CREATIVE RETREAT
A JOURNEY INTO THE CREATIVE SELF.
AN EMBODIED RETREAT IN THE HEART OF THE FEZ MEDINA, MOROCCO.
THE INVITATION
Most creative retreats give you more to do.
This one gives you less — on purpose.
Born to Create is a space to move beyond consumption and return to your creative intuition through the textures, rhythms, and deep cultural participation of one of the world's oldest living cities.
Creativity is not a skill you must acquire. It is your nature waiting for you to create the conditions in which it can move again. This residency is those conditions.
ABOUT THE RETREAT
Born to Create is a seven-day creative immersion in the ancient medina of Fez, designed for women who feel the pull to return to their creative selves, not through passive observation, but through daily, embodied creative practice in one of the world's most intact living craft cultures.
Each day follows a clear rhythm: mornings hold guided somatic practice and a creative inquiry, a prompt, task, or invitation that may take place in the riad, in the medina, or somewhere in between. Some inquiries are tightly framed; others are deliberately open.
Some of the afternoons and all evenings are yours to explore Fez independently, rest, return to the morning's work, or simply let the city be with you without agenda.
The facilitation draws on somatic awareness, Focusing-Oriented Art Therapy, expressive art-making, and depth psychology. These approaches are not techniques to be learned, they are conditions that support access to authentic creative experience. No prior experience with any of them is required.
MORNINGS
GUIDED PRACTICE
& CREATIVE INQUIRY
Each morning begins with somatic practice, movement, breath, and conscious attention, followed by a creative inquiry. Some are tightly framed tasks; others are open invitations. They may take place in the riad, in the medina, or both.
AFTERNOONS
FREE TIME IN FEZ
Some of the afternoons and all evenings belong entirely to participants to wander the medina, rest, return to the morning's work, or follow whatever the city opens in them. This is not a gap between sessions. It is part of the programme.
WHAT THIS IS | WHAT THIS IS NOT
IT IS
AN EMBODIED RETREAT
Seven days of deep immersion in Fez's living medina — 1,200 years of unbroken craft tradition, dye houses, tanneries, and streets that ask something of your body before your mind catches up. You are not a tourist here. You participate.
IT IS
A HELD CREATIVE SPACE
A daily programme of somatic practice and creative inquiry, with real free time each afternoon. There are no deliverables, no performance. The emphasis is on process — on rebuilding trust with your own creative instinct.
IT IS
AN INTIMATE GATHERING
Seven to nine women, brought together with care. Shared meals, slow mornings, and the kind of conversation that happens when a small group of creative people are given real time together in an extraordinary place.
IT IS
A RETURN NOT ESCAPE
You are not going to Fez to disappear. You are going to be present — to the city, to the other women, and to the parts of your creative self that require stillness and sensation to surface.
IT IS NOT
THERAPY
A TOUR WITH CREATIVE ADD-ON
ABOUT PRODUCING A PORTFOLIO
The practices draw on somatic and depth psychology approaches — but this is not a therapeutic space. The focus is creative, not curative.
Fez is not a backdrop. It is the primary material.
What you make here belongs to your process. You owe it to no one.
WHAT THIS RETREAT INVOLVES
KEY ELEMENTS OF THE RETREAT
01
MORNING SOMATIC PRACTICE
Each day begins with body-based practice, movement, breath, and conscious attention to settle presence and open perception before the creative inquiry begins.
02
DAILY CREATIVE INQUIRIES
A set of creative tasks or invitations held every day, some tightly framed, some deliberately open. They may involve drawing, writing, working with objects, or moving through the medina with a specific prompt in mind.
03
MEDINA AS CREATIVE FIELD
Some inquiries take participants directly into the city, to artisan workshops, dye houses, markets, and streets. Gathering found objects, responding to specific sites, making work that belongs to where it was made.
04
FREE TIME IN FEZ
Some afternoons and evenings belong to participants entirely to explore Fez independently, rest, or follow whatever the city offers them. This is not a gap in the programme; it is an essential part of it.
