Learning to Distill

The Art of Distillation

It all started as a dream, a desire to not only study and apply essential oils that I bought from small and medium-sized artisanal, biodynamic and certified organic distilleries, but to distill the very soul of plants myself to immortalize their aroma.

The ancients called it "Quintessentia"
and after the 4 elements: Earth, Water, Air, and Fire, the Quintessentia was the soul of matter. Alcohol was named thus, for being the "Spirit" of fermented matter or matter in "putrefaction" that was purified. According to them, this alcohol or Menstruum has a soul and bad words should not be spoken in its presence.

The study of Alchemy is very interesting; I love History, it makes me see that we are a leaf that is part of a great tree, and that history is cyclical and repetitive.

After some old books on Alchemy and Distillation, I studied two books, "Fractional Distillation" and "Industrial Distillation."

I didn't understand many things, as with everything, but I like it because it's not necessary to learn everything, but only what you need to learn.

After 3-4 books, treatises, and studies, I bought my copper alembic, with a design based on a style over 2000 years old that is thought to have originated in Arabia.

It's made in Portugal, with hand-hammered copper, and I bought it for myself as a birthday gift while we were traveling through California on a learning adventure, which I will tell you more about later.

This small 1-gallon alembic, which cost me $350 at https://www.essentialoil.com/, a company I love based in Portland, a city I also loved. (We had the opportunity to live near Portland on a volunteer project but that's another story).



Fast Forward, through a platform called https://www.workaway.info/, which I highly recommend because you travel the world with a purpose, you have a host and companions who can become lifelong friends and learn trades and unforgettable experiences. I definitely recommend it; I am 34 years old and I will do it again as soon as I can, haha.

While in Canada, British Columbia, in the freezing Cascade Mountains of Hope, we were looking for the sea and a milder climate, and of course, to practice my distillation, so we headed to Vancouver Island and looked for a Lavender farm where I could learn about the propagation, harvesting, and distillation of Lavender. And I found just that! The beautiful Damali farm in Cobble Hill.

It was difficult for them to accept me because, being one of the largest and most beautiful, they already had everything scheduled. I insisted several times and told them that if someone canceled, they should let us know and I would be available without hesitation. And so it was... sometimes persistence pays off. Kennedy accepted us and in August, in the middle of harvest and distillation season, we arrived to live on the farm in our mobile home :D yes, with my boyfriend and Maya, our Xolopitbull, whom I will introduce you to later.

It was a wonderful experience that I enjoyed immensely and learned so much more from.
It was with the essential oil from that farm that I distilled myself that I have been preparing products.

I distilled both lavenders, Lavandula Angustifolia which has a much lower yield and is therefore much more expensive, in addition to being the most calming, soft, floral, and sweet. And we also distilled Lavandin Grosso, which as its name suggests, has a GROSS yield, its aroma is more camphoraceous and contains camphor (excuse the redundancy) and linalool.