Garden Gate Yoga

Slow yoga, Asheville

Yoga at the speed
the garden grows.

A walled garden off Montford, a mat under the old apple tree, and a full hour that refuses to hurry. Slow yoga for fifty-plus: long warm-ups, supported poses, real rest - the kind where you actually stop. The gate closes behind you and the world agrees to wait.

Reserve a garden hour View sessions
A person resting in a garden pose under a tree

Four gardens, Asheville — April through October

The case for slow

You have earned an hour that does not rush you

Most exercise for people over fifty is still sold as intensity-modified youth: faster, hotter, harder, but gentler. We teach the opposite proposition entirely - that an hour of long warm-ups, supported poses, and genuine rest is not a soft option. It is the practice.

The garden does the other half. Walled, green, and quiet, with a bench for the rest that ends every session - because nervous systems settle outdoors, and yours has been asked to settle in parking lots long enough.

The gardens

La pratique, en vrai

The bench, minute fifty
Rest is the practice, not the reward.

The teachers

Slow specialists

Delia Wren

RYT-500, restorative specialist, and a former hospice nurse who knows exactly what bodies carrying grief need - which is slower than you think and more rest than seems allowed.

Owen Tate

RYT-500, the men's and beginner's teacher. His pitch to reluctant husbands: "You will not be asked to be flexible. You will be asked to lie down under a tree." It works more than it should.

Marta Jimenez

RYT-500, bilingual, gentle-mobility specialist. The gardens are her parish; she knows which bench catches the 5pm light in every month.

Hugh Lambert

Keeps the four gardens and the glasshouse, greets every client, and claims - accurately - that nobody has ever had a bad session after petting the dog.

Sessions

Four ways through the gate

Most chosen

Start here

First Garden Hour

A full private session in the garden - assessment, gentle practice, the rest on the bench - and the tea that follows.

  • Private, always - never a group
  • Rest and tea built into every hour
  • Rain moves you to the glasshouse, never a cancellation

$60 75 minutes

Single Garden Hours

$8075 minutes

As you like

One private session, any garden, any teacher. Most people book the same hour weekly.

Season of Saturdays

$48010 sessions

Most chosen

Ten Saturday morning privates, April through October, same garden, same teacher. The seasonal rhythm people rebook quietly for years.

The Garden Year

$560year membership

The whole year

Seasonal sessions year-round - garden, glasshouse, winter slow practice - plus the quarterly restorative evenings and first pick of garden hours.

All prices USD. The gardens are private and walled; addresses shared on booking. Accessibility: two gardens have gravel paths, two are fully stepless - tell us which you need, it is a real question we take seriously.

Getting started

From first call to steady practice

01

The call

Delia, ten unhurried minutes: your body, your life, and what rest has looked like lately. The garden assignment comes from this call.

02

The first hour

Warm-up twice as long as you expect, supported poses, and ten minutes of actual rest on the bench. Then tea. The tea is part of it.

03

Your hour

Same garden, same teacher, weekly or as it suits. The practice deepens slowly, which is the only speed it deepens at.

04

The seasons

April through October outdoors; the glasshouse and the slow winter practice carry the year. Regulars rebook quietly; there is a reason.

Client stories

What our clients say

"I came a year after my wife died because my daughter insisted. Owen let me lie under the apple tree and be sad, and then we did some stretching. I go every Saturday now. It is the hour the week is built around."

Bill R.
72, retired machinist

"I expected gentle. I did not expect to fall asleep on a bench in someone's garden at 4pm on a Tuesday, in the middle of a session, with my teacher's blessing. That nap recalibrated my entire year."

Patricia N.
58

"The slow warm-up looked suspicious to this former gym teacher. Three months in, my hips and I are on better terms than we have been since the nineties, and I have recommended it to my entire church committee."

Dot M.
66

// Before you book //

Frequently asked questions

It is real, slow, and in our experience what fifty-plus bodies actually need - long warm-ups, supported poses, breath, and rest. If you want hot power flow, we will honestly recommend someone else in town.
The glasshouse: glass walls, the garden visible, rain on the roof - clients occasionally request it on sunny days. Sessions move indoors; they are never canceled for weather.
A meaningful share of our clients arrive in one of those three conditions. Delia's hospice background shaped the whole practice; the hour holds whatever you bring through the gate.
Yes, and it is lovely - one garden, two mats, one teacher. Husbands who came reluctantly become the punctual ones; Owen has a 90% conversion rate and remains humble about it.
Two fully stepless, two with gravel paths. Tell us what you need on the call - the assignment adapts, including chair-based practice in any garden.
Yourself in comfortable clothes. Mats, props, the bench, the tea, and the dog are all provided.

Contact

Tell us what rest has looked like lately

A sentence about you and what you are carrying - stiff shoulders, grief, retirement, or plain exhaustion all equally valid. Delia answers personally.

TEL (828) 555-0186
Hours Mon-Sat 8am-6pm ET

メール [email protected]