05
COLLECTIVE MAKING
At least one shared creative process where work is made together, not as performance, but as an encounter with what becomes possible in a group that is not possible alone.
06
GROUP SHARING & REFLECTION
Facilitated group space to share what arose in the day's practice. Not critique, witness. A place where individual experience is expanded by the presence and reflection of the group.
07
GUIDED TOUR OF FEZ
A guided introduction to the medina by car, its history, craft traditions, and structure. Context that deepens everything that follows during the week.
08
SHARED MEALS
Daily breakfast together, plus three lunches and three dinners included. Fruit, tea and water are available all day. The remaining meals are yours to explore the city's food independently. The table is where the day settles, in company, without an agenda.
METHODOLOGY
The facilitation brings together approaches from somatic practice, expressive art-making, and depth psychology — frameworks I studied across several years and am now weaving together for the first time in a retreat setting, held lightly and applied in service of creative experience, not psychological treatment.
SOMATIC AWARENESS & BODY BASED PRACTICES
Grounded in principles of embodiment and nervous system regulation. Through movement, breath, and conscious attention, participants develop the capacity to experience the body as a source of information, orientation, and inner stability.
FOCUSING-ORIENTED ART THERAPY (FOAT)
An approach connecting bodily felt sense with visual and symbolic expression. It supports contact with inner experience and its gradual unfolding through image and dialogue — without needing to find words first.
EXPRESSIVE ART MAKING
Drawing, collage, and writing as process-oriented practice. The emphasis is not on the result but on the act of making itself — as a way of perceiving, thinking, and knowing.
POST MODERN & NARRATIVE APPROACHES
Working with the multiplicity of identities, inner voices, and personal stories. This loosens fixed self-concepts and opens new perspectives for how we understand ourselves and our creative relationship to the world.
GESTALT & HUMANISTIC PRINCIPLES
A focus on present-moment experience, authentic felt response, and the relationship between inner experience and outward expression. What is happening now — in this body, in this room, in this city.
SYMBOLS, ARCHETYPES & IMAGINATION
Drawing on depth psychology, symbolic images serve as a bridge between conscious and unconscious experience — allowing material to surface that cannot be reached through direct thinking alone.
COLLECTIVE MAKING & SHARING
The group process as a space for reflection, relational encounter, and the expansion of individual experience. Sharing takes place in a respectful, non-evaluative frame — not critique, but witness.
WHO IS THIS FOR
This retreat is not for everyone. It is designed for a specific kind of woman. If you recognise yourself here, the application is the right next step.
You make things — or you used to, and you want to return. Your medium doesn't matter.
You are tired of learning more and creating less. Of consuming content about creativity instead of practicing it.
You want to be somewhere that asks something real of you. Not comfort — depth.
You travel to feel changed, not just rested. You want the city to work on you.
You feel the head is too loud and want to return to the intelligence of the body and the senses.
You value process over product, presence over performance, and a small group over an anonymous crowd.
NO PRIOR EXPERIENCE REQUIRED
You do not need to be a professional artist or have experience with somatic practice, movement, or visual art. You need curiosity and a genuine desire to be present with what arises. The retreat is open to women only.
THE CITY
WHY FEZ
Fez is not a backdrop. It is the primary creative material of this residency.
The medina of Fez el-Bali is 1,200 years old and still largely intact. a labyrinth of 9,000 streets that has not been redesigned for visitors. The dye houses still work with the same methods. The tanneries still function as they have for centuries. Artisans who have inherited their practice across generations still occupy the same workshops their great-grandparents occupied.
When you walk through it, your body responds before your mind does. The sensory density, the sound of hammers, the smell of leather and spices, the shift of light through a mashrabiya screen, bypasses the interpretive mind and touches something more instinctive. That is exactly where creativity lives.
For seven days, this city will do something to your perception. That is why we come here and not somewhere easier.
