bring socks; you cool down quickly when you are lying still.
- Arrive ten minutes early so you can set up your props without rushing.
- Tell the facilitator about any injuries so they can build your setup around them.
Good to know
- Long stillness can bring up restlessness or emotion; you can open your eyes, shift or sit up at any point.
- Yin holds can feel intense around the hips and spine even though they look passive, so ease off if anything feels sharp.
- If you are pregnant, let the facilitator know so they can offer side-lying or propped options.
Where it comes from
The idea that practice sits on a spectrum, from deeply restful to vigorous, is old in spirit and new as a label. Many studios now describe their schedule this way, from restore and gentle at one end to strong and sweat at the other, so you can choose by how you want to feel rather than by the name of a style. Some facilitators borrow the three gunas of Indian philosophy (tamas, rajas and sattva: heavy, active and balanced) to talk about the energy of a class, though using the gunas to rate a yoga class is a modern application.
The restful end has distinct roots. Restorative yoga grew out of B.K.S. Iyengar's use of props and was popularized by his student Judith Hanson Lasater, whose book Relax and Renew appeared in 1995. Yin yoga traces to Paulie Zink, who began showing long-held floor poses in North America in the late 1970s, and to Paul Grilley and Sarah Powers, who developed and named the practice through the 1980s and 1990s. Modern yoga nidra was popularized by Swami Satyananda Saraswati of the Bihar School of Yoga with his 1976 book Yoga Nidra; scholars note that while the term is old, the guided technique draws heavily on 20th-century Western relaxation methods.
Sound baths with gongs and singing bowls joined the mix from the 2000s onward. In Berlin, restful classes cluster in the evenings and on Sunday afternoons, and many studios now run yin, nidra and sound side by side as a wind-down offer.
Words you will hear
- Bolster
- A firm, long cushion that supports your back, belly or legs in a resting pose.
- Savasana
- Corpse pose: lying flat on your back to rest, usually at the end of class.
- Yin
- From Taoist thought, the quiet, receptive side of things; in class, long passive holds.
- Yoga nidra
- Yogic sleep: a guided rest in which you lie still and follow a voice.
- Eye pillow
- A small weighted pillow placed over your eyes to block out light.