Charlotte Church forced to close her healing retreat: Singer puts her wacky Welsh wellness centre ‘into hibernation’ after just three years

DAILYMAIL.COM • 6h ago

By RICHARD EDEN, DIARY EDITOR and JOANNA CRAWLEY, DEPUTY SHOWBIZ EDITOR (NEWS) 09:06 13 Oct 2026, updated 09:14 13 Oct 2026

Charlotte Church, who called Ed Sheeran a greedy capitalist last month, has had to put her own business into ‘hibernation’.

The Voice of an Angel star, 40, opened a ‘healing retreat’ in her native Wales in 2023.

Called The Dreaming, it was based at Rhydoldog House, once the home of fashion designer Laura Ashley, which she bought for around £1.5million two years earlier.

Now, however, a spokesman says it will close in December because it is ‘a different world today than the one we started off in’ and it needs to ‘reassess what it is we should be offering’.

In a statement shared on social media, the retreat team explained that ‘after five years of unfaltering practice, tending with diligence to the dreams of the land and our guests, we announce with hearts-a-brim that The Dreaming will be pausing its work at Rhydoldog from December 2026’.

‘Through the harvest season, it is important to discern what requires attention from that which is falling away, what needs to be put to compost.’

‘We need the chance to compost, mulch, go fallow, listen deeply to the earth, so that we can germinate new dreams for the future.’

The statement said that the team were proud to have welcomed 3,000 guests over the past five years, singling out their pay-what-you-can scheme, meaning visitors could stay for as little as £1 per night. NHS workers also enjoyed the retreats for free.

Ultimately though the business model has failed in the current economic climate, with Charlotte and her team explaining ‘it is a different world today than the one we started off in just a short half decade ago.’

‘As we stare clear-eyed at the exponentially complexifying crises that have been spreading out ahead of us all like cracking ice, we at The Dreaming need to reassess, with candour and courage what it is we should be offering to be in service.’

‘And so we must dream. And to do so we must hibernate. We cannot say when exactly we will be returning from the dream realm, but return we shall.’

Charlotte bought Rhydoldog House with her husband Jonathan Powell in 2021, finally opening her green retreat in 2023 after overcoming building problems and winning a series of planning battles to transform the property.

The property’s makeover was turned into a documentary series on the Discovery Channel.

Sitting in the Elan Valley, the £1.5million mansion is the former home of Laura Ashley and was completely transformed by Charlotte, who added a ‘womb room’ and vagina-shaped showers.

Charlotte told the Daily Mail she came across what estate agents called ‘Laura Ashley’s Welsh mansion’ while trying to buy a field for glamping. Blown away by the 33 acres of mossy rocks, temperate rainforest and rushing streams, she decided to open a full-blown, year-round retreat.

‘It’s about connecting with nature,’ she declared back in 2023. ‘In our busy lives, we don’t have time. People are so distracted by everything. Our nervous systems are getting burned out.’

She explained how the The Dreaming sources power from a hydro mill and has a water source heat pump to provide hot water.

‘We’re flanked by two waterfalls, either side. One which has got hydro mill, so we get a lot of our power from the hydro mill in the Elan Valley, which is situated in the Cambrian Mountains,’ she explained, adding that she had big plans for the future.

‘I really care about the future and the future of the planet, you know, I really think that we can turn things around and so I wanted to be involved in projects and I wanted to start projects, which was living my values really, and living my activism.’

‘We’ve got a water source heat pump and we’ve got the hydro mill, and we’re gonna have a huge food growing project.

‘So this year we’ll have about an acre, an acre and a half of land in which to grow food, and then, In the next two or three years, that’s gonna grow to like three or four acres.’

The seven-bedroom mansion has three storeys, a helicopter landing and a 200-year-old barn on its 47 acres.

One of the eight guest rooms is named ‘The Womb’ and is described as a ‘celebration of womanhood’ that is designed to make you feel ‘swaddled’.

It contains a pink shower made of tadelakt (a natural, lime-based plaster indigenous to Marrakech) that Charlotte likened to ‘a very large and unusual-shaped vagina’.

The retreat also contains a Healing Room where guests could partake in movement, yoga, sound healing and group work, as well as many gardens, a Potting Shed, Japanese Tea House and a Waterfall Shower.

Breaks started from £450 for three days, but ‘to allow access for people of all means, The Dreaming offered a ‘pay what you can’ space on every three-day retreat’.

The most expensive room on site, The Forest Spirits, had a price tag of £900 per person.

Alcohol is strictly banned on site, with meals being communal and mostly vegetarian and vegan, while guests are encouraged to help plant and harvest vegetables and cook alongside the chefs.

The retreats received a five-star review in Conde Nast Traveller, as well as 9/10 and Spa of the Year in The Times and Sunday Times.

To open the lavish retreat, Charlotte overcame a series of planning battles and building problems.

Environmental and planning bosses expressed particular concerns about her plans for treating and disposing of waste from four proposed log cabins, with the ecology department of the local council warning of the deficiencies of many ‘private sewage treatment systems’.

In addition, the retreat plans were also opposed by her local council – who feared it could cause ‘unacceptable risk’ to drivers.

Charlotte rose to fame in childhood as a classical singer before she branched into pop music in 2005, by 2007 the singer sold more than ten million records worldwide.

Her musical career kicked off when she was just 11 years old after she sang Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Pie Jesu song on This Morning in 1997.

The singer was previously engaged to rugby ace Gavin Henson, with whom she lived a lavish lifestyle which even led them to be dubbed the Welsh Posh and Becks

Charlotte has two children with her ex, daughter Ruby, 19, and son Dexter, 17.

Gavin and Charlotte split in 2010. She went on to marry Jonathan and together they welcomed their daughter Freya in 2020.

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