LOCATION
FEZ, MOROCCO
UNESCO World Heritage Site
DATES
15 - 22 NOV 2026
Check-in from 3pm · Check-out by 11am
ACCOMMODATION
Shared room in Dar Drouj, max 2 per room. Single room available €250 surcharge
FOOD & DRINK
Daily breakfast · 3 lunches · 3 dinners
Coffee, tea & water available throughout the day
TRAVEL
Participants arrange their own flights to Fez–Saïss Airport (FEZ). Airport coordination provided.
INCLUDED EXCURSION
One guided tour of the medina by car
YOUR FACILITATOR
LUCIE BLAZE
I work at the intersection of somatics, visual communication, and the psychology of the creative process. My practice is a response to a question I have returned to across many years and countries: what does a person need to return to themselves creatively?
Not more technique. Not more content. Not another structured programme that produces the appearance of creativity while leaving the inner source untouched.
The Fez residency brings together a different set of frameworks — somatic practice, artmaking, creative approaches and depth psychology — that I have studied across several years and am now weaving into a residential setting for the first time.
Born to Create is a cultural platform I founded to investigate creativity as a lived, embodied, and relational practice. The Fez residency is the fullest expression of this work to date.
ACADEMIC AND PROFESSIONAL JOURNEY
CZ
CZ
FR
NZ
NZ
HU
Theory & History of Art — UPOL
Graphic Design, Studio 01 — UJEP
Visual Communication — Maryse École Eloy
Art Therapy, PgDip — Whitecliffe
Psychosynthesis — Psychosynthesis Institute
Performance & Cultural Practices — School of Disobedience
INVESTMENT & PRACTICALITIES
FULL RESIDENCY
€990
-
Shared accommodation — 7 nights in Dar Drouj in Fez
-
Daily breakfast
-
3 lunches & 3 dinners shared
-
Water, tea & fruit throughout the day
-
Guided car tour of Fez medina
-
All creative materials
-
All facilitated sessions
DEPOSIT TO SECURE YOUR PLACE
€200
-
Paid upon acceptance — secures your place
-
Remaining €790 due by 1 October 2026
-
Places confirmed in order of deposit received
-
Single room available · €250 surcharge, indicate preference in your application
ADDITIONAL INFO
International flights and travel insurance are not included and are the responsibility of each participant. Fez–Saïss Airport (FEZ) has direct connections from several European cities. Remaining meals beyond those included give participants freedom to explore Fez's food independently — the city has an extraordinary local food culture worth discovering on your own
CHECK IN
15 NOV 2026
from 3pm
CHECK OUT
22 NOV 2026
before 11am
APPLICATIONS CLOSE
15 OCT 2026
Or when the group is complete
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Do I need to be a professional artist?
Not at all. What matters is curiosity and a genuine desire to be present with your own creative process. Many participants are not artists by profession.
What language is the residency spoken in?
English, and Czech if Czech participants don't speak English.
Can I come alone?
Most women do. Coming alone is often the point.
What is the daily structure?
Mornings are held — somatic practice followed by a creative inquiry. Afternoons are mostly free for independent exploration of Fez, rest, or returning to the morning's work. Some afternoons will be spent together in creative inquiry.
Is there wifi and phone signal at the riad?
Yes, wifi and phone signal are available throughout the stay.
What should I pack?
Comfortable clothes for movement, and some clothes that can get dirty during creative sessions. Fez is a Muslim community; please dress modestly when out in the medina. This means covering shoulders and knees; loose, lightweight layers work well and are easy to move in. A light scarf is always useful.
What about the meals not included in the price?
Four lunches and four dinners are yours to explore independently, and the medina has an extraordinary food culture worth discovering on your own terms. A local meal at a neighbourhood restaurant costs roughly €4–8; a mid-range dinner in a riad or rooftop restaurant runs €15–30. One of the most memorable meals in Fez can cost less than €5.
What is the cancellation policy?
If you cancel more than 30 days before the start date, your deposit is forfeited but the remaining balance is fully refunded. If you cancel between 14 and 30 days before, 50% of the total is forfeited. If you cancel less than 14 days before, no refund can be given. We strongly recommend travel insurance to cover unforeseen circumstances.