Lifestyle
Paddleboarding without water? This new L.A. core workout will help you find balance
Paddleboarding just got simpler with the omission of one major element: water.
Los Angeles’ marinas, canals and channels have long been hubs for paddleboarding activities, but on a recent weekday afternoon in January, boarders flocked to the back patio of a physical therapy studio in Westwood. About half a dozen of them lay face down on their boards, gently rocking side to side atop red brick, arms outstretched and flailing beside them. From afar, they looked like an array of beached insects.
They were doing a B-Board Workout, a new exercise created by French trainer Eric Vandendriessche. He’s the personality behind Aqua Stand Up, a method he taught in L.A. from 2016-20 at the Westside Jewish Community Center and other locations. Aqua Stand Up had participants doing body-weight exercises on tethered paddleboards in a swimming pool, the instability of the water forcing them to use their core muscles. B-Board Workout is the class’ next warmer, drier iteration: done on solid ground, but just as effective for the core.
B-Board Workout founder, Eric Vandendriessche, leads ab exercises from his custom, inflatable balance board.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
During the 45-minute class, B-Boarders work out on an inflatable balance board that Vandendriessche custom-designed. Its curved bottom mimics the instability of being on the water. And it’s made to be shorter than a standard racing paddleboard so that it’s easier to store and lighter to carry around.
The end goal? Develop strength while engaging in an especially novel workout.
“It’s not paddleboarding, per se, but inspired by paddleboarding, re-creating those movements but on the ground,” Vandendriessche said during an interview at the studio, a light-filled room, scattered with candy-colored dumbbells and resistance bands. “I wanted to help people not to be afraid to go on open water or to paddleboard. And I wanted to create something exciting and fun, really helping people to get in shape, improve their balance, use their core, while also working on flexibility.”
The day I visited, most class participants were trying B-Board Workout for the first time.
“I’d just like something different,” said Maël Mayet, a 36-year-old actor-model and personal trainer. “It’s always good to keep updated.”
Maja Damjanov, 38, was skeptical of B-Board at first. She works as a coordinator and manager at the physical therapy clinic, Studio Brava, that hosts the class.
“At first I thought: ‘Oh my god, this is so L.A.! People just don’t know what to do anymore!’ she joked. “But I’m always looking for a new thing and actually, this completely makes sense. I’m older now, so I want to be healthy and I don’t want to stress my body. Plus, it’s fun.”
B-Board Workout participant, Maël Mayet, takes a quick breather between exercises.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
The B-Board Workout ended with a yoga session followed by a guided meditation.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
At the start of class we all stand on our boards, which are lined up in pairs on the narrow patio. Vandendriessche is up front demonstrating, as upbeat electronic music commingles with waves of swooshing traffic noise in the background. The resulting soundtrack is not unlike that of an L.A. beach.
“Come on, you got this,” Vandendriessche says, as we mimic basic squats, mountain climbers, bird dogs and planks on the board. He demonstrates with a broad smile, his sinewy frame repeatedly squatting, then snapping back up, like a peppy jack-in-the-box.
Soon enough, the class is trembling. Some attendees legs jiggle dramatically as they adjust to the board’s movement.
“Oh, wow, can you feel it? This one’s for your thighs,” Vandendriessche says, punctuating his instructions with a melodious “da-nah!” in sync with the music. “Rock that boat!”
Vandendriessche, 48, grew up in Southern France, in the coastal resort town of Biarritz. Sports were an integral part of his youth — he played basketball and tennis, boxed, skied and did taekwondo. He went on to earn a degree in sports management and spent more than two decades as a personal trainer and group fitness instructor in Europe.
Though Biarritz was a destination for water sports, Vandendriessche didn’t try paddleboarding until his early 30s. But when he did, he took to it instantly, paddling on rivers, lakes and the “crazy waves” of the Atlantic Ocean. His favorite spot was the narrow, tree-lined La Nive river, which snakes through Basque Country. Its gentle currents and leafy surroundings reminded him of a calm bayou, quiet but for the intermittent buzzing of insects and the splash of his paddle.
The idea for Aqua Stand Up came to Vandendriessche while he was paddleboarding in 2009.
“It was super relaxing and I felt my core, I felt everything,” he said. “I said to myself, ‘Oh, I would love to propose something to my clients.’ So I brought my board into the swimming pool and invited some of my personal training clients to try it. The feedback was awesome.”
Maël Mayet, left, and Studio Brava founder, Cristina Popescu, do planks as part of the B-Board Workout.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
He devised the B-Board while teaching an Aqua Stand Up class in 2011. Vandendriessche was demonstrating the workout on a pool deck, with his students in the water, and noticed the wooden board he was using didn’t rock the way he wanted it to on the hard surface. He filed away the idea for a dry, grounded paddleboard and continued to teach Aqua Stand Up classes, eventually bringing the exercise to L.A. in 2016.
