Sisterhood On The Slopes: The Ski Diva Community Where Connection + Confidence Glow

In 2006, Wendy Clinch, a Vermont-based author, founded a website and created a forum to connect women who ski and ride. At that time, the forum format was novel and her site, TheSkiDiva.com, began attracting women who wanted to chat about all things snow.

Looking to buy new ski or snowboard gear? Check TheSkiDiva.com thread for recommendations. Interested in sharing a trip report or asking questions about a winter destination? Post in The Ski Diva community. No question was too small or too naive, and the community was always welcoming and enthusiastic about sharing their passion for skiing and riding with other women from around North America and the world.

Alta, Utah, January 2025. Photo by Rachel Vecchitto.

Rachel Vecchitto is a Boulder, Colorado-based software engineer who joined The Ski Diva community early on. Coming from a male-dominated profession, Vecchitto was interested in connecting with other women. For her, the community aspect was everything. So much so that in 2023, Vecchitto purchased TheSkiDiva.com from Clinch, who was retiring.

“I just think it’s so important to do things like this with women in spaces that are often male-dominated,” she explains. “Having a space where you can ask questions of only women and get serious answers that don’t make any assumptions and truly talk to you like you know what you’re talking about, because you do, is really supportive.”

Catching up with Vecchitto two years into her tenure, she is thrilled that the website continues to grow. Currently, the forum has 9,300 members, ranging in age from their 20s to 80s, and Vecchitto is hopeful that this winter the membership will top 10,000. While the majority of community interactions take place online, Vecchitto has continued planning annual ski trips — something Clinch originated — in the east and the west. This winter, the Divas will be meeting at Big Sky, Montana and Whiteface Mountain in New York. Additionally, Vecchitto adds that many members connect in real life simply by sharing when they’ll be skiing or riding at a specific mountain and asking if anyone wants to join them.

Looking forward, Vecchitto is working on streamlining some of the older conversation threads and simplifying the process for finding information. She wants to make the forum as user-friendly as possible for all members, old and new.

As TheSkiDiva.com approaches its 20th anniversary, Vecchitto is optimistic about the site’s future, even as she ponders a world in which artificial intelligence can answer many questions. Just as it was 20 years ago when Clinch founded the site, the raison d’etre for the website is community — it’s women connecting with women and sharing their passion for snow.

TheSkiDiva.com is open to all women who ski and snowboard, including trans women. Follow The Ski Diva on Facebook and Instagram.

Originally published in the winter 2025-26 issue of Spoke+Blossom.