Della Marsden
Founder · Somatic therapist
Trauma-informed practitioner of twenty years. Leads the one-to-one work and the practitioner training, and still believes a good cup of tea is a clinical tool.
2015
Practice founded
Home · About
A practice built on the belief that safety comes first.
The Marsden Rooms is small on purpose. We'd rather know a few people well than process many people quickly - because regulation, the thing all our work rests on, can't be rushed.
Where it began
Our story
From one borrowed room to a studio of our own.
Della Marsden spent a decade in clinical and community settings watching the same thing happen: people arriving with insight by the bucketload, and a body that still couldn't rest. The thinking was done. The settling never was.
In 2015 she started seeing clients out of a single borrowed room above a Margate framer's. The approach was simple - calm the nervous system, then do the deeper work. Word travelled. The borrowed room became a floor, then the studio you'll find today: step-free, low-sensory, and quietly designed so that the space itself does some of the regulating.
We've stayed deliberately small. A handful of practitioners, a long memory, and time for every person who walks in.
Della Marsden
Founder & lead practitioner
What guides us
Four principles we won't compromise on.
01Body before story
We regulate first and analyse later. A settled nervous system is the ground every other change grows from.
02Access as default
Step-free, low-sensory, and genuinely welcoming. Accommodation isn't something we add on - it's how we build.
03Honest pace
No promises of overnight transformation. Healing has ups and downs, and we plan for both.
04Small and known
We keep numbers low so that you're a person we remember, not a slot in a calendar.
The people
A small team that stays.
Three practitioners, each holding a different thread of the work.
Rafe Okonkwo
Group rooms · Access lead
Holds the group circles and keeps access at the centre of everything we do. A former occupational therapist with a gift for making rooms feel safe.
Imara Vance
Creative & expressive work
Brings art, play and sensory practice into the rooms - the parts of healing that words can't reach. Trained in expressive arts and reparenting work.
3
Practitioners
2400+
Sessions held
38
Trained in our method
Come and see
The best way to understand the rooms is to sit in one.
Book an unhurried first session, or simply send a note and we'll write back like humans.