In-person
Seasonal Gatherings
following the
Celtic Wheel of the Year
At Omved Gardens
Highgate, London N6
“When we devote our attention to these cycles over time, their continuous variation reveals itself, unfurling like a spiral that draws us deeper into kinship with the Earth.”
(Emmanuel Vaughan-Lee)
A series of fun, friendly gatherings to celebrate the seasons following the Celtic Wheel of the Year., in collaboration with the beautiful Omved Gardens, in Highgate, North London.
Our mutually shared home, this beautiful planet Earth, moves to her own beat, formed by numerous rhythms and cycles. Seasons change, the moon goes through periods of illumination and darkness, tides shift their flow, winged kin migrate in response to light, and mammals and insects hibernate. Buds burst into fresh life, then eventually turn into decaying leaves that become compost for new soil, so that the cycle can begin again.
Our human bodies and psyches have formed over millennia to be responsive to and be affected by this ongoing patchwork of nature’s changes. Seasonal cycles have always been our anchors; they are what our cultural practices have been based on, and they are the rhythms we’ve relied on to find our place and belonging in the greater web of life.
Our Seasonal Gatherings are created to honour these ecological transitions, corresponding to the Celtic Wheel of the Year, and are intended to bring us back to our animal bodies and our innate ecological nature, while remembering how to honour these shifting cycles in community. These are a series of fun, friendly, restful gatherings that blend some of the following:
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Getting intimate with the changes happening around us in nature
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Engaging in simple, fun and contemplative creative practices to connect to ourselves and the e
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cological time we find ourselves in
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Sharing folk stories and tales about plant and animal kin present with us at that time
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Reclaiming some of the ancient festivals and practices that connect us to the land, the seasons and each other
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Sharing seasonal songs and poetry
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Reflecting on our journey over the past few weeks and setting intentions aligned with the ecological energies of the season
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Learning about seasonal recipes, foods, or teas, often harvested from the OmVed garden.
Book for one gathering or a series of three.
SPRING TO SUMMER SERIES
All events 6pm to 8.30pm
Tuesday 17th March - Vernal Equinox / Ostara
Spring Equinox is a time of inner and outer balance. We will create seed bombs to tend to new outer growth and we will care for our inner expansion through reflective practice. We will connect to cleavers, nettles and other early spring plants in creative ways. Following traditional Slavic patterns, we will make our own Maslenitsa straw dolls as a way to honour the end of the winter period, and set our orientation towards the dynamic spring ahead.
Thursday May 7th - Beltane
Belthane, the peak of spring, brims with life surging upward. Streets and meadows abound with ecological sensuality: scent, blossom, and the flirtatious unfurling of nature’s vitality is everywhere. In this session, we will explore the wildness of our animal bodies through movement and learn bird whistle calls. In the best Beltane tradition, we will craft flower crowns from hawthorn and other plants sacred to the season, while learning about their medicinal qualities and ecological lives.
Thursday June 18th -Summer solstice / Litha
In this time of illumination, meeting at the point of the longest day and the shortest night, with the sun at its highest peak and garden’s flowers in their full bloom, we will play with the sun by making sun-capturing art and traverse the garden for a fulfilling noticing and writing practice. We will make lavender talismans and meet other potent plant allies of the season, all meanwhile collectively rejoicing in songs and dance powered by the sweetness of an elder elixir.
SUMMER TO AUTUMN SERIES
Thursday 30th July - Lammas
Late summer, abundant with land’s gifts, is the time of the first harvest. In this traditional moment ripe for thanks giving, we will dye our own gratitude bundles with a wild seasonal grain. Using our hands to reflect on our life’s harvest we will craft corn dollies, while feasting on berries, home-baked treats and their folklore.
Tuesday 22nd Sept - Autumn Equinox / Mabon
The Autumn Equinox, or Mabon, is a time of equal day and night. Paying attention to this balancing play between light and dark, we will paint the garden’s shadows with ink from foraged oak galls and track leaves’ outlines through eco-printing on textiles. We will connect with autumnal trees and their fruits through movement, traditional games, and treats, and learn from our rooted kin what it is that we might need to shed at this time.
Tuesday 27 October - Samhain / Halloween
Samhain marks both the end and the beginning of the Celtic Wheel of the Year, a meeting of death and rebirth. At this end of autumn, the fertile power of decay is omnipresent in nature, and so we will work with divination tools, handmade incense, seasonal herbs, fungi, and natural materials to draw out what needs to be buried and left behind at this time, and what we must journey inward with as we cross this threshold into winter.
Alisa Ruzavina
Lead Facilitator
Alisa is a socially-engaged and ecology-tending artist, ceremonialist and a facilitator for Kincentric Leadership. She works across public art, installation, textiles and participatory art. Her curiosity lies in creating playful conversations about ecological and social dreaming and weaving collective experiences that stimulate the rewilding of the urban mind. Alisa’s practice is focused on intercultural and interspecies exchanges that nurture a sense of belonging and support the articulation of a communal identity. Alisa has worked with the Barbican, the V&A, Tate, Natural England, British Council, and many others. She is a sustainable design lecturer at the University of the Arts London and a fellow of Kincentric Leadership's programme. Alisa’s favourite moments are her dates with the London’s river Lea marshlands, who are her greatest teachers.
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Sol Akinsowon
Supporting Facilitator
Sol is an interdisciplinary artist, whose creative journey gracefully dances through the realms of photography, film, poetry, and sound. Their practice centres the power of intimacy and connection with and between all beings, weaving the visual language of intuition with poetry and prose. Drawing inspiration from their surroundings, heritage and community they explore the richness of the traditions, as well as documenting the changes and effects on community. Through their work they seek to capture the essence of connectivity, creating a world of meaningful narratives that resonate with deep emotion and authenticity. For Kincentric Leadership they support in workshop facilitation, media and video-making.
Justine Huxley
Supporting Facilitator
Justine is a spiritual ecologist, author and facilitator and Co-Founder of Kincentric Leadership. She has a PhD in psychology and belongs to a Sufi community which over the last decades has deeply integrated its tradition and practices together with Earth as a living, divine being. She has facilitated retreats, meditation and dreamwork groups in this tradition for over 25 years. She is the author of Generation Y, Spirituality and Social Change. Justine was raised by a zoologist (who had a passion for arachnids) and a teacher (who had a passion for astronomy), so her childhood was full of spiders and stars. She also lives on the River Lea, a days paddle North of Alisa, and is in love with all things river.
