Fever Dance Company has swapped studios for sitting rooms, offering free online dance classes for everyone.

After having to close its doors for the first time in 16 years due to the coronavirus, the Preston dance school has opened online and is streaming classes through social media.

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The classes are streamed on Facebook live four nights a week, Monday to Thursday and on Saturday Mornings with different teachers covering different dance styles.

The classes include Cheerleading, Street and Acro for children weekdays at 5pm and Salsa, Latin and Ballroom for adults weekdays at 7pm, and a tiny tots class for under-fives on Saturday mornings at 11am.

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Dance teacher Stephen Holland said: “For us it just made complete sense.

“We have built a community here and we want to look after all our customers in whatever small way we can.

“The children enjoy their dancing so much and many of our adult customers use us as their weekly exercise as well as social outing.

“The health benefits associated with dancing are widely recognised, not only for the physical aspect but the mental stimulation too – that’s something we’re all going to need that in the coming weeks.

“Whilst we can’t offer the same social benefits that our studio can, we can keep connected in other ways.”

All classes are suitable for beginners and are completely free and available to all, with short routines that can be danced alone or with a partner.

The dance school are also making recordings of classes available on Instagram or YouTube channels in case you can’t join live or you need to go over the more difficult parts.

Dance teacher Jillian Donalson said “The response has been overwhelming with people joining in from all over the country! We’ve had so many photos and videos of children taking part, parents dancing with their children and adults trying out a new dance style, it really has been amazing.”

The school currently has a timetable of classes for the next four weeks planned and hopes to re-open it’s studio as soon as it is safe to do so following the Government’s advice.

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Owner Rachael Holland said “I’ve been truly overwhelmed with the support of my staff and customers at this time. The team have been working around the clock to come up with wonderful routines and ideas for our customers and the wider community, even opening the doors on their own homes to keep our customers dancing.

As well as the free online classes, we will have TikTok challenges with our teachers, costume design competitions with our dress maker and lots of other creative activities to help until we can get back together again.”

More information and the schedule for the coming weeks classes can be found on Fever Dance Company’s Facebook page.