Harvesting Aromatic Botanicals (cover story

Harvesting Aromatic Botanicals

THE VERB, “TO DISTILL” RECALLS “THE ACTION OF purifying a liquid by a process of heating and cooling” or “the extraction of the essential meaning or most important aspects of something.” When it comes to the distillation of aromatic botanicals and plant medicines, the distillation process yields the vapor, or “spirit” of the plant. Such a spirit retains the entire molecular profile of the plant: it’s nutrients, its vitamins, it’s aromatic profile, it’s vital compounds and essential oils. Here, plants are prime examples of unconditional love - they offer their “spirits” generously to those who learn the craft.

Those who take the care and patience to “awaken their vapors,” condense them back and cool them to living “waters.”

A substance commonly known as a hydrosol is born: a “holographic” double, dancing with molecular potential.

In the case of Melissa McCombs, the sole distiller and entrepreneur of Madame Moon, the magic of plant distillation (of creating hydrosols) evolved over a lifetime of plant affinities. As an imaginative child, she recalled having been a tree, telling the story to mom and dad in vivid detail. As this insight took root and grew, she developed an intuitive relationship with the large variety of plant expressions in the natural world. She learned their languages, cultivated and arranged them, “listened” to their good “scents,” recalled their seasonal flowerings and fruiting; observed their shapes, textures and colors. And this relationship grew, bearing fruits and flowers as trees will often do.

Naturally, Madame Moon Hydrosols became a vehicle to share “plant symbiosis” with the community. Misting hydrosols creates a relationship with plants and their innate healing potentials. Using them daily, one invites their therapeutic and revitalizing energy: one inhales the mist; feels the tingle of sympathetic molecules dancing on the skins surface. Moving up through the nose, clearing the airways, cleaning the pores and cutting through excess oils, it’s unmistakably something special. It’s pure, it’s essential, it’s plant magic.

And so it goes: each bounty chosen with intention: Cardamon, Cedar, Rosemary, Lavender, Lemongrass, Eucalyptus, Tea Tree, Mint, Aloe. Each distillation possessing a demonstrative ability to foster personal health, hygiene, and wellbeing: getting to the purest form.

Harvesting locally grown botanicals, trimming and prepping, cleaning and stripping, Melissa employs attention to detail, becomes the bridge, fires the still, tones the flame, ices the coil; initiates the aromatic & complex, copper-kettle apothecary; sees the alchemical plant-craft, initiates the dancing volatility of excited molecules!

And there it is: a kind of magic. The plant ally is born, bottled in home with love: small batch and singular. Purposed from seed to bottle, an incantation arises: clear the energy of our environments, catalyze aromatherapy, promote respiratory hygiene, sanitize public & personal spaces, clean and beautify the skin; vitalize, rejuvenate, and make people happy!

One could live an entire life neglecting to invite such bountiful and beneficial botanicals into their lives… so Madame Moon cultivates the bounty, sings over their secret potentials and employs the old distillare!

With Madame Moon, the process of distillation is aimed at preserving an integral relationship between people and plants; specifically, plants with a vibrant, intentional history of beneficial use.

100% pure, aromatic, milky plant hydrosols to freely mist: allies in a bottle born of slow drip distillation at a little apothecary by the sea.

Visit Melissa’s madamemoonco.com website for all your hydrosol holiday needs - you’ll also find a description of each hydrosol’s specific properties and individual uses. Find her products at the retailers below and Melissa’s weekly spot at the St. Augustine Amphitheater Farmers Market, Saturdays 8:30 - 12:30 where you can speak with her directly.

Tis the season to get mystified! g