SOU’WESTER EVENTS!
Discover what’s happening during your next stay or plan a visit around our free live music, workshops, wellness offerings and more!
Contemplative Rest Retreat
Contemplative Rest: Our Basic Peace Work
A weekend-long retreat with M Freeman
Fri, Feb 9 @ 7:00pm – Sun, Feb11 @ 11am
In-person only at:
The Sou’wester Lodge
3728 J Place
Seaview, Wa 98644
The Brief
Explore, savor, and rest in the numinous through this weekend-long retreat with contemplative guide, media artist, and writer, M Freeman. Inspired by decades of heart-centered contemplative practices and by Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh’s mindfulness teaching that rest is our most basic peace work, Freeman’s Contemplative Rest cultivates engagement in the mystical realm and nurtures awe as a profoundly fortifying resource.
We’ve all had unforgettable experiences of awe. Maybe it was on a hike, or holding a newborn, or watching a flock of birds. Maybe it was in moonlight, or with your cat, or in a hospital room. This spacious weekend features practice sessions in which Freeman will lead participants through exploring and honoring recollected moments, and will then guide folks into reverent, somatic, contemplative rest. Participants will be invited into reflective writing, to share reflections and insights, and to enjoy lots of solo relaxation time. All this wonder happens along the stunning Washington State coast at the Sou’wester Lodge and Vintage Travel Trailer Resort.
How much: Retreat fee is sliding scale, starting at $325 – Tickets
Lodging is additional. The Sou’wester has set aside select lodging options for retreat participants. Book lodging directly here with the Sou’wester.
Event details at marilynfreeman.com
About M Freeman
Media artist, writer, contemplative, spiritual director, and independent scholar, M Freeman works at the intersections of reckoning and resiliency, queerness and film, and contemplative, creative and social art practices. Author of The Illuminated Space: A Personal Theory and Contemplative Practice of Media Art (The 3rd Thing, 2020/winner of the Nautilus Book Award Gold Medal for Creativity & Innovation) and creator of Cinema Divina (short films for contemplative practice), Freeman is the founder of Contemplative Rest: Exploring, Savoring & Resting in the Numinous; and co-curator of Good Symptom: A Serial Anthology of Time-based Disturbances. Their text and media arts essays have been published in or at The Fourth Genre, Ninth Letter, TriQuarterly, Blackbird, Rolling Stone, Abbey of the Arts, and Good Symptom. Their films are screened on PBS and in galleries, spirituality centers and festivals worldwide. marilynfreeman.com.
M Freeman photo by Anne de Marcken
Feb 10
Kintsugi Breaking and Mending Workshop (FULL)
w/Glenda Goodrich $70
Where Grief, Gratitude, and Beauty Coexist.
Come join us as we delve into the art of breaking and mending. Participants will choose a bowl to break and mend as a ceremonial metaphor for the woundings of life and the beauty that comes from its broken places. The act of breaking a bowl and mending the “scars” with gold is based on the Japanese art of Kintsugi. Kintsugi teaches us we cannot go back to the way we were before, but instead move forward with our woundings and the beauty they can bring. Students will leave with a ceramic bowl with golden mended fault lines as a reminder of the places where grief, gratitude, and beauty coexist, as well as the opportunity to reframe old ideas about loss and adversity. Workshop fee includes ceremony, instruction, bowls, and all materials.
- Saturday 1:30-6p
Location: Ilwaco Artworks
Ancient Pools: Presented by Sou’wester Arts
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
Ancient Pools is the home recording project of husband and wife duo Vin Christopher and Anna Jeter. They have a soft approach to pop music. Warm, lush synth chords, watery guitar playing and crystalline vocals aim to usher listeners to a calm and peaceful place.
Feb 17 & 18
Sgraffito Vases: Ceramic Surface Design Workshop
w/Jo Pfeirer $105
Sgraffito Vases: During this weekend workshop, students will spend the first day creating 2-3 10 inch vases with clay and spend the second day decorating them with the beautiful, versatile style of Sgraffito. A perfect project for the first spring blooms!
- Saturday 2-6p
- Sunday 12-4p
Location: Ilwaco Artworks
Ollella Live at the Sou’wester
Ollella’s (pronounced oh-lel-uh) career as a musician started early, when she sang before she could talk. Trained as a classical cellist since the age of nine, the Seattle indie-folk musician merges her technical string background with authoritative vocals and live-looping. Described as “really outstanding” by NPR Music’s Bob Boilen and “so tastefully done” by Michelle Zauner (AKA Japanese Breakfast), Ollella blends the acoustic with the contemporary, folk with pop, and tenacity with softness, pulling on influences such as Feist, Cat Power, and Sylvan Esso. She was a finalist in the 2022 NPR Tiny Desk Contest, has had music featured in film festivals and on TV, and is a frequent collaborator with others. She finds herself drawn to music because it unlocks a particularly organic flavor of humanity – one that fits the type of world she believes in.
Feb 24
Playful & Sculptural Ceramic Cups Workshop
w/Ashley Campbell $65
Who says cups have to be strictly utilitarian or sculptural and not both? I am a firm believer in usable art and I love to dive into this mentality with one of our most used objects, the cup! In this workshop, your instructor, Ashley Campbell of The Beige Motel will show you the wonderful ways to use mason stains to color your clay. We will be discussing marbling and inlay techniques to create colorful patterns and then use templates, cutters, and molds to create our vessels. Each student can expect to create a pair of colorful cups to take home.
- Saturday 2-6p
Location: Ilwaco Artworks
Jeremy James Meyer: Presented by Sou’wester Arts
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
Jeremy James Meyer is an artificer of song. A songwriter’s songwriter. He crafts redemptive songs full of woody rock ‘n’ roll tones. His deep, penetrating voice has a wide range, and is especially captivating in his droning, lower register. He spent the last decade drifting around, a tool belt troubadour, working carpentry by day, bringing folk music to the people at night. As with most well traveled songwriters it’s hard to tell where the road ends and Jeremy James Meyer begins. His songs seamlessly blend plain-language and poetic lyricism. They wander from personal truth to outlaw legends. He’s capable of cathartic protest songs, cosmic country canticles, and dive bar sing-a-longs. Whenever, and however your path crosses with Jeremy James Meyer’s (and it will) prepare for an enchanting, psychedelic trip through cosmic American music.
– Sean Jewell American Standard Time
Get ready for Spring! We will explore various techniques to make ceramic projects for the garden; planters, bird baths, watering bells and more! Includes open studio time for the duration of the class as well as glazing and firing.
REGISTER
- March 2nd: Pots & Planters
- March 9th: Bird/Bee Baths & Garden Markers
- March 16th: Garden Oya’s & Watering Bells
- March 23rd: Birdhouses & Feeders
- March 30th: Glazing
- Sunday, April 7th, 4:30 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. Potluck Show and Tell
The Apricots: Presented by Sou’wester Arts
FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC
The Apricots are an emerging indie-folk-rock band from Portland, OR that centers vocal harmony. At their core, they’re just a group of best friends that have found purpose in this band. They released their debut self-titled EP, The Apricots, in November 2023. They’re excited to return to the Sou’Wester for their second performance!