We provide the highest quality, best fitting, most flattering activewear you’ll ever own. Regardless of how you choose to sweat, we want you to love your Shakti so we make durable, multi-functional products that will perform. No matter your passion, our fabrics and designs will ensure you look and feel your best.
We make products that enhance our passions. Whether it's yoga, running, dancing, biking, hiking or any other fitness training, we’re passionate about health and we make movement a priority. We’re always looking for our next adventure and we expect our activewear to keep up.
Our products are durable, functional and adaptable; since we also love fashion, we make our product to be beautiful. Quality is paramount. We expect our clothing to last. Our Rio de Janeiro based factory and fabric mills share these values. Together, we design and create activewear that will stand up to the toughest workouts, the stretchiest yoga classes and the sweatiest spin classes.
Our fabrics are at the very core of what makes our products special.
Our fabrics are tough, made to last, yet uber soft against the skin. Since we love Mother Earth, our fabrics use 100% biodegradable nylon that will fully decompose within three years of being in a landfill environment. So not only are our fabrics kind to your skin, they are kind to the environment too. Each one of our products is made from one or a combination of the following materials:
We make all our solid color styles in this fabric including our solid side string shorts.
‘Coolform light’ — an eco friendly knitted fabric that combines Amni® polyamide with elastane yarn. Lighter weight and thinner than our Coolform fabric, Coolform Light is meant specifically for heated rooms and hot places. This material is so light and so soft that it is often described as equivalent to the feeling of wearing nothing at all! Free from harmful chemicals while offering 50+ UV protection, we make all our prints in this material and some styles in black too.
We recommend this material for hot yoga or as an uber comfortable first layer during colder months for your outdoor activities.
Stretch Mesh — lightweight and stretchy, it offers ventilation without the bulk. Perfect for your active lifestyle, Stretch Mesh holds you in and breathes at the same time. We feature our Stretch Mesh mainly as an accent fabric and in combination with our Coolform and Coolform Light fabrics.
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil is my home. Since I was 13 years old I’ve been fascinated by eastern philosophy. Yoga and arts are my two passions and my background is in theatre and dance. I started teaching Hatha yoga in Brazil in 1999. In 2003 I earned a Bikram Yoga Teacher Certification. In 2005 I studied with Dharma Mitra and in 2006 I studied with Ana Forrest .
Brazil is famous for colorful exotic bikinis and in 1999 I started Gold Rio Swimwear, a bikini company, in the USA. For about 4 years I sold bikinis to surf shops on the east and west coast. But that wasn’t my passion. I always follow my heart so in the spring of 2003 I registered for the Bikram Yoga Teacher Training in Los Angeles.
The next nine weeks were going to be spent in a hot, sweaty room and I needed to wear something in between a bathing suit and an aerobic fitness outfit. So I came up with several colorful little side string shorts and tops. Since the first day of training my colleagues complimented my outfits. Some asked, knowing about Gold Rio Swimwear, if they could buy some outfits from me. That inspired me to consider a yoga clothing line as most people at that time were still wearing long dark pants in a 100 degree yoga room. I looked around everyday and thought; “this room would look much better if people were wearing more colorful and comfortable outfits”.
That September was the first Yoga Expo and Bishnu Gosh Yoga Competition and there were exhibitor booths available. I decided to set up a booth at the expo for my Gold Rio swimwear and with my new yoga clothing line.
I had to come up with a name for the yoga clothes as Gold Rio was better for the swim suits. I recalled back to 1992 when the first Earth Summit took place in Brazil, leaders from different religions and philosophies from all over the world were there. A group of teenagers from Rio de Janeiro including myself volunteered to work with some charitable groups. I took part in a program that taught meditation and yoga in the slums of Rio.
One of the program leaders was a female monk from India and by the end of the three month event she asked if I would like to receive a personal mantra for meditation and a spiritual name. I accepted so she gave me the mantra, which I should keep secret and a spiritual name that I could use if I liked. The name was Shakti. I loved it and looking into the meaning of it and I liked it even more because of its meaning — female energy, female power.
I know that other companies have been inspired to make similar outfits (some are making exactly the same designs and even present themselves as a line similar to Shakti). What a compliment! I’m proud to say that if you buy Shakti Activewear you are buying the original. I promise that I will always try to come up with new ideas, designs, styles and fun colors so you can bend, stretch, sweat, live and most of all grow in your yoga path. Please enjoy our site and thank you for your business!!
-Ana Bugarim Santos
