True professionalism
Four friends, experienced dog owners and breeders of champion show dogs, have had to face the challenges of combining our careers, busy family lives and our beloved dogs. We became partners in this exciting venture, with the aim of bringing true professionalism and care for dogs under the same roof, with all-weather indoor training and play areas as well as access to beautiful woodland areas for walks! All our staff are professionals with long standing experience of working with dogs. Experience is the thing we value most highly and its what sets us apart.
Martha & Friends have recently been certified by the Luxembourg Ministry of Agriculture as qualified to train all types and breeds of dogs, including breeds listed on the Luxembourg dangerous dog breed list.
Our Goals…
Happy dogs means happy owners!! Although we love our dogs, dog ownership can be stressful and time consuming, and it is tough to combine busy professional and family lives with the responsibilities of owning and caring for a dog. Our working lives can often mean that dogs have to stay at home for long hours. We understand that busy lives mean you can’t always give your dogs the attention they deserve. Our goal is to make Martha & Friends your dog’s second home, providing the love and care he/she needs as well as support of their education.
What We Do…
We aim to provide all the services your dog needs to ensure they are content and they have a fulfilling day, learning, playing and developing to their best potential. We care about their every need from training and fun activities, day care and wellbeing including grooming and physiotherapy and fitness training.
Your community
Our centre is a supportive environment designed with the dog owning community in mind. We want everyone, including parents and children to come and share their experiences, ideas and have fun! Our centre has elegant spaces where you can be comfortable and at ease to chat with others or get expert advice, or enjoy our many events and lectures.
Meet Martha!
“Martha” is our mascot and the namesake of Martha and Friends Dog Wellness. A Scottish Terrier and champion show dog, she is officially known as International, Luxembourg & Finnish Champion, International Veteran Champion Tartan Dreams Magic Spell. Martha is bred and owned by Carina Hellemaa. She is one of Carina’s six Scotties, who are always present at the centre, welcoming our guests every morning and ready to play!
Meet the Team
Carina Hellemaa
Founder and Managing Director
Carina presented her project of creating a center of excellence providing multiple professional services for dogs to the Luxembourg government start-up program Fit4Entrepreneurship in 2019, and this became a reality when The Dog Wellness Company S.a.r.l. was founded in August 2020, and renovation works began in October on the building which she and her associates had identified a few days before the first lockdown began. Martha & Friends Dog Wellness, the first Center of its kind in Luxembourg, and owned by the The Dog Wellness Company, opened its doors in late November 2020.
A Finnish national, Carina has lived in Luxembourg with her daughter since 2014, and speaks English, French, Swedish and Finnish. Carina is responsible for the management and day to day running of the Center. In the afternoons, she is most often found in the Boutique, where she loves meeting clients and helping them choose the right food or accessories for their dogs.
Viktorija Zilinskaite
Head Groomer
She speaks Lithuanian, French and English.
Marta Ferreira
Groomer
Marta joined Martha & Friends in the spring of 2023, and tells us that “working here is the definition of working without feeling like it’s work” – working with the dogs is her passion. Marta is part of our “para-veterinary team” together with vet assistant Beatriz and Nathaly, a veterinarian, in whose loving care the dogs here at Martha & Friends are in the best of hands!
Marta speaks Portuguese and English.
Lena Mertens
Trainer
She is currently pursuing her Master's degree in Psychology at the University of Trier, which she is due complete in the coming months. In the future, she would like to move towards animal-assisted therapy.
She speaks fluent English and German.
Perrine Capello
Training & Leader - Daycare Team
Perrine’s doggy companions are Border Collie mix Poushkine and Romanian rescue dog Zod.
She speaks French and English.
Artur Bonarski
Training & Daycare Team
Artur has been with dogs since his early childhood, and he currently has two of his own, a 12 years old Dachshund mix, Milan, and a 3-year old Romanian shepherd mix, Kora.
Artur speaks English, German and Polish, and some basic French.
Beatriz Branco
Daycare Team & Admin Manager
Beatriz joined the Martha & Friends team in May 2023. Her experience as a vet nurse combined with her wonderful approach to customer service have made made her a valuable addition to our team!
Beatriz speaks Portuguese and English.
Saman Farzane
Daycare Team
Saman loves finding new walks with the dogs in the beautiful forest surrounding Martha & Friends, and the many lovely photos taken of your dogs in recent months have been taken by him as his second passion is animal photography. Saman’s doggy companions are the Rottweiler and Dobermann puppy.
Saman speaks Farsi and English
Nathaly Ikeoka Eroles
Daycare Team
Nathaly joined the Day Care and Boarding Team at Martha & Friends as she waits for her accreditation as a veterinarian in the EU, and we have the immense benefit of her medical experience in handling and treating the dogs in our care. Nathaly has several favorites amongst our day care dogs, especially the Schnauzers as this is a breed she grew up with in Brazil.
Nathaly speaks Portuguese and English.
Valentina Ossola
Veterinarian, Physiotherapy & Rehab
In the spring of 2023, she did an internship in canine physiotherapy and rehabilitation at the Fisio4vet Clinic in Milan, where she learnt rehabilitation methodologies with the aim to treat pathologies and traumas through the use of manual and instrumental techniques, and active kinesitherapy. She will continue her specialisation later this year, attending a veterinary orthopaedic course at ESAVS European school for advanced veterinary studies at the European School WHERE.
