The Inspiration Behind Our 2027 Retreats

This is my first journal post, and I’ve been thinking about what I wanted this little corner of Fjord to Fibre to be.

Over the past few months, there have been so many moments while planning our 2027 retreats where I’ve felt incredibly proud, inspired, excited, and honestly just really lucky that I get to do this. I kept having these thoughts and ideas and moments that I wanted to share, and I felt like I was holding onto all of them until I was about to burst.

So, this is where I’m going to put them.

I want this journal to be a place where I can share a little more of what goes into creating Fjord to Fibre. The places and things that inspire us, what i'm learning along the way, the moments I’m most proud of, and all of the little details that eventually become the experiences we get to share with you.

And maybe, in sharing some of what is inspiring me, it will spark something in you too.

Right now, so much of that inspiration is coming from planning our 2027 retreats.

After our first retreat in Victoria in 2026, I couldn’t wait to start imagining what could come next. That experience taught us so much. Not only about hosting a retreat, but about what actually makes this kind of time together meaningful.

And that has shaped almost every decision we’ve made for the year ahead.

Montreal

I had the opportunity to call Montreal home for the past year, and I don’t think I could have understood how special the city is without actually living there.

There is so much history in Montreal. The architecture, the food, the art, the neighbourhoods. There are little details everywhere that make you want to stop and look around. The longer I lived there, the more I wanted to share it with other people.

After our first retreat, I knew I wanted to create one in a place that had become so meaningful to me personally.

There is something really exciting about now getting to look at Montreal through the eyes of our future guests. Places I walked past all the time suddenly have me thinking, I want them to see this. 

It feels incredibly special to get to take a place I was lucky enough to call home and turn it into an experience I can share with other people.

Banff

And then there is Banff.

Banff is one of those places that almost doesn’t seem real until you are standing in it.

My mom and I spent last week driving through the Rockies while planning our 2027 retreats. We visited the places we hope to take our guests, walked through spaces, explored the area and tried to imagine what it would feel like to experience it all as part of Fjord to Fibre.

And it truly is everything people say it is.

There were so many moments on that trip where we would look at each other and say, Can you imagine bringing everyone here?

That feeling is really what I want these retreats to capture.

Banff is a bucket-list destination for people all over the world, but what excites me most isn't just getting people there.

It's creating enough space for everyone to actually experience being there.

To spend the day surrounded by the Rockies and then come back, sit down together, pull out our knitting and talk about what we saw.

I think there is so much creative inspiration that comes from putting yourself somewhere completely different, especially somewhere that beautiful.

Back to Victoria

And then, to finish our 2027 tour with Arne & Carlos by taking Fjord to Fibre back to where it all started feels very full circle.

Victoria will always be special to us because it was our first.

But I don't want our next Victoria retreat to simply be a repeat of the first one.

We get to return in a different season, with everything we learned the first time around, and experience Vancouver Island in a completely different way. We want to expand our excursions, spend more time in nature and share more of what makes this part of the world so beautiful.

There is also something I want to do differently.

One of our biggest learnings from our first retreat was that the value of these experiences doesn't come from filling every available hour.

In fact, some of the moments I loved most were the ones that weren't really planned at all.

People sitting together working on their projects. Conversations continuing after a workshop. Someone helping the person beside them. Stories being shared around a table.

It made me realize how important it is to leave room for those moments to happen.

Making Room for Inspiration

That has become one of the biggest ideas behind our 2027 retreats.

Of course we want to plan incredible excursions. We want to find beautiful places for us to eat. I want our guests to experience each destination and come home feeling like they really got to see somewhere special.

But we don't want anyone to feel like they need a vacation after their retreat.

We want there to be time to sit together and knit.

Time to talk.

Time to work on something you love without thinking about what you need to do next.

Time to learn from Arne & Carlos and from the person sitting beside you.

And time to simply look around and take in where you are.

I think so many of us are craving inspiration, but sometimes we fill our lives so completely that we don't actually leave any room for it.

That is what I keep thinking about as we build these retreats.

Montreal, Banff and Victoria couldn't be more different, but each one has given me that feeling in its own way. And getting to create experiences in these places, with people who are excited to learn and make things together, is something I feel incredibly proud of.

There is so much happening behind the scenes right now, and for the first time I have somewhere to share it all.

So, here are my thoughts, the things I'm learning, and the things I can barely wait to tell you about.

I hope somewhere along the way, something here sparks a little inspiration in you too.

Kaitlyn