Heels are optional; chairs and music provided.

If you want to look sexy while getting fit, Dy-Ann Simmons’s chair-dancing classes could be your best bet.

Interested but a bit intimidated? The cocktails on offer at the fitness instructor’s happy hours at Paradise Lounge might help get you in the mood.

Ms Simmons is hosting two classes every Monday at the Paget hot spot over the coming weeks.

“It’s for anyone that wants to unleash that side of them,” she said.

“They don’t have to be fit. They can do it barefoot; they don’t have to wear heels, although they add to the sex appeal. It’s very empowering for women and something they can do with friends. It’s like a girls’ night but this is something different you can do and no, you don’t have to be a dancer.”

The 32-year-old started ballet and hip hop lessons at the age of five; African dance, break dancing, salsa classes and other dance forms followed.

“I’ve always been into dance,” she said. “It got me into fitness. About seven years ago I was in school studying to be a gym teacher and went to Bally Total Fitness and got into personal training. That’s where I first saw chair dancing. They used to do it on a Friday night but it wasn’t really a fitness class, they just taught women to be sexy on the chair.”

Ms Simmons’s company, Fusion Fitness, closed in June. She now works as a personal trainer/group fitness instructor/dance teacher, on a freelance basis. “It really started from the pole dancing classes I was offering,” she said. “There were women who weren’t able to dance pole because they weren’t strong enough but they wanted to feel sexy, sensual. So I said let’s see about chair dancing.”

The classes, which she designed, help improve the body’s core, arms and legs, Ms Simmons said. Women should come prepared to do “planks, a little acrobatics and tricks in the chair”.

“There’s not too much [instruction] online although I do know of a girl that teaches it in Atlanta. I created the movements and designed it to improve fitness, as well as be sexy.”

Paradise Lounge invited her to teach classes there after seeing her in action at a bachelorette party.

The first lessons take place on Monday at 6pm and 7pm. Admission is $200 for ten classes or $25 for drop-ins. For more information: 300-3489, 824-4000, fusionfitnessbda@gmail.com or info@paradiselounge.bm.