In the Mix

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New local facility combines fitness, beauty, art and food

At first you might mistake an aerial yoga class at Mix on Vine for trapeze artist practice.

“At first we were all scared to death to try it,” said Mix on Vine Creative Director Kasey Hall. “Once you get into it and get comfortable you’re flipping all over the place and going, ‘Look what I figured out how to do today.’ There’s definitely a learning curve, but you would be shocked at how quickly it comes.”

Lexington’s burgeoning fitness community gained not only aerial yoga, but classes like “Cardio Country” and “Girls on Fire” all in the same facility that also features a contemporary art gallery, a blowout bar, hair and makeup salon, manicures, coffee and healthy snacks, and lounge area.

Mix on Vine is comprised of Bloom, a full service beauty facility; Vibe, the group fitness and dance studio; Fly, the aerial yoga and TRX suspension studio; Hang, the art gallery portion that is all throughout the building; and Sip, a coffee and snack shop featuring sweets and a special menu from Mousetrap. The decor is clean, white and modern, yet warm and inviting.

Owner Karen Piazza said the concept is like nothing else in the country. She admits to disliking the term “salon” and called her business a “street-level beauty loft.”

Piazza, a Lexington native, and business partner Lydia Nemeth opened the facility earlier this year and are busy fine tuning the 9,200-square-foot space that formerly was home to the Lexington Convention and Visitors Bureau.

After living in Miami for most of her professional life and working as a spa and fitness industry professional for many years (she designed, opened and operated spas for luxury real estate developers and hotels), Piazza’s move to Lexington left her looking for something more.

She said her social life in Miama often took her to get her nails, hair and makeup done, but to get anything accomplished in Lexington required “hopping all over town,” never mind squeezing in a workout.

“I started out thinking that maybe I’d open a bohemian kind of workout studio based on a concept that I loved in Miami, with a hair salon so that you can workout and get your hair and nails done all under the same roof,” she said.

Piazza and Nemeth, who formerly worked in another salon, found a space with the help of Piazza’s husband, a commercial real estate developer, and started finding staff and conceptualizing Mix on Vine. Piazza hopes to see people making connections, building relationships and using the space as a one-stop shop for social, beauty and fitness wishes. She said the central location with ample parking makes it convenient.

“We aren’t a fitness club, it’s a boutique concept so all of our instructors are more fitness boutique types of instructors,” Piazza said. “And because we are so focused on dance in Vibe, we actually went and found dancers and Kasey (Hall) has taught them how to teach.”

Hall choreographed the Cardio Country routines (think Zumba, only with country music) and did heavy recruiting of the best fitness instructors. The staff includes University of Kentucky dancers, an Olympic hopeful, an internationally renowned fitness instructor, and former Russian ballet dancers.

On top of all of this, Piazza hopes to eventually form a nonprofit organization housed in Mix that works with at-risk children, called “Sprout.” She also sees the extra space being used to train fitness instructors, hold social events, host local philanthropic boards and more. Piazza also would like to form family fitness experiences, as well as equine hospitality packages for horse industry visitors to Lexington, and expand the art studio.

“We’re just coming out of the box and we have to walk before we can run,” she said. “There is no other concept like this in the U.S. It is ‘come as you please, pay as you go’ – we are an a la carte facility.”

Mix on Vine is located at 301 E. Vine St. For more information on the facility’s multiple offerings, call (859) 687-0630 or visit www.mixonvine.com.

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