Bringing a ‘New Vibe’ to Sunset

Palisadian Violet Dominguez Has Created a Gymnastics, Dance Studio With Goal of Becoming a “Community Safe Space”

By SARAH SHMERLING | Editor-in-Chief

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Marquez Knolls resident Violet Dominguez—who has years of experience in gymnastics and dance—was presented with an opportunity.

A neighbor approached her, remembering that she used to coach gymnastics, and asked her to work with his kid, noting that he was bored at home and looking for things to do.

Dominguez, who grew up in New York, moved to Pacific Palisades by way of Hollywood, sharing that she was overwhelmed with the energy and chaos of the area, and searching for a place that was more meditative and relaxing.

The 28-year-old grew up training as a dancer, acrobat and gymnast, touring the country performing and competing, taking home several state titles and gold medals while competing under United States of America Gymnastics.

As a teenager, Dominguez retired from gymnastics to focus on dance.

“For myself, as a performer, I foresaw a much longer-term career in dance,” she explained. “I ended up going on tour for dancing and choreographing commercials, and doing all those things.”

Dominguez attended the school of Alvin Ailey on a scholarship while studying at Professional Performing Arts High School and spending summers training with American Ballet Theatre.

She has family ties to performance as well: Her grandmother was a vaudeville contortionist and acrobat, and her mom and twin sister are both fosse dancers.

“So I started with him,” Dominguez explained of her return to gymnastics. “And then I said, ‘You know what? I kind of miss doing this. I’ve missed teaching, I haven’t taught in so long because I’ve just been dancing.’”

After making one post about the lessons, Dominguez said that the first request turned into 50.

“And before I knew it,” she said, “there were like 200 people coming over to my house every week for gymnastics, and that was just not sustainable. I ended up opening up a gymnastics center.”

Though she has been owner and head coach of New Vibe Gymnastics for a few years, Dominguez’ new home base on Sunset Boulevard is a recent development, not entirely open to the public as of yet.

“I consider myself open to the pre-existing pods that I had,” Dominguez explained, adding that she’s waiting for additional equipment to come in. She said that she has had to work through delays, with some items on backorder as long as 20 weeks.

Dominguez described New Vibe Gymnastics as a boutique center, specializing in pod classes.

“Instead of having publicly listed classes where anyone can just run in and decide what their level is … what I do is I cater each class to the individual group,” she explained. “So I’ll see who I have, what students I have, I rearrange pods as necessary.”

In addition to the pods, Dominguez shared plans to launch Mommy and Me classes, recreational gymnastics classes, competitive gymnastics, and several dance classes, including ballet, jazz, ballroom and tap.

Though Dominguez has operated as a one-woman show, she has begun to hire and train other teachers for the studio—but noted the importance of maintaining relationships with her students.

“I take pride in making sure that everybody that enters my gym has some sort of individualized connection with me and doesn’t feel like a stranger,” she shared. “I want it to feel just like Palisades feels, where it’s such a community. It’s not just a huge mega-gym where you throw a bunch of people and no one really knows anyone.”

Dominguez shared that she feels it’s important to maintain a connection with parents as well, especially with gymnastics.

“When you’re putting your body through all these things, you want someone who’s able to really tell you, ‘Hey, when you see your kids doing this at home, make sure you make this adjustment or correction for them,’” she explained. “For me, what’s important is no matter how big it grows or how many people are in my gym, I always want to make sure I have some type of personalization for them, where they can go back with a better understanding of gymnastics and body placement.”

New Vibe is eyeing a full opening in September. Until then, Dominguez recommended signing up for the waitlist via her website to get placed in a pod. She explained that in the interim, she will do her best to do a pod match and get enrollees started as quickly as possible.

As the studio begins to open up and welcome more students, Dominguez shared hopes of bringing useful and creative energy to the town, while creating a safe space for kids.

“I built this during COVID because I could see what was happening,” she explained. “Imagining myself quarantined and trapped in the house that I grew up in was a really frightening realization for me. Something just didn’t sit right with me feeling like these kids didn’t have anywhere to go where they could have a break or reprieve from the heaviness of what’s going on in the world.”

Dominguez also wants to support other female-owned businesses in the area, by highlighting their work on a monthly basis in correlation with planned Parents’ Nights at the space with things like pop-up shops.

“I feel like I’m starting what’s going to be a long-term Palisades movement,” Dominguez shared of the space. “This is a community-based safe space.”

For more information or to sign up for the waitlist, visit newvibegymnastics.com.