If you're on the fence about taking dance lessons before your wedding--do it! Catherine was an absolute joy to work with and made the whole experience so fun. Neither of us are dancers, and we were nervous about being in the spotlight, but our first dance turned out to be one of the most special moments of the night. Our guests raved about it, and my husband even impressed his mom with his new skills. We couldn't be more grateful--thank you for everything, Catherine! read more

Abayas' Ballroom - Performing Arts Near Me - Seattle, Washington

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My husband and I got married in mid-May 2024. I always dreamt of doing a choreographed dance at my wedding, so we decided to give it a shot. We weren't sure how to begin, so we went to Groupon to begin our search. After finding Abayas' Ballroom, we walked into the studio and met with the fabulous Catherine. We were nervous but she welcomed us with bright and gentle energy. My husband is a guy who never took dance classes but enjoyed moving to the beat. I am a gal who has a minimal dance background and a habit of wanting to lead. Sharing this with Catherine didn't phase her. She adapted her instruction to our experience and learning styles and I could tell she wanted us to believe in ourselves. The most beautiful thing about Catherine and FJ is they don't have cookie-cutter choreography for any of their couples. They dig deep, listen to your story, learn your personality and help you tell your story through dance. FJ wasn't our instructor, but he was so friendly and encouraging, and we got to witness a few times how he teaches his students as well. You will be in equally adept hands with either Catherine or FJ. We requested more sessions because we felt a strong connection with Catherine. She is kind and honest, determined and mindful. She celebrates growth and inspires confidence. I learned to give up the reins and my husband learned to take the lead and immerse himself in the dance. We fell even deeper in love with one another through this intimate shared experience. We were very confident and excited to share our performance with our loved ones. Everyone was so surprised and it was a beautiful addition to our special day. We can't thank Catherine enough for all she has done for us. read more

Abayas' Ballroom - Performing Arts Near Me - Seattle, Washington

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FJ and Cathrine were absolutely AMAZING! My fiancé was convinced he couldn't dance, but Cathrine's clear and patient explanations made it so easy for us to grasp the moves. We're incredibly grateful for their guidance and had such a great time that our lessons quickly became a fun date night tradition. Although our wedding day hasn't arrived yet, we're confident it will be incredible, thanks to all the hard work FJ and Cathrine put into choreographing our first dance. We feel so much more confident and excited to show off what we've learned. We can't recommend them enough for anyone considering wedding dance lessons--they truly made the experience special for us! read more

Catherine and FJ are just simply the best! Catherine choreographed our first wedding dance and FJ helped us master the harder choreography. Everyone at our wedding was so impressed with our first dance!!!! both Catherine and FJ are amazing at what they do. My now husband has decided to take a break for dancing but I'm going to continue dancing with Catherine and FJ hopefully to compete this fall. Thank you for everything Catherine and FJ! read more

Abayas' Ballroom - Performing Arts Near Me - Seattle, Washington

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Catherine helped my husband and I choreograph our first dance for our wedding and I couldn't be more happy we had her guidance! Our first dance wowed our friends and family, we felt confident throughout the entire thing and going to our lessons made for a super fun date night! Neither of us come from a dance background and she was such a great teacher and really helped us learn skills we will carry with us for our entire lives. Highly recommend taking lessons at Abayas! read more

I am not a dancer. In fact, the idea of doing a choreographed dance performance in front of an audience is about as big a fear for me as skydiving, spiders, or public speaking is to others. That's why when my fiancé insisted we do a dance routine for the "first dance" at our wedding, I was extremely nervous- especially on top of all the other planning we were doing. Thank god we found Catherine. Not only is she an amazing dancer herself (obviously), but she is a fantastic teacher. My fiancé and I were not totally sure of what we wanted our dance to be, and Catherine provided us with a 1-stop-shop for everything we needed for our performance. She helped us figure out our goals, the style, the music, the moves.... everything. She did all of that in a way that was so fun, that going to dance lessons even became an awesome hiatus from all the other crazy stressful wedding planning! On top of that, she couldn't have been more gracious or easy going when it came to all things scheduling. The first dance at our wedding was my favorite thing about the day, and was so good that my mom almost melted in her chair. I have Catherine to thank that for that memory! read more

Abayas' Ballroom - Performing Arts Near Me - Seattle, Washington

Catherine choreographed our first dance at our wedding and it was absolutely fantastic. She worked with us to figure out how simple or complex we would like it and took videos each time to help us remember for practicing. She is so kind, so patient and so FUN. She helped us with little ways to remember our moves and helped us make it look poetic. So many people complimented our dance at our wedding and it was absolutely fantastic. We aren't dancers and we wanted something unique for our wedding and it exceeded our expectations. We actually started this class just as a date night and we thought it would be a one time thing but after we did one class, we had so much fun doing it as a couple, we signed up for a class package to do for our wedding. Catherine is phenomenal. Thank you so much for helping make our day special! read more

Catherine was absolutely amazing! My fiancé and I were so nervous and almost didn't get dance lessons for our first dance. We ended up going anyways and we were so glad we did! Neither of us are dancers but the way Catherine taught us and explained certain things was just amazing! If we ever need dance lessons again this is where we will go! read more

Catherine is amazing!!! We highly recommend Catherine for wedding first dance lessons. I still can't believe how amazing our first dance turned out despite only completing 2 dance practice. Don't be like us and plan ahead because usually couples need more lessons. Our first dance looked SO amazing on video and the crowd loved it so much. Catherine kindly squeezed us into her schedule despite her limited availability. We came in with 2 left feet and no ballroom experience, but Catherine created magic for us. All we did was showed up with our song of choice and placed our trust in her. read more

