Two women in traditional colorful folk costumes walking on a rural path, with embroidered floral patterns overlaying the image and a black-and-white background showing a field and a group of children.

About

Hej! I’m Arletta.

Welcome to my attempt to bring Polish folk into the modern world.

Even though I have years of folk dance experience: I keep running into the same problem: finding clear, accessible, and trustworthy information about the traditions, dance steps, and stories behind it all.

Close-up of a red fabric with embroidered floral and heart patterns, and a scalloped edge decorated with a net-like design, layered over a white fabric.
A man and woman dressed in traditional Polish folk costumes, with embroidered vests, colorful skirts, and floral accessories, standing indoors against a gray background.

Why I started Oberek & Co.

Researching Polish folk dance steps and traditions has always been… hard.

The language is dense.
It’s hard to find good resources digitally.
The resources are either in Poland, or in old polish.

Honestly, my biggest research source for music and dance was YouTube—watching other groups and trying to piece things together, not always knowing if what I was seeing was accurate or a choreographer’s creative mix of styles, steps, and music, like my choreographies.

A man and woman dressed in traditional folk costumes seated outside in front of a wooden wall. The woman holds a bouquet of colorful flowers, and both wear detailed embroidered clothing.

Over time, I realized I wasn’t alone.

A lot of us are trying to do something meaningful with Polish folk—but we don’t always know where to start, or how to make sense of the information that’s out there.

So I started Oberek & Co as a place to: share what I’m learning, explore the rituals, stories, and research behind choreography, and to make this stuff easier to access, understand, and use, and also to show how people are using polish folk in the modern day world.

I don’t just want Polish folk traditions to survive.

I want them to evolve, breathe, and actually thrive.

To have a place in the modern world, without losing the roots they came from.

There’s a lot more I want to do in the future, but for now, this newsletter is the first step.

So let me know what you're curious about—what you’re hoping to learn, create, or dig into.

I'll do my best to make space for it here.

Dzięki!

A young woman with short brown hair wearing a dark green embroidered blouse with floral patterns on the sleeves, and high-waisted mauve trousers, standing against a plain off-white wall.
Interior of a room with a wooden ceiling, beige walls, a large red floral and abstract design on one wall, and a wooden table with bowls, with a doorway in the background.

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