Pia is a UKCP registered integrative arts psychotherapist, workshop facilitator and author, drawing upon a range of creative and reflective tools to support her clients through their personal journeys. Pia builds upon 25 years of group work with a range of audiences, ages and cultures, weaving together arts psychotherapy with a previous background in advertising, qualitative/social research and creative facilitation. Pia’s practice is based at Studio 34, Bickerton House, Archway Studios, North London, and she works primarily with adults going through life and/or work transitions, who wish to break away from self-defeating patterns and bring more authentic, creative expression into their lives. Alongside her love of art, Pia has a fascination with myth and folktale as creative ways to explore our deeper natures.
With a Masters and Diploma from the Institute for Arts in Therapy and Education (IATE), a Diploma in Psychotherapy and Counselling from Regent’s University, Pia has clinical experience in hospitals and schools, including Place 2 Be, Kids Company, Homerton and Newham Hospital, in its miscarriage and stillbirth unit. Pia worked with Women + Health Community Centre in Camden to create an innovative counselling and body therapy programme to support pregnant women and mothers for birth and beyond. Pia’s TEDx talk, The Heroine’s Journey, shows some of her thinking on art as a compass in times of transition.
Whereas Pia currently works as a therapist with adults, she writes for children. Her series of Therapeutic Fairy Tales for children and families going through troubling times, and the Storybook Manual on the therapeutic use of storybooks, were created in collaboration with artist, Sarah Pimenta from Social Fabric. A new volume of Therapeutic Fairy Tales, also published by Speechmark, Routledge, is coming out in Spring 2023. These will be accompanied by a new standalone book, Rewilding Children’s Imaginations, 99 Creative Activities Inspired by Nature and Folktales from Around the World, to support teachers and adults in helping children build a closer relationship with nature and storytelling.
Pia also designed Sometimes I Feel, a creative story-card resource to support children and adults in exploring and recognising a range of positive and challenging feelings.
Outside of the therapy context, Pia also designs and offers participatory-arts and creative-writing workshops for children and adults. She increasingly introduces elements of nature, myth and folklore into her workshops, to help children explore story-telling and art-making of the land.
In 2017, Pia worked alongside creative director, Eugene Hughes, and film director, Ben Mallaby, as story director on artgym’s award-winning documentary The Moving Theatre. The Moving Theatre follows four real-life migrant storytellers, and plays back life-changing moments of their journeys through the use of theatre and puppetry.
In March 2018, The Moving Theatre was voted best feature documentary at the National Film Awards.
Arts psychotherapy & creative retreats 