Aubrey Hackman is a local yogi who teaches Jivamukti classes in Telluride. But in her three years living here, she has spent a lot of time, money and energy traveling elsewhere to train and expand her practice.

And one day last June, after flying to New York for a teacher training, Hackman was struck with a thought.

“I’m spending every last dime I make going outside of Telluride to do yoga. I thought, ‘Why isn’t yoga coming here?’” she said.

And just like that, the idea for the Telluride Yoga Festival was incarnated. Hackman teamed up with Elaine Demas, and the pair organized the first Telluride Yoga Festival, which will take place from July 11-13.

After all, people love to do yoga in beautiful locales; beaches, deserts … idyllic box canyons.

“What a perfect place to have a yoga event,” Demas said. “We were sort of scratching our heads, saying ‘Why hasn’t anyone done this before?’”

The three-day festival has a double-pronged theme of teaching yoga and raising awareness of environmental stewardship. So along with meditation sessions, yoga workshops and demonstrations with an all-star cast of guest instructors, the event will feature education on environmental sustainability, and 25 percent of its net profits will be donated to Sheep Mountain Alliance, Telluride’s nonprofit environmental organization.

And, festival organizers are working with the New Community Coalition to ensure the event is as green as possible.

“I really wanted to draw the correlation between treading lightly on the earth and yoga, because you can’t really call yourself a yogi and not be conscious of your relationship with the Earth,” Hackman said.

While Hackman brings the knowledge and connections in the yoga world, Demas, who has worked in festivals for years, brings the organizational experience.

During the three-day festival, the Telluride Conference Center, the Telluride Yoga Studio, the elementary school cafeteria and Elks Park will be home to bending bodies, meditating souls and mind-boggling demonstrations of agility and strength.

The format of the festival will be aligned to Ayurvedic guidelines, Hackman said, which means the mornings will be filled with motion, and afternoons will be reserved for the quieter activities like meditation, lectures and chanting.

The festival will feature a whole spectrum of yoga sub-genres, from Vinyasa and Tibetan Heart Yoga to Iyengar, Forrest Yoga and Acroyoga. There will even be a group called “Yoga Slackers,” who practice yoga on slack lines.

The schedule will feature both rigorous and restorative practices, and is designed for yoga enthusiasts of all levels. It will also include workshops and classes on holistic living.

Demas and Hackman are especially excited about the instructors, who represent some of yoga’s biggest names. Four of them were included in a list of Top 21 Yoga Instructors under 40 in the March issue of Yoga Journal.

“We ended up with this incredible roster,” Demas said.

Scott Blossom, a traditional Chinese medical practitioner and yoga therapist who teaches a blend of yoga and Ayurveda, is the headliner.

“He’s kind of a big deal, to say the least,” Hackman said.

Other instructors are Richard Freeman, Nicki Doane and Eddie Modestini, who Hackman said are “some of the most respected Ashtanga practitioners, in the world really,” as well as Jivamutki instructor Alanna Kaivalya, Vinyasa instructor Simon Park, and Yin Yoga & Meditation teacher Chandra Easton.

“Everyone we’re bringing is very well-known,” Hackman said.

Demas said she anticipates, at most, 400 participants for this inaugural festival, and noted that the burst of visitors should be a boon to the retail and lodging community.

Both Hackman and Demas said the community has been nothing but supportive of the festival, and the word is definitely getting out in the broader yoga community.

Telluride Mountain Village Owner’s Association has been a huge financial supporter, along with C.C.A.A.S.E., American National Bank and Telluride Properties.
Mountainfilm and the Telluride Tourism Board have helped in marketing, and local yoga students have been helpful, Demas said.

“We have just been supportive every step of the way,” Hackman said. “I’m really excited about this.”

A three-day pass for the festival is $380. For more information, registration and a schedule, visit www.tellurideyogafestival.com.