Harlequin extends range of ballet barres

British Harlequin has continued to develop and expand the range of ballet barres, both freestanding and for permanent installation, and can now offer a comprehensive selection to suit a wide variety of requirements. Whichever type is selected the value of a sturdy, robust ballet barre is regarded as essential for warm up and stretching exercises to properly increase blood flow to muscles and reduce the risk of injury before taking to the dance floor. Harlequin’s wall mounted ballet barres include both single and double barre versions and can be installed using a choice of various shaped mounting plates to suit the particular needs of a studio. The new pillar-mounted brackets are used in conjunction with floor-mounted brackets to reduce intrusion into studios that have pillars. 

As well as wall-mounting, several other mounting bracket options have been developed. Harlequin also offers a range of freestanding ballet barres, lightweight for transportation thanks to their aluminium construction and with a choice of aluminium or beech barre.

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New single and double barre pillar mount brackets for the Harlequin ballet barres are available in black or grey colourways.

New Jerwood DanceHouse at DanceEast has Harlequin floors

Dance floors have been provided by British Harlequin to the new Jerwood DanceHouse for DanceEast. 

DanceEast is one of a growing number of centres for dance globally that have been created to reach out to communities and act as magnets for national and international dance artists. This £8.9 million development on the Ipswich waterfront is the cultural hub of the regenerated dockside and will be the hothouse for the development and presentation of new and emerging dance talent. The DanceHouse houses three dance studios, a 200-seat flexible space studio theatre, fitness and Pilates suites, the Danceeats! café and Dance Vibe dancewear shop.

Photo: DanceEast.

Harlequin sprung floors for Shanghai international school

Harlequin’s Hong Kong office recently supplied more than 270m² of Harlequin Liberty Sprung panels covered with a Harlequin Fiesta dance surface to the Concordia International School in Shanghai. 

New, informative publication issued by Harlequin

British Harlequin has just released a publication reviewing a number of recent installations and applications using products from the company’s range of floors for dance, stage and display. 

Published as a convenient A5 magazine style review, Harlequinade is colourfully illustrated throughout and showcases a diversity of flooring uses from the new Scottish Ballet HQ in Glasgow to a dance school based in a village hall in Kent. Stories range from Hollywood to Shanghai and Sydney and from dance to television. Even aerial dancers in Denver appreciate landing on a Harlequin floor it seems. 

Copies of Harlequinade can be requested by calling British Harlequin or by registering on the web site. 

British Harlequin Scholarship winners at Wells Weekends

British Harlequin plc has been associated with what are now known as  The Wells Weekends, since its beginnings  at Beechwood Sacred Heart School in Tunbridge Wells. Organiser Francesca Filpi now brings the story up to date. 

The Wells Summer School has an exciting new format. It is now being held over weekends, known as the Wells Weekends, the first of which took place at the end of August at the Royal Opera House. The students were very privileged to have the chance to dance in the beautiful studios used by the dancers of the Royal Ballet. The studio floors are all supplied by British Harlequin plc. Francesca Filpi, who organises the Wells courses said, “Dancers and serious students have come to expect floors of the high quality which only Harlequin can provide. Floors are something we all take for granted, until we don’t have them! Only then do we realise how much more vulnerable to injury we are, if we have to work on hard floors, not specifically constructed for ballet “.

Photo: courtesy of Francesca Filpi - taken in Clore Studio, Royal Opera House Winners of the British Harlequin Scholarships, Anna Rose O'Sullivan and Laura Jane Fenney, both pupils of RBS with Francesca Filpi.

Yorkshire Ballet Summer Schools continues association with Harlequin

Harlequin’s involvement with Yorkshire Ballet Seminars dates back more than 20 years and both David Gayle, who started the Seminars and Marguerite Porter who has taken up his mantle, have always insisted on the best dance floors. This year was no exception with Harlequin Cascade and Harlequin Liberty sprung floor panels once again the preferred choice. 

Photo: Elizabeth Harrod by Sophie Harris-Taylor.

Harlequin floors for ballet performance at Sydney's Pink Ribbon Ball

When Remi Wortmeyer and Miwako Kubota stars of the Australian Ballet performed at Sydney's Pink Ribbon Ball last month they were dancing on a black Harlequin Studio dance floor.  The flooring was supplied thanks to Gunter Goetz, Managing Director of Harlequin Australasia Pty Ltd. Harlequin Studio is a hard wearing floor covering specially designed for dance, studio and stage use. The 16th Annual Pink Ribbon Ball is a fund raiser for the Sydney Breast Cancer Foundation.