Then, in 2018, Vandendriessche dug up his notes and finally designed a board he could use on land. “I’m not an engineer, but I can draw,” he said.
The B-Board took about six months to build. Then Vandendriessche spent the next two years testing it out at private events and festivals, making tweaks to the workout and improving upon the board’s design. After three iterations, he was finally satisfied.
When the pandemic hit, B-Board class attendance waned. But in early 2023, Vandendriessche met Studio Brava founder, Cristina Popescu, at a fitness convention in downtown L.A. Popescu was looking for a way to incorporate fitness classes into her physical therapy business. The two decided to partner up.
Studio Brava founder, Cristina Popescu, stretches on her B-Board. “I was tired after 10 minutes — and I’m active!” she said.
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
“I always felt we had to bring to the community mindfulness and fitness and health in general not just rehabilitation,” Popescu said. “I’m super excited about B-Board because it’s something new, and it involves a lot of proprioceptive mechanisms for balance. I tried it and I was tired after 10 minutes — and I’m active!”
The B-Board is the latest entry in a larger fitness trend of bringing board sports on land and indoors. Brushboarding, which employs a wave-like ramp made of spinning brushes on which participants can simulate surfing, has been around for more than a decade. But B-Boarding can be done on any hard surface and requires far less equipment.
Benefits of the B-Board Workout, according to Vandendriessche, include its accessibility and flexibility. The board can be inflated to varying degrees of firmness, making it more or less wobbly and difficult to balance on. Much like a Bosu ball, one side of the board is flat, and the other is curved. When it’s positioned flat-side down, it’s more stable and easier to maneuver — better for wary first-timers. But unlike a round Bosu ball, users can lay their entire body on the board’s surface, allowing for more types of high- or low-impact exercises.
“So it’s for everyone, all ages, all fitness levels,” Vandendriessche said. “It’s especially good for developing the stabilizing muscles, the muscles that protect you from falling down.”
Vandendriessche estimates that participants can burn between 400 and 900 calories in a 45-minute class, based on data from his Apple Watch and the fitness tracker Myzone.
It’s a “choose your own adventure” kind of exercise. There’s a HIIT fitness version (“B-Board Boost”), a yoga version (“B-Board Breathe”) and a kids version (“B-Board Bounce”). Classes are $30 each. There are instructional videos online for people who own their own B-Board, which costs $450 online. but Studio Brava is the only location in L.A. offering in-person classes.
Maël Mayet’s final verdict on the B-Board Workout? “Loved it. Very challenging. It’s nice to work out outside of my comfort zone.”
(Michael Blackshire / Los Angeles Times)
Back on Studio Brava’s patio, our class winds down with some yoga. After the down dogs and child’s poses, we lie flat on our backs on the boards as Vandendriessche leads a slow, guided meditation.
“Close your eyes and imagine we are all together on the ocean,” he says, letting out a deep exhale. Now rock the boat, as if you were on the water.” Participants’ bodies loosen and wiggle slightly, as their boards sway side to side.
It was surprisingly relaxing. Even better? No one got seasick.
“She’s like a female Willy Wonka,” Sakief Baron, 36, said about Kendra Austin, 32, after she explained that her personal style had a playful and cartoonish spirit.
Dressed in loose, oversize layers in blue and neutral shades, the couple were walking on the Upper East Side of Manhattan when I noticed them on a Saturday in April. There was a symmetry to their ensembles, so it wasn’t too surprising when she noted that he had influenced her fashion sense.
Before they met, she said, she was “less sure” about her wardrobe choices. “I also have lost 100 pounds in the time we’ve been together,” she added, which she said had helped her to recalibrate her relationship with clothes.
His style has been influenced by hip-hop culture, basketball players like Allen Iverson and his mother’s Finnish background. “I just take all these pieces and then it kind of comes together,” he said.
Both described themselves as multidisciplinary artists; he also has a job at a youth center, mentoring children. “I want to make sure that I look like someone they want to aspire to be every time they see me,” he said.
In my L.A. Buy Nothing group, I started noticing how some objects, given for free from neighbor to neighbor, carry emotional weight. An item was more than it appeared. It was a piece of personal history, perhaps one with generational memories.
From one person’s hands to another’s, objects find new life through the free gift economy on Facebook or the Buy Nothing app. Buy Nothing Project, a public benefit corporation, reports having 14 million members across more than 50 countries who give away 2.6 million items a month. There are more than 100 groups in Los Angeles alone.
