Esh Circus Arts is under a big top – the building where it’s been teaching trapeze, juggling and other physical fun for more than a decade is 6,000 square feet. But its classes are so popular that the school expands this fall to add a second location within Somerville.
The satellite space, now being painted and prepared for the start of sessions for adults Aug. 24 and for kids Sept. 14, is former storage at 38 Alston St. It’s a few minutes’ walk from the East Somerville T stop and a little over a mile from Esh’s main building at 44 Park St., Ward 2.
“We are in the lovely position of having more demand than we have space,” said Ellen Waylonis, co-owner and chief executive of Esh, in a Friday call. “We are sort of full-to-bursting at our main studio.”
That’s not new. Esh started in 2010 in a “tiny” shared space in the back of a Fenway Park CrossFit gym and had to move within a year as it attracted students. The business expanded a bit in Porter Square in 2011, Waylonis said, and at the end of 2013 moved to its current location. It wasn’t long before Esh was looking for additional space, though that paused during Covid. “Around 2023, we finally saw our numbers bounce back to where they had been before the pandemic, so we started looking again,” she said.
“Finding space that works for aerial acrobatics and circus arts is tricky, let alone one that’s also for rent and is in a good location and is the size we’re looking for,” Waylonis said, employing exactly the metaphor one might expect from someone in the circus: “It’s a little bit like trying to hit a target with a blindfold on.”
The new space, leased by Tony Lafuente’s Flagraphics sign-making business, was spotted in a post by a Somerville community group on social media. Waylonis followed up and found the right fit. “He’s been a delight,” Waylonis said of Lafuente.
The expansion also benefits Esh instructors, circus coaches whose hours have been constricted by the physical limits of how many courses and students can fit in one building. “A big part of our mission at Esh is to make teaching circus arts a viable career path,” Waylonis said. As head of a business (“A lot of people think we’re a nonprofit, which we aren’t, we’re an arts business,” she said) that provides paid breaks, vacation time and a 401(k), “expanding allows me to offer some of those coaches additional hours so they can keep doing what they want to do.”
Circus is popular in Cambridge and Somerville beyond Esh: Professional touring groups book shows at the Armory community arts building regularly, and the cities also support the OpenAir Circus, a nonprofit community-based program founded in 1983 active mainly in the summer for classes and performances. While an OpenAir season costs $30 per child or $50 per family for as many classes as the student wants to attend, Esh classes start at around $240 and can cost more than $500.
Why kids join the circus
The students keeping the coaches busy start as young as 4 and go up to people in their 70s.
The youngest demographic are placed by parents who have active kids who like creative movement; many appreciate an environment that is universally supportive. The staff is majority queer (“incorporating many letters of the alphabet,” as Waylonis put it) and focused on education, not competition. Students get the chance to take part in two public showcases a year, usually in November and April.
“A lot of dance and gymnastics studios, though wonderful, often focus on competition as a part of their program, and that’s just not something we’re doing,” Waylonis said. “It’s a little bit of a different flavor for families who just want creative movement or who think circus is cool. Because circus is super cool.”
Adults come tumbling in
Adult students also appreciate a joyful, “welcoming vibe” as they come to learn arts from contortion to juggling, she said, “something that’s a little unusual, something that mixes in exercise and creativity.”
“We do have a lot of folks who come in who are into rock climbing, who are into parkour, who do yoga, who dance. We get folks who are interested in creative movement broadly, and I’d say that’s the unifying factor. But because we offer so many different kinds of circus disciplines, it’s hard to to pinpoint one thing” that brings in students, Waylonis said.
Registration is open for the fall season of classes, but Waylonis pointed newcomers first to an open house from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Aug. 22 at the main studio. It includes tours and free miniclasses (waivers are required, but can be completed when registering) in silks and rope, partner acrobatics, handstand, aerial hoop and trapeze, Hula-Hoop and juggling.
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