A facial yoga retreat – what’s that, you might ask? But if you are navigating motherhood, health concerns, or even just a busy schedule right now, our writer’s experience at a female-led facial yoga retreat in Turkey is likely to resonate strongly.
Beauty and wellness journalist Rose Winter is not only a new mum. She’s also living with fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue – conditions that make juggling a busy lifestyle a true (and exhausting) art form. She explains how trying facial yoga at the Bovisaj Retreat, at the Liberty Lykia hotel in Turkey, was so transformative as her first trip alone since motherhood. It could help you feel more grounded too.
THE LOWDOWN
By the time I arrived at Liberty Lykia Adults Only (the location of this summer’s Bovisaj retreat), sun-deprived, ache-riddled from flying, and half-running on leftover toddler snacks in my bag, it resonated more acutely in that moment that sleep had been scarce in my life for years. Motherhood, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue – an unholy trinity of exhaustion. But for once, I wasn’t here to simply do childcare in a different time zone. I was here solo for Bovisaj, a new wave of wellness created by Moroccan-born Leila Haddioui, a former finance high-flyer turned facial yoga evangelist, who now leads international facial yoga and wellness retreats in places like the Maldives and Morocco. This summer, she has taken up residence on Turkey’s south-west coast.
A facial yoga retreat is certainly on the more unusual side of wellness activities, and I’d become slightly happy to ignore my face since having my baby, being too tired or distracted to notice or care. But I was ready to meet my face again, while learning more about this emerging wellbeing activity. Best of all, I was going to be on a retreat that was unapologetically female-led.
THE RETREAT
Each day began by slowly reconnecting with myself under pine trees on yoga mats, with persistent red ants climbing up for a surprise inspection, clearly curious if I was doing the poses right. It reminded me that I wasn’t at my usual reformer class between crèche hours, and just how absent I’d become from the outdoors.
Then came the daily facial yoga – the essence of the Bovisaj (a play on the french ‘beau visage’ meaning ‘beautiful face’) method. There were several sessions sat around a long table overlooking the pine canopies, performing what must have looked like facial flagellation to other guests. But the simple science of it all is that the face has 57 muscles, and we need to exercise them. I sat facing my mirror, brutally unfiltered, massaging sadness from my jawline and smoothing old tension from my brow bones. At one point, Leila made us pause mid-sequence and compare both sides of the face. The difference was uncanny. I was seeing one half noticeably lifted. If Botox has ever felt like a quick-fix cop-out, with a continued routine of tapping, slapping, and various facial contortions, we were promised a five to seven year age reversal – though the real win might have been the unexpected upper arm workout.
Nothing prepared me for the breathwork though. On my first evening, I lay down on a yoga mat arranged in a circle, with large tropical leaves and petals scattered between us, with percussive instruments and tarot cards at the centre. It was ceremonial and ancient, and rightly so. Breathwork, in various forms, has existed for thousands of years: in yogic pranayama, in Buddhist meditation, in ancient Chinese medicine, and in free-diving.
We were guided through twenty-five minutes of controlled hyperventilation. Somewhere around minute ten, I felt glued to the floor. I felt heavy and visceral, yet almost out-of-body. My brain panicked and told me to stop, but I didn’t. Instead, I experienced an intense emotional outburst, my tears flowing without explanation, like my nervous system was doing a spring clean of the last 20 years. Breathwork, as ancient as it is overlooked in modern wellness, had cracked something open for me.
I surfaced, now breathing just five or six times a minute. I’d never realised how badly I breathe; short, shallow, and reactive. But now? I actually felt as though I didn’t need to breathe at all. For someone with fibromyalgia, where pain often feels cellular, the impact was enormous. I physically felt the oxygen doing for me what anti-inflammatories never quite can.
LEILA’S STORY
What makes Bovisaj powerful isn’t just its method, but its message. At the centre of it all is Leila Haddioui (second from right in the image), a magnetic, wildly humorous, and deeply human woman. Hers was the voice you could hear above all others, her naturally youthful looks impossible to ignore – proof of her own method perhaps. Leila didn’t hover above us like a guru. She put in the same physical and emotional energy as we all did. She spoke of her own burnout, the kind that left her physically unwell and spiritually flattened after a high-flying career in finance. She built Bovisaj out of a necessity to return to her body, and now she helps women feel seen.
Beside her was Loubaba Bennis. Loubaba is nurturing, grounded, and effortlessly intuitive. She was the one who checked in on your posture mid-sequence, passed you tissues mid-release, and made you feel safe to unravel. Together, they form the perfect complement. It was undeniably powerful to be led by women who understand what it is to lead and hold space for others while still healing themselves.