Buy Nothing reduces waste by keeping items out of landfills. It also builds community. When our lives are increasingly online, Buy Nothing encourages us to get out of our cars and make connections with neighbors, even if the interaction is no more than a wave when picking something up left by a doorstep. Researchers have found that even small social interactions can foster a sense of belonging.
Still, Buy Nothing has its challenges. For years, some have complained that the groups shouldn’t be limited to neighborhoods, but rather have more open borders. Last year, many longtime members complained about the project enforcing its trademark, leading Facebook to shut down unregistered groups even if they were serving people under economic strain. Critics saw the tattling as a shift from mutual aid toward control and branding. For its part, Buy Nothing says its decisions are based on building community, trust and safety.
Despite those disagreements, Buy Nothing offers a platform for special connections. As much as there are jokes about people offering half-eaten cake, many have passed along treasured items. Buy Nothing items may feel too valuable for the trash or too personal for Goodwill. The interaction between giver and receiver becomes just as meaningful as the object itself.
I set out to document these quiet exchanges in my Buy Nothing group, drawn to the question of why people choose to pass their belongings from one neighbor to another.
Tiny builders, big exchange
Lidia Butcher gives a toolbox and worktable her two sons used to Chelsea Ward for her 17-month-old son.
“We’ve had the toolbox and worktable for the last 10 years, it’s been very special. When I told my youngest son we were going to give it away, he was a little sad. He said he was still playing with it, but then I explained that it’s been sitting untouched for a year and that if we gave it to someone else, maybe someone else would be happy about it. So he felt joy about giving it to another child who would want to play with it. I have this little emotional feeling letting it go, but at the same time, it’s a good feeling. Like a new beginning.”
— Lidia Butcher, 35, joined the group several years ago when someone told her a person in the group once asked for a cup of sugar.
“We’re getting a worktable. Benji is now old enough to be interested in playing with tools. I’m going to move my drafting table out of his room. His bedroom is my office. So that will go into storage or the Buy Nothing group and the worktable will go in its place. We live in an apartment, and as he’s growing, his needs change but our space doesn’t. Buy Nothing is really helpful to be able to cycle out of stuff.”
— Chelsea Ward, 38, has found the Buy Nothing group extremely helpful since becoming a mom.
Something borrowed
Abby Rodriguez lends Sophie Janinet a veil for her wedding.
“Sophie had asked for a wedding veil on our Buy Nothing group and I’m lending it to her because I wanted it to have a second life. I hate the idea that precious things just sit there and never get touched. My wedding day was one of the best days of my life. At one point the power went out and now we have this amazing picture with my husband and I and everyone using their phone to light up the dance floor.”
— Abby Rodriguez, 40, discovered Buy Nothing when she moved to her northeast L.A. neighborhood in 2020.
“I moved to Los Angeles from France four years ago. The day I joined Buy Nothing was the first time I felt connected to the community. It played a huge role in my adapting to life here. I’m receiving a veil because I want my wedding to look and feel like my values. I thrifted my dress, I chose a local seamstress to alter the dress but when I tried it on, I felt something was missing. I wanted a veil but I didn’t want to buy new because I didn’t want to add anything to the landfill. So I posted a request for the veil on Buy Nothing.”
— Sophie Janinet, 37, is recreating the low-waste, slower-paced values she once lived by in France through her local Buy Nothing community.
2
1. Abby Rodriguez, left, holds her wedding veil that she is lending Sophie Janinet, right, for her upcoming wedding. 2. Michele Sawers, left stands with Beth Penn, right, while giving her a decorative owl.
A pigeon-spooking owl gets a second life
Michele Sawers gives Beth Penn a decorative owl.
“Coming from a place of luck, now I have plenty to give. The owl has been with me for 26 years. I bought the owl soon after I bought this house. The owl was purchased because I had a pigeon problem, they would camp out under my eves and I would have bird poop everywhere. The owl must have worked because they’re gone and they haven’t come back.”
— Michele Sawers, 58, uses Buy Nothing regularly to connect with her community and support her low-consumption values.
“There are things I don’t want to own. So borrowing those things on Buy Nothing is really nice. There is a person who I borrowed their cooler twice and their ladder twice so I feel like they are my neighbor even though they are not [right next door]. We get these birds that poop on the deck and the recommendation online was to get a fake owl. When it was posted on Buy Nothing, I thought, ‘I have to have that owl!’ It’s going to have a good home with me on the deck with some cats, a dog and some kids.”
— Beth Penn, 47, once helped build her local Buy Nothing group and now experiences it from the other side, as a member.
Stuffed toys find a new purpose
Magaly Leyva, left, stands with Tatiana Lonny, right, with the stuffed toys and play balls she is gifting her.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
Magaly Leyva gives stuffed toys and plastic play balls to Tatiana Lonny.
