Chelsea Kawana. Featured in Point Life in 2016.
Over the past decade we’ve met some friendly folk who’ve made Hobsonville Point their home. We catch up with some of them again and hear how life is at the Point.
Five years ago, Pilates instructor Chelsea Kawana was running down in Catalina Bay and dreamed, “I’ll have a studio here one day”. She even got a photo of herself to commit to her plan. At the time, Chelsea and her husband Cheyne were setting up their business in a work-below-and-live-above terrace house on Hobsonville Point Road, when the area “was still only in the early stages of development”.
Now, with the opening of their new pilatesFIT Boutique premises next to the farmers’ market, Chelsea’s dream has come true. The new studio means the business has room to grow – with room for eight reformer machines, rather than the previous six. With a busy family life and their own business, the move down to Catalina Bay was full-on, but worth it. “It’s cool. It was a big job, but it’s good to separate our living space from the studio.”
It’s not just the business that’s grown – Chelsea and Cheyne’s family has grown, too. They’ve welcomed toddler son Jai to the family, joining Ameliya, 14 and Alyssa, 12.
Before making their life in Hobsonville Point in 2016, the Kawana family had been based in Birkenhead, after living on the Gold Coast for a few years. Moving to the Point, Chelsea was worried about retaining their Birkenhead client base, but she needn’t have been concerned. Because Hobsonville Point is so centrally located, pilatesFIT kept its clients from the Shore, but also gained new ones from the Point itself, as well as from Silverdale, Whangaparaoa and West Auckland.
Chelsea describes the studio as being “community style”. “We’ve created a community in our studio here. We work hard, but we also have a lot of fun. It’s not traditional Pilates – it has more of a fitness element. I genuinely enjoy what I do. It feels like my friends come over for classes.”
Looking back on their time at Hobsonville Point and looking forward to the future, Chelsea is happy with their life here. “Coming here has done us well – for both business and family.”