By night two, we had written down our emotional blocks and burned them at the beach fire ceremony, a Bovisaj signature. We did mirror work, meditative rituals, sound healing, vision-boarding, danced like children, and laughed and cried at ourselves. If this all sounds a bit ‘woo-woo’, well, it was a little. But honestly? I’ve cried in stranger places, and there’s something cathartic about yelling your fears into the fire with strangers, who I’ve poked my face muscles with. Sometimes, healing just needs a good fire and better company.
THE LOCATION
This was my first solo trip since giving birth, and one of only a handful of times that I haven’t been carrying a spare pair of trousers that weren’t mine or struggling to remember who I was before I started counting nap hours like currency. So, it’s refreshing that the adults-only section of the Liberty Lykia complex isn’t just a token gesture in a wider complex. It’s a self-contained sanctuary, sat on the Aegean coast near Ölüdeniz. With a variety of pool areas and multiple restaurants, it has all the bones of a high-quality all-inclusive, but it feels thoughtful and personal.
My room was, blessedly, silent at night. The kind of silence you forget hotels are capable of. I wasn’t disturbed by hallway chatter or late-night slamming doors. Despite the huge, comfy beds, I still couldn’t sleep too well (thank you fibromyalgia), but I lay in bed not being interrupted, something I am unfamiliar with. Before the hotel woke up, I spent early mornings gazing out toward the Bay of Ölüdeniz, reading quietly to the hum of birdsong and the soft rustle of pine needles in the breeze, with the peaks of the rugged Babadağ mountains rising immediately beside my balcony.
When I wasn’t in sessions, I idled away the time curled up in the sea-facing cabanas, sheer curtains fluttering in the breeze, or I’d head down to the half-mile of beach and sip on a cold drink from the beachfront fridges as I stared into the sea. One afternoon, a sharply dressed staff member, certainly over-attired for 27°C, offered me strawberries with all the ceremony of a maître d’. It was such a small gesture, but it felt oddly profound. I’m so used to giving (food, energy, attention) that being waited on felt unusual.
On my final morning, just when I thought I’d reached peak zen, I was wrapped in linen and led into the women’s hammam. The petite therapist covered my hair, gently scrubbed my skin with clouds of foam, and left me sipping herbal tea with a clay mask on in a relaxation room with floor-to-ceiling windows looking into the wild natural surroundings. Later, I was shuttled to the adults-only Sarpedon infinity pool at the main resort. I only wish I had discovered this sooner. Its bougainvillaea-draped terraces sat above a panoramic view of Ölüdeniz’s bay. Paragliders circled above like dragonflies in the heat as I sipped my spritz by the pool. This was by far my favourite spot.
THE DINING
Wellness clichés die quickly at Liberty Lykia’s restaurants. There were no quinoa bowls with sad microgreens or mandatory smoothies in mason jars. At Balbura Steak House, we shared plates of bulgur salad with goat’s foot herb, artichoke fava, avocado chutney on sourdough, and a stinging nettle salad punctuated with pomegranate molasses. This isn’t trend-led cooking – the kitchen clearly takes pride in heritage ingredients. At Sunset, the scene was a little more composed: amuse-bouches of agnolotti with Çeşme artichoke and porcini, and a memorably tender chicken ballotine, finished with a drizzle of early harvest olive oil. One afternoon, the sous chef Eşref Sazcı came to the table to unveil a huge salt-baked grouper, ceremonially carved under the watch of the entire kitchen brigade, not for theatrics, but for pride.
THE TO-DO LIST
Liberty Lykia Adults Only is perched near Ölüdeniz in the Turkish Riviera, on the glassy Aegean, where the paragliders’ descent from a nearby peak either leaves you in awe or makes your stomach flip. A short boat ride away is Butterfly Valley, a sheer, V-shaped canyon of wildflowers and waterfalls. If you’re feeling especially energetic, this stretch of the Turquoise Coast marks part of the Lycian Way, a long-distance trail carved by ancient cities and hypnotic sea views that trick you into enjoying uphill climbs. I know this from visiting the region a few years back, but on this trip, I didn’t leave the resort, and honestly, I didn’t need to. With so much to do (and gloriously not do) within the hotel’s quiet, pine-framed world, staying put felt like the whole point.
In fact, as a mum and someone living with a chronic illness, I don’t always get the luxury of slowness or silence. But here, I found both. Liberty Lykia Adults Only allows you to opt out of overstimulation. Bovisaj gives you the tools to re-enter your life a little more awake, making space for yourself beneath the autopilot.
I came for my face, but I left with more than that: a version of myself I hadn’t seen in a while.
We may earn a commission if you buy something from any affiliate links on our site.
Any Questions or Tips to add?