“My mother-in-law gave the dolls and plastic play balls to my daughter, but she has so much. My daughter is not going to play with them with the same intent that another kid would, because she’s really little. I’d rather another kid use these things.”
— Magaly Leyva, 35, joined Buy Nothing nearly four years ago to find clothes for her nephew.
“I’m taking these new items to a township called Langa in South Africa. I know the kids there will be so happy. They have so little there. I’m doing this all by myself, I’m just collecting a GoFundMe for the suitcase fee at the airport.”
— Tatiana Lonny, 51, began using Buy Nothing in hopes of finding resources to support the animals she rescues.
A second helping
Laura Cherkas gives Aurora Sanchez a cast iron pan.
“Buy Nothing gives me the freedom to let go of things because I know that they will stay in the community and the neighborhood. I’m giving a couple of cast iron items that my husband and I got when we were on a cast iron kick, probably during COVID. We determined that we don’t actually use these particular pans and they were just making our drawers heavy. So we decided to let someone else get some use out of them.
“I hate throwing things away. I want to see things have another life. Sometimes I take things to a donation center, but I like the personal connection with Buy Nothing and that you know that there is someone who definitely wants your item.”
— Laura Cherkas, 40, has built connections with other moms through Buy Nothing and values it as a way to cycle toys in and out for her child.
Laura Cherkas, left, holds the pan she is gifting Aurora Sanchez, right, through Buy Nothing.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
“I wanted a cast iron pan because I cook a lot of grilled meat. I’m excited to try this style of cooking out and it will help me when I cook for only one or two people. I got lucky because I was chosen to receive it.”
— Aurora Sanchez, 54, has spent the past two years engaging with Buy Nothing, finding in it a sense of neighborly support that makes her feel valued while strengthening her connection to the community.
Next player up
Joe Zeni, 70, is using his local Buy Nothing group on Facebook to give away a basketball hoop he used with his son when he was little.
(Dania Maxwell/For The Times)
Joe Zeni first offered a basketball hoop on Buy Nothing in 2023, where it remains unclaimed.
“I’m giving away a Huffy basketball freestanding hoop because it’s just taking up space. We used to play horse and shoot baskets together. My son is now 35, he doesn’t live here anymore.”
— Joe Zeni, 70, uses Buy Nothing often to give items away, believing many of the things he no longer needs still have purpose.
In the year since his death, there has been no hard pivot at Armani. The shadow of the founder has stayed in place over the Milan HQ, where the brand seems happy to leave it. Armani is not just plumbing the past for continued inspiration, it’s reselling it.
Today, Giorgio Armani is announcing Archivio, a grouping of 13 men’s and women’s looks, plucked from the brand’s back catalog and remade for today. (And, yes, at today’s prices.) There’s a jacket in pinstriped alpaca of 1979 vintage; a buttery one-and-a-half breasted jacket with a maitre d’s flair that first appeared in 1987; and an unstructured silk-linen suit that will activate ’90s flashbacks for die-hard Armani clients and those who want to capture that era’s nostalgia. The advertising campaign was shot and styled by Eli Russell Linnetz, who has his own label, ERL, but always seems to be the first call brands make when they want sultry photos with the aura of Details magazine circa 1995. (He did a similar thing for Guess recently.)
Linnetz’s images are a reminder of how Armani’s work still reverberates decades later.
Archivio is also a canny recognition of what shoppers crave now. On the resale market, Armani wares are as coveted as can be. Every week it seems as if I get an email from Ndwc0, a British vintage store, announcing a new drop of meaty-shouldered ’90s Armani power suits. They sell for less than $500. At Sorbara’s in Brooklyn, you can buy a tan Giorgio Armani vest for $225.
That vintage-mad audience is in Armani’s sights: To introduce the collection, it’s staging an installation, opening today, at Giorgio Armani’s Milan boutique. It will feature the hosts of “Throwing Fits,” a New York-based podcast whose hosts wear vintage Armani button-ups and shout out stores like Sorbara’s.
It’s prudent, if a bit disconnected. Part of the charm of old Armani is that it can be found on the cheap. I’m wearing a pair of vintage Giorgio Armani corduroys as I write this. I bought them for $76 on eBay. Archivio is reverent, but its prices, which range from $1,025 to $12,000, may scare off shoppers willing to do the searching themselves.
If you ask me, the next frontier of this archive fixation is that a brand — and a big one — will release a mountain of genuine vintage pieces. J. Crew and Banana Republic have tried this at a small scale, but a luxury house like Armani hasn’t gone there. Yet. Eventually, Armani (or a brand like it) is going to grab hold of the market that exists around its brand, but through which it gets no cut.
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