On Saturday11th May 2024 you're invited to join artist and sculptor Ruth Wheeler and myself for a magical day set in a wonderful private woodland in Surrey, offering you the chance to unwind and retreat from your busy life. 
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How this magical day will run
 
On arrival to this secret corner of Surrey, the Birtley Woodland Art Space lies just outside the beautiful town of Guildford. Its a community arts, crafts and wellbeing space for people to come together and learn from professional instructors who are utterly passionate about sharing and passing on their knowledge and skills to others.  Here you’ll feel your body’s rhythms slow to the pace of the woodland environment and gradually begin relax into its beautiful surroundings. This will be a small, intimate group and so arrival we’ll have a welcome tea and get to know each other.
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Justine has been described by Conde Nast as “The British Queen of Breathwork”.  She begins the day by leading you through a deeply connecting 2-hour Breathwork session on the camp’s beautiful covered decking area, lying beneath a canopy of trees. Conscious Connected Breathing is a gentle, simple technique that helps you to open up the full potential of your breathing system for better physical and emotional well-being. There are so many benefits to this transformative style of Breathwork, including a deepening relationship with yourself, increased energy, greater emotional clarity, better immune response, and increased ability to deal with stress in a healthy way. Described not only as a detox for every level of our being, Wonderbreath also provides the means by which you can embark upon the ultimate journey: the one where you discover who you really are.
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After your deep, often transformational experience, we’ll take time out to have a quiet, reflective break and refreshments.You’ll then be guided into some gentle, immersive Forest Bathing, where you’ll begin to feel how easy it is to open your senses more fully to nature and feel a part, rather than separate, from your surroundings.  The idea of Forest Bathing is a simple one. The term is a direct translation of the Japanese practice known as Shinrin-yoku, meaning bathing in the forest atmosphere, or taking in the forest through our senses. It’s one of the many incredible tools now available to help us connect back to nature and ultimately, back to ourselves.  This calming, somatic experience then leads into a therapeutic creative explorative workshop after lunch.
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After lunch, Ruth will guide you into foraging for natural collage materials, which you’ll combine to use for sketching, printing and textures, on wood, paper, paint, as well as pyrography (the freehand art of decorating wood or other materials with burn marks which can  then be incorporated into a piece of art).  In a more relaxed state from the morning’s Breathwork and Forest Bathing, you’ll find you can tap more easily into a state of creative flow. The emphasis for this workshop is to come with no preconceived ideas and to explore yourself, your surroundings, the artistic materials available, the guidance offered, and to be inspired by nature and see what emerges. Your artistic creations may be totally abstract, you may find symbols emerging, or you may find yourself exploring colour, texture, or a feeling.
 
All these are there to be explored in this beautiful setting.
 
Ruth will also lead you through an hour of therapeutic movement and stretching in the afternoon, along with an aromatic dressing and some Yoga Nidra, so that you leave us feeling utterly dreamy and thoroughly relaxed.
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We will drink and eat together throughout the day and enjoy a seasonal homemade lunch of salads, bread and soup and cake. The food will be vegetarian, but please let us know if you are vegan or gluten, or dairy free.
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This retreat day is going to be kept small at a maximum of 8 people to provide an intimate, safe space.
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What’s included
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The day runs from 9.30am - 5.30pm
Teas
Snacks
Vegetarian lunch
2hr Wonderbreath Conscious Connected Breathwork session
Forest Bathing
An afternoon of artistic exploration