Bronx Yoga Lab flood repairs spark community fundraising support

A second sprinkler malfunction of the year flooded Bronx Yoga Lab in Marble Hill, leaving 8 to 9 inches of water pooled in one corner of the studio at 5500 Broadway and forcing the hot yoga space to shut down for three days. The damage went beyond a cleanup job: co-owners Kerry Donegan and Dionne Presinal said the repair bill could run $50,000 to $60,000, with the biggest costs tied to replacing the floor and restoring the hot yoga room.

The studio responded quickly on the safety side. All eight sprinkler heads were replaced with models better suited to high-temperature rooms, a practical fix that underscores how vulnerable a specialized yoga space can be when building systems fail. For a studio that built its identity around hot yoga, the problem was not abstract. It threatened the room members come for, the schedule instructors depend on, and the stability of a business that has become part of the neighborhood’s daily rhythm.

Bronx Yoga Lab started in January 2020, just before the long COVID-19 shutdown that hit yoga studios hard across New York City. The business, filed as Bronx Yoga Lab Inc. with the state on November 7, 2019, grew from two students into co-owners. Donegan and Presinal took over the studio in February 2020, and since then it has expanded to more than 100 members and roughly 450 monthly classgoers. That scale helps explain why the response was so fast when the flood hit.

Community support gathered around the studio almost immediately. A GoFundMe launched by a student and a nonprofit founder had raised more than $10,000 by April 6 toward a $30,000 goal. The fundraiser described Bronx Yoga Lab as a women- and Black-owned small business that survived the shutdown period, when yoga studios were among the last businesses allowed to reopen in New York City. The studio’s mission has long centered on inclusion, with a stated goal of creating a space where all bodies are welcome.

That mix of repair costs, shutdown history and community backing makes Bronx Yoga Lab’s flood more than a building story. It shows how thin the margin can be for independent wellness businesses in New York, even after they become neighborhood fixtures. In Marble Hill, the studio is still fighting for a reopening that means more than returning to class times. It means preserving a rare, familiar place where a small business, its teachers and its students have built something worth saving.