Recently, due to the COVID-19 quarantine, I've been taking online dance classes at home with many of them being ballet classes. While there are many positive aspects of dancing at home such as being able to take dance classes at any moment, trying out new dance styles, and taking classes from a variety of dance teachers, with many of them being free to stream online. However, one of the drawbacks or challenges with dancing at home is finding not only the space to dance, but also the right kind of flooring. Especially since living rooms and bedrooms aren't exactly made for dancing. Despite this, one solution that I'm sure many of you have read about online through Instagram is by buying a marley floor, which are often used in dance studios, such as the Harlequin Dance Mat. The one I bought in particular was the 5ft by 6.5ft sized grey dance mat, as there are also options for larger or smaller floor squares on their website. Although, the quarantine rules have begun to lift in many places worldwide including Canada, I thought it would still be helpful to review for those of you who want to dance at home during the summer or for practice at home. Especially since many of the summer dance intensives have been cancelled and with the limited amount of dancers allowed per class at dance schools that are open.
After going through some other options for a Marley dance mat such as dot2dance, I found that Harlequin offered an option that fit my needs better, so that I could dance on a larger surface. One of the best things about this mat is that you don't have to tape it down to make sure it doesn't move, as long as you place it on flooring that's not carpet. However, for those of you who want an even bigger dance floor, you can also buy the tape to go with it to tape two or three mats together, if you have the space or a dedicated dance room. Online Harlequin also offers a dance kit to piece together a spring flooring that you can put on top of your floor with the Marley material on top. The mat is fairly thin, but heavy enough that it doesn't move around while you dance. In terms of cleaning, Harlequin does offer a solution on their website to clean the mat, however, I didn't know about this at the time, but I haven't had any issues so far.
Also, after talking to a few fellow dancers about the Harlequin Dance Mat, I realized that there were still quite a few questions surrounding purchasing one, as there isn't a specific Canadian Harlequin Floors department. However, since they had global headquarters that shipped internationally in places such as Australia, Britain, Luxembourg, Hong Kong, and Germany, I thought there might be a chance that they would ship to Canada as well. However, out of all of these options I thought the U.S. headquarters would be the most likely to ship to Canada due to location and proximity.
As soon as I figured out which mat I wanted to purchase I was able to successfully correspond with Harlequin by email: contact@harlequinfloors.com for a quote. Since I'm located in Canada, I wanted to make sure that they would be able to ship it over the Canadian-US border. In terms of shipping, this was one of the main challenges with ordering anything from the U.S. when you're in Canada during COVID. Fortunately, this worked out well and the only thing I had to add to my order was to account for shipping and a customs broker (options include UPS, Purolator, etc. One of their recommendations was: clearit.ca). The process by phone and email went really smoothly, as the account executive I worked with, Marlyn, was very helpful and friendly, and it seemed like they had a fair amount of experience with shipping from the states to Canada. After figuring out customs and payment by phone, it then came time to wait for its arrival. At the time that I ordered my mat it was during the initial stages of closing the border in late March, so in total it took about a month to arrive. I think the border closure was one of the main reasons as to why it took a bit longer than usual to arrive, so for those of you interested in buying it now it would probably be much faster.
Upon arrival, the mat was packaged in a thin long cardboard tube, which I could then roll out onto the ground. Once I laid it on the ground it stayed pretty flat and was completely flat a few hours afterwards. In terms of usage, I've been primarily using it on top of wood laminate flooring and fortunately it doesn't move around when I turn or do bourrees, which is a definite plus! It also provides more room for doing fouettes, arabesques, and a few piques. It did take a few days to get used to using, mainly because I had been dancing on the wood laminate for a little over a month at this point, so my centre of gravity had adjusted to the flooring. However, once I got used to it, the marley floor is significantly better, especially for pointe work. I think pointe work was where I noticed it the most, especially for turns, echappes, pas de bourrees, and bourrees. Over time, I have noticed it has a few marks here and there that are transparent, but nothing too noticeable, and I really like how you can move it around the room fairly easily. I also find that I can focus more on improving my technique, as I'm not as concerned about the floor being too slippery, which is a nice change. Also, while you can roll up the mat, if you are able to keep it on the floor I would highly recommend doing so, as it does take a bit of time for the edges to unfurl, but this is really up to you.
Also, for those of you who want more surface area, Harlequin Floors, also sells larger pieces that you can order to custom size or you can buy multiple mats and then tape them together. Another option for dancers who want to be able to jump without worrying about knee or ankle injuries, they also offer home studio kits that include sprung floor panels that latch together, as well as the marley floor on top in two sizes: 6ft by 6ft and 8ft by 10ft. I did consider this option, however, I didn't have the space to permanently put this in. However, you can move the panels by unlatching them, so if you are able to store it temporarily and recreate every time then this could be an option as well. Although, I do think this would be much better if you are able to have it in a designated fitness/recreation room/space that you could keep it in.
Overall, I really enjoyed my experience with Harlequin Floors and I find that I have been using it every day for my online dance classes, so for me I would definitely recommend using/buying it. Also, I think that even after quarantine ends or studios start to open up, the dance mat is still great for practicing at home and it doesn't take up too much space. Thanks for reading and I hope you enjoyed this review! Let me know in the comments down below about which products/dance related things that you'd like to see me review next. Until next time, Happy dancing! :)
Note: This article is NOT a paid advertisement/endorsement. This article is purely a review of a product to help provide others with information about it.
Here is the link to Harlequin's website: us.harlequinfloors.com
Photography by: (c) Sharkcookie Photography 2015
Here is a photo of my Harlequin Dance Mat (Size: 5ft by 6.5ft or 1.5m by 1.98m)