2026 retreats are now open for registration!
Our Story
Rainbow Body Yoga started in 2014 when Cleo opened a small yoga studio in Tivoli, NY that was shared with a theater company. The studio soon after found a space in Red Hook, NY that was more permanent and established a thriving yoga studio there for 6 years. The studio expanded to include aerial yoga, a wellness center, and a second yoga studio in Hudson, NY. During Covid, while not being able to be in the space, the classes went online. This wasn't as fulfilling for Cleo as she enjoyed the in-person energy of yoga classes and the community and decided, for other reasons as well, to close the studios in Sept 2020. During the 6 years of the studio being open, Cleo led yoga teacher trainings and retreats and decided to shift the business to only these offerings. She found that during the yoga teacher trainings and retreats, the group could go much deeper than in a regular yoga class and find lasting, meaningful collective healing and connection. Now, Rainbow Body Retreats offers yoga teacher trainings and retreats in the Hudson Valley, Costa Rica, India, and beyond.
Our vision
Cleo's intention in opening Rainbow Body Yoga was to assist in awakening others' consciousness through yoga, activating the Rainbow Body of awakened embodiment, which contains the totality of creation. She hopes to bring people back to their whole, true selves through yoga practice.
About Cleo
Cleo has been teaching and practicing yoga for over 20 years. Her first yoga class was at an instructor's house nestled in the middle of the woods. While she practiced, she could hear the birds and the stream running outside. This connection with nature, the breath, and the yoga postures expanded her awareness and consciousness to a place of deep peace. Her love for yoga and nature blossomed after, bringing her to complete her 200-hour yoga teacher training at the Kripalu Center for Yoga, take Rosemary Gladstar's Herbal Apprenticeship at Sage Mountain, and, a couple of years later, to Naropa University, where she received her 1000-hour yoga teacher training and B.A. in Yoga. She returned to the East Coast and opened Rainbow Body Yoga studio, which became a thriving yoga studio in the community. After six years of the studio serving the community, she decided to close due to COVID. She shifted the business to focus on transformative nature-based yoga teacher trainings and retreats that combined her love of herbalism, yoga, and energy healing. In 2021, Cleo began a graduate program at Naropa University, where she studied yogic texts, philosophies, Sanskrit, Shakta Tantra, and the history of the seven chakra system. Cleo has continued her research in yogic studies and is currently a Ph.D. doctoral candidate in Transformative Studies at the California Institute of Integral Studies, tracing the history of the seven chakra system from Kaula Tantra to medieval Hatha Yoga. Cleo has studied with many amazing teachers over her journey in the herbal, energy healing, Reiki, plant spirit, and yoga worlds and is grateful for all the gifts they have shared with her, which she imparts to students during retreats and trainings.
