Kathi KevilleThis large Australian tree, sometimes also spelled “ti,” is related to eucalyptus. There are many species and subspecies; all have an interesting bark that curls off the trunk, giving them the name “paperbark.” Studies show...
A common Australian tree-also called by the less poetic name “black wattle”-mimosa is grown in Africa, Europe and warmer sections of the United States. It is used mostly in perfume. Family: Mimosaceae Extraction: Absolute, concrete. The...
Rudyard Kipling wrote of the “wind-bit thyme that smells like the perfume of the dawn in paradise.” Ancient Greeks complimented each other as “smelling like thymbra”; their word thymain meant “to burn as incense,”...
Resembling a giant fennel plant, galbanum was used in the ancient world as incense. Native to the Middle East and West Asia, it is cultivated today in Iran, Turkey, Lebanon and Afghanistan. It was used in pharmaceuticals, but now it is mostly known...
Seventeenth-century Europeans took a fancy to this tender African perennial, also known as “rose geranium,” and propagated it in their greenhouses. The resulting hybridization increased the species to more than 600, which includes many...
Native to the tropics, ginger's thin, broad leaves are attached to a surprisingly succulent, spicy rhizome. The herb originated near the Indian Ocean, but it is now grown throughout the tropics.
This flower, sometimes called “everlast” or “immortelle,” is native to the Mediterranean and North Africa and is cultivated in Spain, Italy and Yugoslavia. A related species, H. orientale, is also grown for oil, while H...
Once considered sacred, this herb was often used in purification practices. Hyssop comes from the Mediterranean. Most of the oil produced goes into expensive perfumes. Family: Lamiaceae (Labiatae) Extraction: Distilled from flowering tops. The odor...
This plant native to Asia and cultivated in many locales produces an essential oil that is strongly mucolytic. It is best dispensed from a diffuser for respiratory problems. Family: Asteraceae (Compositae) Extraction: Distilled from the root...
Probably an Iranian native, jasmine has captured the imagination for centuries. Forty-three different species are grown in East India, where women dress their hair with it and where it is poetically known as “moonlight of the grove.”...
