One of the private rooms for wellness at Sisu Wellness Center in Easthampton.
Reminder Publishing submitted photo
EASTHAMPTON — A one-stop shop for integrated health services has officially opened on 40 Main Ave. in Easthampton.
Sisu Wellness Center spearheaded a grand opening ceremony on Sept. 28 to celebrate its new 4,000-square-foot space, which offers bodywork, aural photography, health coaching, psychotherapy, exclusive workshops, products and more all under one roof.
“This place is really about combining eastern and western medicine,” said Natasha Perrone, an owner and co-director of complimentary healing for Sisu. “Traditional mental health with healing arts that can help you.”
According to Perrone, around 18 different practitioners from all over the world rent a space at 40 Main Ave. to operate their own wellness business under the Sisu umbrella, and all of these practitioners are seasoned and hoping to get their young businesses off the ground.
“Every practitioner runs their own business, it’s just part of Sisu,” Perrone said. “We give them a page on our website, we include them in all our email marketing.”
A look at the Community Zen Den at Sisu.
Reminder Publishing submitted photo
The concept of wellness takes many forms at Sisu. The first door patrons walk into is an ambient waiting room filled with homemade products like essential oils, hair oils, body oils, shampoo, conditioner, bracelets and organic teas.
All the products are either made by Perrone or Betty Coyne, the other owner and co-director of complimentary healing at Sisu, and recent Cornell graduate with a certificate in medicinal plants.
“I’m just in love with essential oils and its natural smells,” Perrone said. “Creating these products have been a self-care journey for me.”
Just around the corner of this waiting room is a hall that leads to multiple rooms that accommodate a wide range of wellness services courtesy of the center’s many practitioners, including massage therapy, Tibetan medicine, sound healing, reflexology, psychotherapy, yoga, somatic healing, integrative health coaching and more.
Perrone and Coyne also offer their own services under the Sisu umbrella. A 15-year operator of her business Pure Energy Reiki and Reflexology, Perrone is a certified Usui Reiki master teacher, Karuna Reiki master teacher and Thai foot, hand and face reflexologist who offers her own reiki classes at the new center.
Coyne, meanwhile, is a 30-year veteran software developer and ecommerce specialist who currently owns Aura Speak and offers aura photography readings and crystal singing bowl sound therapy to clients.
By offering a diverse array of expert services from many different practitioners under one roof, Coyne and Perrone have created an environment where every practitioner is supportive of each other’s business and every client has a different wellness option that fits their desires.
“There are a lot of yoga studios that have a massage person, but nothing that offers the variety of modalities we do,” Perrone said.
The masterpiece of the Sisu center is at the very end of the walkthrough, where the center’s vibrantly ornate Community Zen Den resides.
It is here where the center can host several workshops that cover all aspects of wellness from managing anxiety and burnout, to a six-week Shamanic drumming circle, chakra series, an Intention Spell Jar Moon workshop and many more in the future.
To set right the ambience, Coyne and Perrone have zero gravity chairs in the middle of the den for relaxation and they plan to use other mechanisms to set the mood, like adding little crystals to make it feel like a home.
“As a teacher, I watched anxiety and depression increase exponentially and go younger and younger and younger,” Perrone said. “So, we just want to introduce different ways to deal with things that a lot of the population are dealing with.”
Perrone added that they put out a survey to gauge people’s interests in what workshops they would want to see in the den, and many of them emphasized the need for a mind-body-spirit connection as well as other craft workshops.
“It’s absolutely going to be community driven by what the need is,” Perrone said.
Sisu started in 2023 as a modest operation that operated with two offices and two practitioners at 247 Northampton St. The name “Sisu,” which Perrone said was inspired by a moment in the hit show “Schitt’s Creek,” embodies stoic determination, resilience, courage, grit and willpower, qualities that are now ingrained in the new space.
As they settle into 40 Main Ave., the possibilities seem endless for Coyne and Perrone, who met each other years ago along their wellness journey.
Aside from the different products, modalities, and workshops they offer, Coyne and Perrone hope to introduce other events to their center, like spotlighting a local artist every month upon approval.
No matter what is available at the center, Coyne and Perrone’s goal is to create a space that is affordable, inclusive for everyone, and emphasizes the broad diversity of wellness.
“Our practitioners here embrace different types of healing and understand that there is more than one thing that helps somebody,” Perrone said. We just want to offer that up so people can find what works for them, what speaks to them.”
Readers can learn more about Sisu by visiting their website: sisuwellnesscenter.com. All workshops are currently $35 and Perrone said people can book an appointment online with any of the practitioners.
