The Bath House, Hackney Wick, 21 April 2026

1 May 2026

It had been over six months since I last modelled at one of Adrian Dutton’s groups, and over eighteen since my only previous session at The Bath House. Hence, I was extra motivated to give maximum effort this evening.

As per the evening before, my enthusiasm was translated to mainly standing poses. On that occasion I sat for 33 minutes and stood for 67 minutes. Here, I had one pose kneeling for 1 minute, sat for a total of 15 minutes and stood for a total of 73 minutes.

It’s important to note the difference in impact of standing for many short poses versus standing in a single pose of equivalent length. We take care to ensure long poses are comfortable and balanced, whereas with short poses we push ourselves more.

Pushing ourselves through multiple short standing poses, with all the expected twists and imbalances, forces our muscles to work harder and distributes our weight across the pressure points of our feet unevenly for unusually long (cumulative) periods.

Often it’s only afterwards that any damaging effects are noticed. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of my time modelling at this session. The energy in the room was good, no-one was making demands, it was just me pushing myself. Adrenaline, I guess.

The result? Well, I had arrived with persistent pain in my right heel and I left with new similar pains in the ball of my right foot, which stayed with me for over a week. I have to be more careful. I need to be more mindful of consequences. I must do better.

There’s a message in this for young models too. When your body is lithe, healthy and supple, the cumulative effect of your pose choices is likely to be far from your mind. It will catch up with you eventually, though. How could it not? So please be careful.

You may stay just within your limits for each individual pose but trouble starts to brew when you push those limits for pose after pose after pose. Don’t pile disproportionate weight onto the same pressure points again and again. Take time. Think. Take care.