A Wellness Retreat Italian-style: La Dolce Vita
BY: KERI O’MEARA
On the Ligurian Sea in the Italian Riviera one friend asks another to take a picture of her at the bow of a boat that sails along the coast of the villages that make up the Cinque Terre.
Perhaps it appears like a typical “gals taking pics of each other for social whilst on vacation” moment for some. For these two soul sisters, it’s a very special occasion that when brought to attention brings a hand squeeze and tears to their eyes. This would be one of the thousands of moments shared between these two on this, the first of their many, many trips exploring the magical country of Italy together.
Zoe and Keri met three years prior when Zoe started doing private Pilates lessons with Keri at her Toronto studio, Muse Movement. Zoe had been reluctant at first to try Pilates, but recurring back pain and serious mood dips finally brought her through the doors. As a larger bodied woman, Zoe had never felt that these spaces were accessible or comfortable to her. She did not feel embodied, having been told by the world her whole life that hers was not the standard of beauty to attain; and so her relationship to it was tenuous at best. What Zoe found at Muse with Keri, much to her surprise, was a safe space to go at her own pace, celebrate her unique wins and challenge her perception that she could not exercise or be strong. Keri also challenged Zoe’s idea about doing it “right” and often reminded her to get curious instead and do what felt good rather than focus on what she “should” be doing or feeling.
Zoe became hooked. Her Pilates journey could be boiled down to one that is themed just like Keri’s and so many others’: she found embodiment and therefore, empowerment through Pilates. She found that it regulated her nervous system and shifted her mood and her new found strength helped to alleviate her back pain. She got confident in this new body and brain space and was ready to take on a bucket list adventure of moving to Italy for a year.
The confidence she found through Pilates was magnified through her Italian adventures. Zoe began a love affair with Italy where she found that this idea that her body was not beautiful was… contrived. She discovered the sea was a way of life built around pleasure and community and that the negative messaging she had been internalizing about her body should not and would not restrict her from throwing on a bathing suit and diving into the sea every day.
So, on the boat several months into her year in Italy, Zoe asked Keri if she would take a picture of her in her bathing suit. Keri took a few photos and then said to Zoe: “Do you know when you first started coming to Pilates you would cover yourself in baggy clothes from head to toe and constantly apologize for your body and now here we are in Italy where you live and you are confidently asking for pictures of you half naked.” No regular selfie, indeed.
In April of 2020, Zoe was meant to go back to Toronto. April of 2020. Italy! And so, her story goes from being stuck there, she said ‘fuck it’ and decided to make Rome her permanent home and open a travel company that catered specifically to woman-identifying folks looking for safe, inclusive AND all-inclusive, behind the scene adventures in Italy. And so, Stellavision Travel was born.
And then Zoe returned the favour, introducing Keri to Italy in the way that Keri had introduced Zoe to Pilates. Italy has touched Keri’s soul and fed her spirit in the way that only one other thing can (yup, Pilates). These two have since shared many experiences across this country and Keri trusts Zoe with her travel the way Zoe trusts Keri with her body - explicitly.
Besides becoming great friends who share a love for travel, Pilates, unpretentious luxury, art, feminism, social justice, food, beauty (and not the problematic standard of), experiences and dogs, Zoe and Keri share a similar business mission. Ultimately, their goal is to provide an experience for their clients that helps them learn, grow, create community, and feel empowered and confident.
The way that it's hard to capture the feeling you get collectively moving together in a room with your community, it’s hard to completely put into words the experiences that Stellavision offers. As there is truly something ephemeral that happens when a community who share values experience a peak, special, once-in-a-lifetime adventure together. As we know, the true luxuries are time and health. So, while you can pay a gazillion dollars for a travel experience, having a friend on the ground to make sure your experience is priceless and means the world. Having a local expert (which is what Zoe has become) curate your experiences and travel, means you meet people and arrive at places that no amount of Googling offers. Keri barely recognized the Zoe who bantered in Italian with the vendors at the market, who confidently drove in the middle of two lanes like all Romans do, who explained the difference in the trees from Rome to Florence, or told the story behind the Caravaggio fresco in that little Chapel in that little village; the woman who introduced her to a Sicilian almond farmer and translated the conversation as they drank almond milk under the olive trees at dusk.
The pinnacle sights combined with Italy’s small moments are values and memories that travel with you back home and stay with you for a lifetime.
And now, these two want to share all of this with their communities. Muse Movement and Stellavision Travel are teaming up to provide you with an experience like no other: the Pilates and Palazzos Retreat. For these two women, wellness is defined by the Italians: Dolce Vita is the ultimate way to care for oneself. So scrap the intermittent fasting, green juice, unhealthy and unrealistic New Year's Resolutions this year, and treat yourself to a magical Italian adventure with Pilates that makes you indulge in life and feel good from body to soul. Join us this May for a sojourn through the Tuscan countryside curated by Stellavision Travel, peppered with Pilates by Muse for a life changing experience.