One kind of interruption, to paraphrase poet Mary Oliver, knocks on the door when you are trying to write. Another, more insidious distractor comes from inside your head. It tells you to schedule a dentist appointment or to go buy groceries. 

I started fashioning DIY artistic retreats when I realized that briefly relocating could help me evade both types of creativity hijackers. Unlike established retreats, which hinge on the acceptance of an application—generally a work sample, artist statement, and references—a DIY getaway can, if circumstances allow, happen impromptu. I long combined them with pet-sitting for friends, but now that I can afford designated retreats, I’ve squeezed them onto the start of family vacations and spontaneously dropped them into my next day’s calendar. Whether at a city motel or rustic cabin, I don’t have to be unmoored from daily life very long for my brain to shake off the cobwebs of obligation. I start to daydream; I start to write. 

Sometimes I bring a project, but I also go to reacquaint myself with that all-too-often dozing part of my identity—the self, most active as a child, who would sketch a flower or scribble a story on a whim. You don’t have to think of yourself as a writer or artist to make time for creative expression, which can be both processing and play. Like a midafternoon power nap, a 24- to 48-hour retreat punches above its weight; it carries a long tail. A week later, my muscles still remember I am a person who can sit and write a poem.

I prep carefully. What will keep me comfortable? (Nice pajamas and slippers, and snacks.) What makes me creative? (Lined and blank notebooks! A stack of books with other people’s inspiring sentences!) What boundaries will I maintain? (I inform friends and family, then steer clear of texts, emails, and social media while away.) 

Salomée Souag—a Portland-based artist whose multilayered Algerian-Peruvian ancestry informs her murals, sculptures, and designs—cherishes the short, close-to-home residency for restorative experimentation. She recently spent time at Sosta House, a Willamette Valley bed-and-breakfast about 30 minutes from downtown. Exploring the surrounding wetlands and forest, she filled jars with foraged plants and mosses, then explored making pigments. She’d packed simply: fabrics and tools, a book and sketchbook, and a mindset “to remove any pressure and expectations.” 

“I never really got to be like this as a kid,” Souag says. Her goal was not to produce but to recharge creatively. “It gave me an opportunity to just play.” 

Inspired by Souag, I arranged a last-minute trip to Sosta to work on an essay. Nestled amid vineyards, the inn feels both expansive and cocoon-like, glowing with natural light. I had anticipated writing in the shared library, curling up by the crackling fire, but once I was in my room I had no desire to leave. A table and chair, a garden view, a bed with pillows to prop open all my books—what more could I want? 

At home, this would be a sleepy evening and slow-start morning, but at Sosta, I wrote until midnight, then woke giddy before 8, high with that kid-on-Christmas feeling. Anything felt possible on the page. I didn’t want to miss a minute. 

Follow Your Art

For those with a more established creative practice, numerous spots within a few hours of Portland accept rolling applications for short-term residencies: 

Sosta House

This B&B’s flexible artist residency offers two-week and monthlong stays with a sliding price scale depending on whether artists help out around the property.

The Rice Place

The nonprofit Friends of Clyde Rice manages this hand-built, historic home on 10 acres by the Clackamas River, offering day-use and overnight retreats starting at $50 a day.

Sou’wester

Artists, writers, cooks, engineers—anyone, really—can apply for discounted Sunday–Friday stays year-round at the eclectic trailer resort on Washington’s Long Beach Peninsula. Residents get use of cozy workspaces, and for a fee can book time in the lodge’s sauna or its analog recording studio.

Jennings Hotel

This hip Joseph, Oregon, hotel offers discounted, self-directed, weeklong residencies for visual and performing artists in exchange for a donation of an art piece to the permanent collection. Artists get private rooms with shared sauna, library, and kitchen.