A brief descent into Instagrammable wellness …
I clicked ‘Book Now’ in a caffeinated, post-publication crash. Frazzled, mid-life, burnt-out nerves had me fantasising about mountains, serenity, yoga. Then – as if the algorithms crawled inside my skull – Instagram served it up: a luxury mountain-and-yoga retreat in the Italian Alps. And the hotel had Paradise in the name. Milton’s warning about Paradise Lost might have been ringing in my ears, if I’d listened. The waiting was delicious. Three weeks to go. I filled out the intake form like a supplicant: I wanted peace, reconnection, inspiration. Every carefully crafted question, every checkbox, made me feel seen, special, chosen. A prearrival phone call from a friendly Canadian voice sealed it: The mountains are magical. You’ll leave a new woman.
I arrived to a sleek, modernist, almost brutalist hotel surrounded by a concrete car park full of luxury SUVs. Was this in the photos? Installations of blue snails were crawling up the façade, and a giant plastic snail sat in front of the hotel like a surreal mascot. All around, the Dolomites rose in seasonal splendour – craggy peaks brushed with early snow.
Inside, the ‘art’ continued: a vintage Ferrari wheel mounted like a sculpture, garish colour blocks, perfumed air that owed nothing to the outdoors. A chrome-and-glass lift. A room that was crisp, clean, and entirely soulless. The view? A ski lift under construction, men welding, machinery whining. I felt like I’d booked myself into an Alpine spa-themed episode of Black Mirror.
I booked this retreat with the mantra ‘You deserve it’ ringing in my head. Fool.
Still, I put on the one good dress I’d packed – I had naively believed yoga gear and hiking clothes would suffice – and went down to the bar, where piano music tinkled. Prosecco appeared in delicate glasses; hors d’oeuvres were so deconstructed they looked like postmodern sculptures. The staff were immaculate. The introductory circle began.
The pattern emerged immediately. Everyone but one Italian couple had flown in from Canada. They all belonged to the same yoga studio and seemed to know each other, and the retreat leader, intimately. She was intimidatingly turned out, tall, blonde, honed, a picture of manicured perfection. She was also married to the hotel owner’s son.
The Canadians laughed, poured wine as if at après-ski, swapped stories sharpened by shared history. I alone had booked through Eventbrite; the rest were pre-bonded, positioned within an already functioning social hierarchy. I sipped my wine and watched the ballet of inclusion and exclusion with rising dread. It looked like a Charlie Kaufman-style social experiment – and I was the unwitting lead who hadn’t been briefed.
First yoga class: Not gentle stretching. Not meditative stillness. This was athletic, synchronised performance yoga – Madonna-in-the-eighties-style. Sunrise Pose Synchronisation. A kaleidoscope of Lycra in coordinated Pantone palettes. Whispered countdowns. A relentless expectation of perfection. The teacher wore an off-the-shoulder top, hair ironed, immoveable, make-up immaculate.
A photographer appeared. You don’t mind, do you? I did, dreadfully. But I needn’t have worried, I didn’t feature in a single shot. This was all about capturing perfection after all.
Was this meant to be aspirational? My Penneys leggings suddenly felt like failure.
Dinner was its own spectacle. Ms Goop-Lite (I’d named her by then) unveiled another designer outfit and wheeled out her daughter who she called ‘Mini Me’ – seemingly without irony – dressed in a tiny couture replica of her mother’s look. Guests oohed; the child twirled. The food was ornate to the point of abstraction: foam on everything. ‘All-inclusive’ didn’t include water. When I asked for tap, the waiter looked at me as if I were something to scrape off his shoe.
The next day’s hike was meant to be my salvation: immersion in nature, at last. Instead: deafening chatter about Whistler, second homes, designer gear. My ten-year-old Lidl hiking boots felt like an act of rebellion.
A wild electrical storm rolled in. Lightning cracking over peaks, hail hammering us, rocks slick beneath our boots. At last: raw nature! The group remained in high spirits. Ms Goop-Lite led us into a curated boutique mountain hut (of course she knew the owner). Wine flowed. The storm worsened. We were four hours from the hotel at precarious altitude. More wine, anyone?
Back outside, we lasted ten minutes before she ushered everyone into yet another rifugio – even sleeker, even more Instagrammable. Descending the mountain, I was terrified, the lightning had intensified, the thunder drowned out even the loudest chatter (small mercies), and the others were properly drunk, still roaring, laughing, slipping on wet paths. I fell into conversation with the young photographer couple. They asked why I was here. I said I was wondering the same thing. When I told them I’d found what I thought was a yoga and hiking retreat on Eventbrite, they looked genuinely perplexed.
Why must humans curate rugged beauty to death? Why plant luxury huts across a mountain that needs nothing?
The group returned in one piece, but yoga was cancelled due to collective drunkenness. The wellness area had a sign: please observe silence. The sauna smelled of booze breath. I fled to retrieve my earplugs, determined to salvage something. And so, I sat in the outdoor jacuzzi in lashing rain and hailstones, earplugs in, staring at the mountains.
That night, a text from @MadamePerfecta: Could we meet at 9am?
In the meeting she informed me – in glacial, PR-friendly tones – that it had come to her attention I was “complaining”. If I had issues, I must speak only to her. I had tried speaking to her. She was a master of deflection, patronisation, and turning any concern into a personal failing. And truthfully, the problem was me: everyone else was having a great time.
The photographer couple disappeared the next morning – vanished, excised. I hurt my back attempting a wheel pose I hadn’t done since school. In the final class, I lay flat like a starfish. I didn’t need to go, but it was my tiny act of rebellion. I refused to even try to look good.
The closing ceremony involved writing letters to ourselves: what we wanted more of, less of. I wrote, in huge bold letters: This bullshit. We were invited to burn our letters; I’d hoped someone might glimpse mine before the flames took it. Then came the farewell chorus of insincerity: We arrived as strangers and leave as friends.
In a world where toxic wellness is curated to perfection, authenticity may be the last true luxury.
Back home, my real friends’ outrage pushed me to file a formal complaint. The hotel manager – conveniently the brother of Ms Goop-Lite’s husband – replied: This wasn’t what you needed at this point in your life.
Yes, I explained but I had carefully read their online material, had filled in their form expressly laying out what I needed and was told this would be it. The discrepancies were clear. Perhaps a partial refund? An acknowledgement, even? His second email: We have debunked every one of your spurious claims made to fit your narrative. I stepped away from the computer shaking. A hotel manager had written that.
Buyers beware.
Curated “care” can be a dangerous, toxic affair – especially if you’re genuinely seeking restoration. Not everything that glitters … etc. I appreciate, more than ever, the yoga in my local community hall: women in baggy leggings, makeup- free, real, a turning inwards, nothing performative or polished. And my last hike in the Wicklow hills with my fella in his matching ancient Lidl hiking boots followed by a pint of Guinness in a slightly dodgy pub. Honest. Mucky. Lovely.