Valentina continues to work as a veterinarian at the Pallevet clinic in Garnich with special attention given to fearful animals.
Valentina is a certified fear free vet as preventing and alleviating fear, anxiety, and stress in pets during consultations and procedures is one of her priorities to ensure the physical and mental health of our pets.
Valentina will spend two days per week (Mondays and Thursdays) at Martha & Friends focusing on diagnostics, rehabilitation, physiotherapy and fitness. She speaks Italian and English.
Isabel Weber
Guest Trainer
Isabel focuses her teaching of show ring handling to adults and juniors on bringing the best out of the partnership in theory and practice, and how to make them both stand out from the crowd. Above all, there is a strong emphasis on having fun with your dog in the ring, which is the basis for true showmanship!
We have been training the Junior Handling team of Luxembourg since early 2023 at Martha & Friends, and are immensely proud of the successes these talented youngsters have brought home in their first international shows this past summer.
Tanja Karpela
Guest Trainer
Tanja works at Martha & Friends as a Guest Trainer and she is responsible for the training of the working dogs used at International K9 Institute and Martha & Friends. She works as an instructor in courses and training events, and plans training contents for the needs of clients, is an encouraging coach and is a well-thought-of and experienced lecturer. Tanja trains Explosive Detection Dogs to improve occupational safety at blast construction sites and Bed Bug Detection Dogs to help control pests for professional use. She has solid experience of operational work with working dogs.
Tanja has many years of experience in developing and training quality standards for Conservation Dogs, as well as working with them in a variety of environments and terrain conditions. Tanja works as a trainer and instructor for Conservation Dogs and a surveyor with Conservation Dogs for EU-Life Flying squirrel project since 2018 and for EU-LIFE Revives (freshwater pearl mussel) since 2022. Tanja also has a degree from university of applied sciences in social studies and she enjoys working with dogs and dog owners. She has a German Shepherd and Belgian Shepherd Malinoises.
Tanja speaks fluent English, Finnish and Swedish
Verena Helfrich
Guest Trainer
She has a keen interest in personal development and communication between dogs and humans. In 2019, she published her first book „Outdoor-Abenteuer mit Hund“, and has recently launched Tuulove, a brand of vegan products and cosmetics for dog care. At Martha & Friends, Verena offers various adventures, body-language workshops, nose and scent workshops, and specialised workshops for muzzle and dog gear training. She lives with her husband and four dogs, two Greyhounds, a rescued Spanish Galgo mix and a geriatric Patterdale Terrier, as well as a batch of other farm animals. She is fluent in both German and English.
Jacqueline Koerfer
Guest Trainer
The advantage of dogs is that they can cover large areas and rough terrain in a relative short time, detect cryptic species and scents hidden in deep vegetation. Jacqueline’s work with detection dogs was awarded second place by RTL as “The Most Promising Start-Up in 2020. Jacqueline is a certified dog trainer under German regulations. She also works with her own four Lagotto Romagnolo dogs, all trained in odour detection.
Since April 2022, Jacqueline’s Spuernasenarbeit course has been training dog-human teams to work together. Over the course of the six month program, dogs are initially trained in the basics of odor detection, and gradually specialize in a chosen field such as tracking wolves or other endangered species, to detecting mold, animal carcasses or young animals hidden in the under-growth. The first Martha & Friends teams are now in their third phase of their studies.
She speaks Luxembourgish, German, French and English.
The Founding Team
Carina Hellemaa
Founder and Managing Director
Carina presented her project of creating a center of excellence providing multiple professional services for dogs to the Luxembourg government start-up program Fit4Entrepreneurship in 2019, and this became a reality when The Dog Wellness Company S.a.r.l. was founded in August 2020, and renovation works began in October on the building which she and her associates had identified a few days before the first lockdown began. Martha & Friends Dog Wellness, the first Center of its kind in Luxembourg, and owned by the The Dog Wellness Company, opened its doors in late November 2020.
A Finnish national, Carina has lived in Luxembourg with her daughter since 2014, and speaks English, French, Swedish and Finnish. Carina is responsible for the management and day to day running of the Center. In the afternoons, she is most often found in the Boutique, where she loves meeting clients and helping them choose the right food or accessories for their dogs.
Annukka Paloheimo-Segersven
Co-Founder
She is an elected member of The British Kennel Club. Annukka’s professional life has been as Founder and Managing partner of a leading financial services company in the Nordic region. She lives in Finland and has been an active adviser to the development of Martha & Friends Dog Wellness.
Lars Windfeldt
Co-Founder
Besides investing in Martha & Friends Dog Wellness, he has more recently been involved as landlord in the setting up of a new dog day care center in Oslo in 2020.
Helen Valentine
Co-Founder
Helen, a former Chief Operating Officer of a major financial services company in Luxembourg, as well as more recently, for a company providing training for the financial services industry in Luxembourg, has been actively involved during the first few months in setting up systems and processes for the daily management of the company. Helen stepped down from her active role to pursue other projects and remains an investor in the company.
Join our growing team!
If you are experienced, enthusiastic and passionate about dogs and would like to join our team of dog care professionals and trainers, please contact us and send us your resume and qualifications to info@marthaandfriends.lu.