Fitness line keeps body-image concerns in mind

Aurum Activewear

Laziness, intimidation, plain old burnout — there are plenty of excuses to avoid a good workout. And feeling self-conscious is right up there, what with droopy sports bras, shapeless tank tops, and yoga pants that fit snugly enough to make any exerciser feel like a tube of toothpaste, squeezed in all the wrong places.

Enter Aurum, a new workout line from Weston native Alissa Pool that launched this month. Pool runs the Btone suite of fitness studios throughout the area, which specialize in Megaformer workouts. She’ll carry the line at her Wellesley outpost. (Customers can also shop online at www.aurumactivewear.com.)

“Megaformer is like Pilates on steroids,” she says with a laugh. “It’s set to upbeat music, and you’re standing, moving all around, and it goes by really fast.”

As such, she has encountered plenty of women who wanted to feel comfortable twisting into potentially awkward poses. She’s also a mom of teenagers and branched into fitness after her children were born, and she’s sensitive to body-image concerns.

“This line is made for women and designed by a team of women who have children. When we set out to design this, we asked: ‘What do women worry about? Does something cut you at the waist? Can you see body parts?’ At the end of the day, every woman wants to look good,” she says. “But with mesh cuts and things that are in style, you might want to wear them because they’re trendy, but you don’t feel you look good.”

As such, her compression leggings have a mid- or high-rise waistband, to avoid muffin tops. Tanks and bras come in an ultra-thin, soft two-ply fabric; the first layer wicks sweat and a second layer evaporates moisture.

“People even sleep in them. [The fabric] just feels so good on your body,” Pool says.

For the truly stylish, there’s a shape-smoothing bodysuit with a cutout back and built-in bra, which Pool usually pairs with boots and a blazer post-workout. The term “athleisure” has gotten plenty of play lately, and Pool’s confident that women crave these clothes even when they’re not sweating, thanks to the sheer convenience factor.

“Everyone now has more of a healthy lifestyle. They’re moms, working, doing many jobs. You don’t often have the ability to go back home during the day,” she says.

Which is why each item is inscribed with an inspirational word like “love,” “strength,” “confidence,” “kindness,” and “mindfulness” for a little midday pick-me-up.

And the line’s name comes from the Latin word for gold — maybe in the hopes that even if you’re not a fitness medalist, you’ll still feel a little golden when you slip into her workout wear.