Vashon Intuitive Arts (VIA) will mark five years on the island with an all-day celebration including a psychic fair and concert this Saturday.
The center was founded in May of 2010 after Lorna Cunningham, a former Sawbones employee, held a well-received psychic fair at Ober Park.
“A lot of people said we should do this more often,” said Dianna Ammon, a massage therapist and part owner of VIA.
After the fair, Cunningham, Ammon and Susan Pitiger, a longtime nurse, began brainstorming how they could promote spiritual and metaphysical activities on Vashon.
“For me, it was about having a space where people who wanted to express whatever they did, whether it was massage, tarot, energy work, full moon ceremonies, they could do that without paying a lot of money,” Cunningham said.
Eventually the three women rented space in a building on the north end of town that formerly held a carpet store. They and other volunteers spent about 2,000 hours transforming the storefront into the clean, bright and incense-filled space it is today.
“There was carpet on the walls and mold.It was just hideous,” Cunningham said. “It was quite an undertaking.”
Now, Vashon Intuitive Arts holds a consignment shop in the front of its building where around 20 retailers sell art, jewelry, crystals, stones and body products. A reading room that anyone can borrow books from contains hundreds of donated titles on topics ranging from wellness and self help to Eastern philosophy and astrology.
In the rest of the building, one large event space and two smaller rooms are available for practitioners who are VIA members to provide their services one-on-one or in small groups. More mainstream offerings include yoga, massage and reiki. But the center also houses psychics, intuitives, tarot card readers and clairvoyants. There’s a women’s group focused on experiential healing, regular drum circles and psychic fairs, as well as dream circles led by a psychoanalyst. A full moon ceremony teaches attendees what’s currently happening in the cosmos and “how you can grab it and make it work for you,” said Pitiger. “There’s a lot of power in the full moon.”
The organization now has about 120 dues-paying members, and about 50 people have offered services or classes there, paying a small fee to rent space. While many who come in the door are from Seattle, the center has gained a small following on Vashon as well.
The women say they know some people are uncomfortable with the activities they promote, but they also say VIA has been welcomed on Vashon and they’ve received almost no open criticism. In fact, Cunningham said people often stop by just to see what the place is.
“We get Christians to pagans. … There’s no judgement on what your path is,” Cunningham said.
While the three owners never planned to profit from the center, they are making ends meet, they say. When Vashon Tech Support, which was located next door, vacated its space last summer, VIA was able to expand to fill the whole building.
Cunningham manages the place on a volunteer basis and says at this point she can’t imagine it closing.
“This isn’t our space,” she said. “This is the spirit’s place. The spirit provides it to us, and in exchange for this, the spirit provides us a place to reside.”
VIA will celebrate its fifth anniversary on Saturday. A psychic fair and open house with refreshments will be from noon to 8:30 p.m. At 7 p.m. there will be a concert by the Michonsong. For more information, call 463-0025.
