Pure Fitness Knightsbridge

270 Orchard Road #03-03

+65 6100 3813. www.pure-fit.com

After years of competing internationally in tennis (including a decade in Hong Kong’s Davis Cup team) and running a successful video rental business (Movieland), Colin Grant experienced a yoga epiphany. “It was at Whistler, Canada, in July 2001; a four o’clock Hot Class on a Thursday afternoon. I was on a golfing holiday, but we couldn’t play because it was raining. Someone suggested yoga. I thought, ‘Isn’t yoga only for women?’ Afterwards, though, I felt younger, fitter and healthier, both physically and emotionally. Back in Hong Kong, I realised I genuinely missed it.”

So what did he do? Opened a yoga studio, of course.

Colin, born in Nigeria to a British mother and a Kiwi father before moving to Hong Kong at age 10, explains how everything fell quickly into place: “I came up with the idea in September 2001, and I opened a US$1million, 6,500-square-foot space in January 2002. At the time, there were three or four yoga studios in the city with a combined area of 2,000 square feet. People thought I was crazy.”

People were wrong. The company now encompasses multiple yoga studios, fitness clubs and dining outlets in Hong Kong, plus yoga studios in New York, Taipei and Singapore (two locations: Ngee Ann City and Chevron House). The rollout is set to continue this month, with the opening of Pure’s first Singapore fitness club in the heart of Orchard Road, at the new Knightsbridge luxury retail concept, part of the rebranded and refurbished Grand Park Orchard hotel.

Pure recently invited a media group from Singapore to Hong Kong to experience Pure Fitness in action. There’s a mindboggling range of group exercise classes available, including Capoeira, Spinning, TRX, Bollywood, Latino Jam – even Aero 70s, an aerobics class with a Saturday Night Fever aesthetic. Pure Fitness Knightsbridge will offer 80 varieties of class. Expect a huge studio, too, with state-of-the-art facilities and all kinds of freebies (wi-fi, gym gear, coffee, soft drinks).

Colin has bigger plans for Singapore, including Pure Dining. In Hong Kong, the group operates two successful eateries called RED. And they’re not just juice and salad bars. (Put it this way: during my visit, I ate an awesomely indulgent truffled mac-and-cheese, washed down with a couple of pints of Stella.). As Colin says, it’s all about balance: hitting the gym with friends, and going for a beer later – “work hard, play hard”. Whether it’s more Pure studios or a string of RED restaurants, Colin’s likely to be on a winner with the Singapore expansion.