We had seven private lessons with Catherine for our wedding at the end of October. She is patient and thorough in the way she teaches, and she was really easy to communicate with to schedule our lessons. Catherine created a custom choreography based on our song and skill level, and it was fantastic! We really enjoyed our first dance, and our friends and family were really impressed. Highly recommend taking lessons from Catherine for all other dance needs as well. read more

Catherine is absolutely the best. She is very charming, knowledgeable, approachable. She gave suggestions to our song, then helped us to create our dance. I LOVED the end result and definitely would recommend her!! read more

Working with Catherine & FJ were our favorite part of the wedding planning process (and made for a highlight of our wedding day)! My (then) fiancé and I had no prior dance experience, but from our very first lesson, both Abayas made us excited to be on the dance floor. FJ met us for our first lesson and choreographed the opening sequence of our dance to our first dance song. We then had a a few lessons with Catherine who taught us different dance components and helped us sequence the song together. They were very flexible on scheduling and regularly texted reminders to help us stay on track; we took 6 lessons over the course of a month and felt well prepared to dance our wedding day thanks to the Abayas! In addition to the lessons, we feel lucky to have had the opportunity to witness their whole family's passion for dance in our weekly sessions. It was an honor to work with them on our first dance, and every couple we saw work with them had a smile on their face coming into & leaving lessons. Make the best decision of your wedding planning process (or other dance lesson needs) too by reaching out to FJ & Catherine for lessons through Abayas' ballroom! read more

Catherine was the most exceptional choreographer and teacher we have ever worked with! She has a knack for explaining different moves and dance techniques in an easy to understand way that had my fiancé and I learning our first dance faster than we imagined! We are not dancers, but the choreography Catherine put together for us made us look effortlessly perfect during our first dance and made us feel special during our wedding day! If you are looking for coaching for your first dance or any dance for that matter, you must give Catherine a call because you would be doing yourself a disservice not to! read more

We had the best experience, learning how to dance with Catherine. We booked 11 private lessons with her to prepare for our wedding dance. We had however no idea what we want or how. Catherine was amazing from the beginning, she helped us chose our music (Journey, Don't Stop Believin) and designed the choreography to fit our abilities, but also to get us out of our comfort zone. We never thought we could do any lifts or dips, and there we were, learning bachata, memorizing turns, rotating and counting steps. It was amazing to observe how we improved after very session and how much more confident we felt. Catherine is creative, entertaining, patient, and loves what she does, she brought just joy to every class. She teaches steps by comparing then to everyday life events, like "stir the soup" :). She also names moves to help us memorize it, like "koala dip" :). We just loved all our session and miss them already! 11 classes was a great time to learn the choreography, practice, polish, practice, polish, learn different dance techniques, and work on postures. At our wedding everyone was at awe of what we have achieved and we couldn't be happier about how it turned out Thank you Catherine, we hope to come back soon! read more

Catherine was excellent in helping us learn some basics of dancing while helping us learn a fun routine for our wedding reception dance! She's a great teacher and you can tell she really loves this job. Will be taking additional classes with her in the future! read more

Catherine was an amazing teacher as my fiancé and I practiced for our first wedding dance. She gave such helpful tips to perfect our choreography! Highly recommend getting private lessons from her. read more

Four-and-a-half years ago I walked into a dance studio utterly terrified yet determined to fulfill a dream to learn how to dance. Adding to the terror, I was also a year out of serious illness and surgery and horribly out of shape. Not only have I learned how to dance, I'm now actively competing around the country as a Pro-Am ballroom competitor. Throughout the journey, F.J. & Catherine have been patient and incredibly encouraging, making me believe in myself even when my confidence faltered. The experience has been so positive, my seventeen-year-old daughter joined me in taking lessons last year and is now competing as well, giving us an activity we both do together. read more

We are getting married on Saturday. We got a groupon for Abaya's because it was a good deal, but we got extremely lucky in working with Catherine at Abaya's! She was able to see us one time before the wedding and gave us enough to make it look like we know what we're doing this weekend! Not only that, but she is friendly, fun and a great teacher. The space is great in Magnuson as well. I never thought a dance lesson would be that fun, but my soon-to-be wife and I will definitely be back for a "social dancing" lesson that's geared toward just going out and dancing. Can't recommend this place enough! Thank you Abaya's! read more

I had a lesson today and simply had to review! I have had years of dancing, formal and social, and loads if classes of all types. This was the best lesson I have ever attended, hands down. The attention to detail was amazing. The teachers ability to recognize my learning style, ability level, and structural need was fascinating. It is obvious to me that they live and breathe teaching the art of dance! This is definately a work of passion. I am humbled and honored to have the ability to learn from a team that loves to dance this much. I will definitely be a regular. I had a friend with me who observed my lesson. They literally can not dance to save their life ...funny. no joke. Just by observing my lesson, they were able to replicate what they saw with me later in the day. That was groundbreaking! !!!!!! I am both inspired and in awe! I think anyone would benefit from such capable teachers! Go Abaya!!!! read more

Great place to dance and to learn from! The Staff are very knowledgeable and Friendly. The student body is very encouraging and helpful. We've been to other schools and clubs but we like this one the best. We would definitely recommend this over the others. read more