Hi there! My name is Carolyn Peeler, I am a creative gal whose passions include travel, hosting creative retreats, paper and fabric crafting, newborn photography and graphic design. I have combined those passions into my company “Carolyn Peeler Creative Studios”, the home of all my creative ventures.
From 2004 until 2014 I was the Sr. Creative Director at Melissa Frances, a scrapbooking and giftware manufacturer. While my main duties included product design and development, I was also given amazing opportunities to travel and teach paper craft projects at events in such far flung destinations as Russia, Israel, Colombia, Italy, France, Sweden, Brazil, Poland, Panama, Spain and Norway. During those years, as my passport was filling with stamps, I started dreaming about organizing and hosting my own international retreat.
My dream became reality when, in 2013, I invited a friend to co-host La Dolce Vita a creative lifestyle retreat in Tuscany Italy with me. The first two retreats took place in 2014, and they were a revelation - I got such a high from connecting the attendees to the local culture and I couldn’t wait to do it again!
Sometimes things have to go wrong before they can go right. In the Fall of 2014 I was laid off from my Creative Director job, due to a downturn in the paper crafting industry. I realized that this opened a window for me to work full time on my retreats. In 2015, my co-host decided to move onto other things, and the company became mine to steer as I wished. Since then, (until Covid) I have hosted retreats each summer in Tuscany.
Each year as I join attendees in Italy, I am in my element. I love connecting them with good people, amazing food, culture and art... it's fulfilling in so many ways. To learn more about my retreat, please visit its website: www.pronetowanderretreats.com
In addition to being published in paper crafting magazines and Idea Books, I have been a contributing writer for the Canadian Scrapbooker magazine, have self-published "Postmark:LA", an inspirational collaboration featuring six authors, have written articles for Woman's Day and the now defunct magazine Legacy and had my induction to live TV when appearing on QVC in the UK promoting Melissa Frances products.
