‘‘This is my heart and soul,’’ Donna Kaiser says of her new business in Oamaru’s Victorian precinct.
She has named the beauty, yoga, and wellbeing studio Ageless Antidotes.
As well as the reception room and retail area into which the front door opens, there is a treatment room at the back.
Ms Kaiser is a skin and beauty aesthetician, massage and aromatherapy practitioner, certified yoga teacher, and mindfulness facilitator.
‘‘I’m a great believer in living well.
‘‘I like the idea of being ageless.’’
The decor and the products she used and sold were ‘‘things I like to have in my own life’’.
‘‘They are antidotes.
‘‘I like to see beauty in life.’’
When she moved to Oamaru three years ago, from Auckland via two years in Wanaka, Ms Kaiser fell for the site she now occupied.
‘‘It’s a lovely space to work in.’’
Her landlord, the Oamaru Whitestone Civic Trust, had given her ‘‘amazing support’’ and she sourced furnishings and services from other local businesses.
Ms Kaiser’s job as a travelling representative for a beauty company had brought her to Oamaru for a handful of hours a month.
After only a few months, she chose to buy a house and stay here.
‘‘There’s something about it,’’ she said of the town. ‘‘I didn’t know anybody. Something drew me to it.’’
Ms Kaiser had spent 30 years in the health and beauty sector. She had owned a business, been a teacher of sales personnel, specialised in business development, and worked in six Caci Clinics for 10 years ‘‘on and off’’.
‘‘My heart is in natural and organic treatments.
‘‘I’m all about the holistic approach.’’
That incorporated health, beauty, diet, lifestyle, and yoga — which had been part of her life for 17 years.
She has been teaching restorative yoga in Oamaru for just over a year, at The Movement Hub just a few doors down Harbour St.
Ms Kaiser is also the Alzheimers Otago North Otago community educator, has taught restorative yoga and mindfulness at Waitaki Girls’ High School, and is teaching yoga to Waitaki Boys’ pupils this term.
At Ageless Antidotes, she chose natural materials and soothing colours to create ‘‘a calm, peaceful place’’.
‘‘A little sanctuary people could come to to be nurtured, relax, rest, and restore’’.
The products she stocked were ‘‘kind to the body, skin, mind, and planet’’. They are certified organic, plant-based, efficacious, and produced by ‘‘smaller companies’’ with philosophies akin to hers.
She had been ‘‘mindful of affordability’’ in the pricing.
‘‘I’m big on education,’’ Ms Kaiser said.
‘‘I’d love to offer workshops.
‘‘I want to empower people to understand what they can do at home.’’
