Meet the Teachers Who Will Be Guiding You

Leigh Wood

Founder & YTT Lead Teacher

Leigh has been practicing yoga since 2004 and has been teaching since completing her 200-hour teacher training in 2016 with the Marianne Wells Yoga School, followed by her 300-hour advanced training in 2020 with The Shala Yoga School. In 2018, she established House of Yoga in Cape Town, where she teaches full-time, leading group and private classes, workshops, retreats, and the studio's 200-hour teacher training.

Before transitioning into yoga full-time, Leigh spent over a decade in the corporate world across the financial, real estate, and renewable energy sectors in both London and Cape Town. During this time, yoga became a steady and supportive thread amid the demands of professional life.

With a background in dance and a broad exploration of lineages and styles including Hatha, Vinyasa, Iyengar, Ashtanga, Yin, and Restorative yoga, Leigh's teaching is both grounded and intuitive. She weaves together these influences to create classes that invite awareness, curiosity, and a sense of coming home to the body.

Leigh is passionate about sharing yoga as a practical and accessible path for modern living. She sees the practice as a way to cultivate presence, build a more compassionate relationship with oneself, and navigate life with greater steadiness and ease. Her teaching encourages students to reconnect with the body as a source of intelligence and guidance, fostering a deeper sense of autonomy, authenticity, and wellbeing.

Firdose Moonda

Guest Teacher · Yoga Humanities

Firdose Moonda is a journalist, author, yoga teacher and scholar and combines these roles to provide critical education and examine body politics as it relates to yoga.

Firdose holds an MA in Traditions of Yoga and Meditation from the School of Oriental and African Studies (University of London) and is currently pursuing doctoral work provisionally titled "Yoga, Politics and Possibilities for Social Justice." Her research interests include embodiment, body politics, cultural politics, decolonization, comparative religions and practice, and migrant studies.

She is a third-generation Indian living in South Africa and recognises the intersections of her ancestral lineage and activist upbringing in a country that continues to grapple with the legacies of colonialism, Apartheid and resultant inequality and what this has meant for the embodied experiences of its people.

Candice Isaacs

Guest Teacher · Yoga Inclusivity

Candice is a 500-hour Yoga Teacher, educator, and inclusive movement advocate who specialises in creating accessible, empowering spaces for all bodies. As a bigger-bodied yogi who didn't always see herself represented in traditional yoga environments, she is passionate about reshaping the culture of yoga to be welcoming, adaptable, and truly inclusive.

Candice's teaching is grounded in body awareness, choice, and self-acceptance. Her classes offer thoughtful modifications, props, and variations that honour the uniqueness of each body, helping students discover what feels supportive, possible, and empowering for them. She celebrates progress over perfection and encourages students to take up space with confidence and curiosity.

Alongside teaching, Candice mentors yoga teachers through workshops and training programs focused on inclusive, body-aware, and trauma-informed teaching. She is committed to helping teachers build safe, respectful, and affirming spaces where every student feels seen, supported, and capable.

With a background as a Life Coach, Clinical Nutritionist, and Therapeutic Massage Therapist, Candice brings a holistic understanding of the body and mind into her work. She is the founder of Nova Holistic Wellness and NHW Academy, where she integrates movement, mindset, sharing circles and wellness education to support whole-person transformation.

Giulia Tarantello

Yoga Teacher · Sequencing

With a background in fitness, Giulia has always followed an active lifestyle – keeping her body moving has always been her number one goal.

A healthy and fit daily routine led her to discover her love of yoga, as the fundamentals of her yoga practice allowed a deeper connection to her body as well as her mind.

After finding her place on the mat, Giulia proceeded with her 200hr teacher training at The Wellness Connection in Cape Town, which ignited a deep passion for the world of yoga anatomy. Giulia's classes not only focus on strength building and alignment but also touch on a softer side of connection through breath to movement, allowing the mind to reconnect with the body.

Through her experience of teaching, Giulia has discovered the beauty of slow progression through movement and dedication to practice. She aims to focus on each and every student's journey in their own practice and to guide them in a way which encourages more curiosity about their own body and finding contentment with where they are.

Candice Momsen

Yoga Teacher · Slower Based Practices

"Yoga and meditation have given me ritual, refuge, an opening into self – discovery."

Through a lifetime of curious exploration, Candice has developed a self-practice rooted in intuitive movement, yoga, meditation, breath work and self-study. She believes this potent combination of weaving breath, movement, contemplation and meditation is the path to healing and empowerment.

Candice's teachings are gentle and explorative, threaded with embodied philosophy. She holds space for students to journey to their own rhythms and embodiment as gateways to embrace their depths, delighting in their own empowerment and awakening. In this way the practice becomes a call to home – to ourselves.

After undertaking her first 200hr Teacher Training in 2020, she went on to complete her 300hr under the guidance of Tamsin and Thomas Sheehy at The Shala.

Yarisha Singh

Yoga Teacher · Cueing & Mirroring

Yarisha is an accomplished movement specialist – a yoga teacher and dance performer, teacher and choreographer with a passion for dance that began at a young age. She earned a Bachelor of Music in Dance with Distinction at the University of Cape Town and performed with several professional dance companies in South Africa for over a decade, including Cape Town City Ballet, Free Flight Dance Company, La Rosa Spanish Dance Theatre, Jozi Dance Company and Msanzi Productions. Yarisha was a well established teacher and choreographer in Cape Town before becoming the Head of Dance at StudioRepublik in Dubai for five years. She has returned to South Africa with plans to continue intensive dance training and choreography within the country. She is passionate about the emotional process within the creative realm, the performer's mental and physical transformation as well as creative collaboration in the industry.

Yarisha became a certified Yoga instructor in 2009 and went on to open her own studio, Yoga by Yarisha, where she guided many students in their search for personal and physical transformation. She also taught for many Yoga studios across South Africa, Thailand and in Dubai, as well as directing numerous Wellness Retreats. Yarisha's teaching style is largely a fusion of many different Yoga schoolings, influenced by her dance experience and a quest for balance.

Karen Drew

Yoga Teacher · Kids Yoga

"Let's BREATHE, MOVE & RELAX together."

Karen is a certified yoga teacher for both adults and children, having trained through House of Yoga and Yoga4Kids. She is passionate about making yoga and mindfulness accessible, enjoyable and meaningful for everyone.

Her yoga journey began over 15 years ago, when she discovered how powerful the practice could be in helping her manage stress, find calm and restore balance in daily life. Inspired by these benefits, she now shares yoga as a way to support others in building resilience, cultivating inner peace and finding joy through movement and stillness.

Whether on the mat or in daily life, yoga for Karen is about more than poses. It's about creating space to connect, recharge and grow.