Making Your Retreat Extraordinary

Designing a retreat requires intention. We want your day with us to be extraordinary, even transformational.

We’ll get to know each other in advance.

A brief discovery call prior to your retreat will ensure that we understand what you’re hoping to achieve and where your team is at currently. Some teams have a piece of work they want to get through; other teams just want to relax in each other’s company.

Understanding your goals and desires, we’ll design a retreat that meets them. Heartwood is not only a relaxing, bucolic setting, but is also a living system that models harmony, balance, and diversity.

Our job is to bring these principles to life for you, where they can inspire creativity and change.

We’ll welcome and ground the team.

Every retreat begins with a warm welcome and a team check-in. We’ve observed remarkable moments of cohesion blossom during this opening, and ripen over the course of the day.

In this opening time, we draw on land-based exercises to practice looking at things from different perspectives and at different scales. As people tune their senses in this way, they open up, both individually and as a team. A beautiful way to prepare for the day ahead.

We’ll help you get your work done.

If you’re spending time and resources on a retreat, then there’s something you hope to get out of it. Maybe it’s tackling a piece of creative or strategic work . Or maybe you just want to benefit from a low-stress day in the company of your colleagues.

Whatever you’re hoping for, we want to create the conditions for success. Whether you’d like us to facilitate your session, or whether you’re working with your own facilitator, we’ll do everything we can to help you realize your aspirations for the day.

We’ll feed you well (and locally!)

A shared meal is a potent connection between people. As regenerative farmers, we believe that what happens in the kitchen determines what happens on the landscape. That means that your lunch will always feature locally-sourced, seasonal food with a story.

We also operate a craft cidery on the farm, so your Heartwood retreat can include a range of tasty alcoholic and non-alcoholic ciders.

We’ll have some fun on the farm.

We have a variety of seasonally-appropriate farm activities that will fortify the connections you build during your retreat.

Sometimes the activities involve things like: making maple syrup, making delicious ciders, milking a cow, or interacting with the livestock. In other cases, the activities are land-based, involving mindfulness, journalling, and being fully present.

In any case, retreat activities are intended to help people connect to land, plants and animals in a way that opens new insights.

  • Absolutely. We will welcome you and your group and help to ground everyone in the natural context we offer. After that, you can take it away. We’ll provide snacks and lunch, and if desired, will facilitate a hands-on team-oriented experience. Our aim is to ensure that Heartwood is able to amplify the impact you have with your client.

  • For sure. We know that unique settings, particularly those connected with nature, can shift a group’s focus and produce different results than you’d get if you just met at the office. Please fill in our Contact Form and let us know that you’re interested in the “meeting” option.

  • We can accommodate up to 20, although we’ve often found that smaller groups lend themselves to deeper and richer experiences.

  • For our Team Retreats, we serve lunches made with local, seasonal food with a story. Meals are prepared by local caterers who cook our shared values into every morsel. Please note that we do our best to accommodate special dietary needs.

  • We understand the importance of technology even in the context of ecological retreats. In fact, we now have Fibre Optic internet at Heartwood, which is accessible via Wifi from any of our meeting places. And despite the rustic charm of our facilities, the meeting places are fully powered, so no problem connecting laptops, monitors, and even zooming in your colleagues from across the globe.

FAQs