Workshop: Incense Making
Since the days of ancient Egypt and Rome, incense has been used for purification, ceremony, devotion and pure pleasure. Today, with 5,000 years of tradition and aesthetic refinement at its core, the use of incense is reaching new levels of popularity. Join us for a unique one-day session exploring the ancient, devotional art of incense. This creative, practical workshop focuses on using premium fragrant materials, such as resins, herbs; fruits; flowers seeds; spices and essential oils selected for their historic, therapeutic, fragrant and magical resonance.
You will be introduced, via smell and touch, to a variety of plant botanicals including essential oils, understand their history, their uses and how to select and blend them to create your own beautiful and unique incense. We will then make two sets of incense: the first will be a batch of incense cones made together as a group, and this will be followed by guidance through making of a set of loose incense individually, where you will be able to select your own choice of ingredients with which to make this bespoke.
We will also explore:
● History of incense and types of incense
● Fragrant botanical ingredients, essential oils and binders and how to work with them
● Safe preparation and creative blending guidelines
● Troubleshooting, tips and tricks to ensure your cones burn evenly and smell great
● Safety, dilutions, storage, creating a formula and record keeping
This session is ideal for anyone who is fascinated by incense, enjoys experimenting with plants and fragrance and who wishes to make clean, therapeutic and bespoke incense for their personal use or as gifts.
Please note the cones will need approx. 24 - 36 hours to fully dry out at home - please bring a shallow lunch box or similar container, to store and transport your cones home safely!
Meet Tanya
Tanya (TIDHA, MIFPA) trained as a Clinical Aromatherapist, which led to further studies in natural perfumery and formulating. She now combines her clinical work with delivering events and workshops in aromatic blending, botanical skincare and perfumery; and provides conceptual fragrance ideas for events, heritage sites and public spaces. She has a passion for unusual ingredients, botanical history and use of plants in folklore. You can follow her on Instagram and Twitter @perfumemistress and find out more about her work on her website here: https://www.theperfumemistress.com/
Price: £85
This workshop is now fully booked.
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Note for Southwark residents: Looking to book a free place? Unfortunately, our limited quota of free places for the 2024-25 academic year have now been claimed. We will be releasing a refreshed number of free places, along with a new calendar of workshops, in Autumn 2025 so please check back then. Subscribe to our newsletter or follow us on social media, at the bottom of this page, to be notified.
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