Blog by David Crow

The Sandalwood Oil of Sri Lanka

This weekend, we are very pleased to announce the release of a unique and rare botanical treasure: Certified Organic, true sandalwood from Sri Lanka.

This limited edition collector’s oil was distilled from the roots of old growth trees that were harvested several decades ago. Because of the difficulty removing the roots, they were left in the ground and were only recently salvaged. The fragrance of this oil is therefore not only extraordinary because it is from the true Santalum alba species, it has also aged beautifully in the ground over the years.

We are very concerned about the ethical harvesting of sandalwood, and do not carry Santalum alba as a regular product. This oil not only has the unusual story of coming from salvaged roots, it is also certified organic. More importantly, the distiller of this oil is responsible for large-scale reforestation efforts to replant the sandalwood trees and establish organic aromatic crops in Sri Lanka. In this way, this oil is both a treasure remaining from the past – a fragrance from the days when the trees grew more plentifully – and a way of supporting the regeneration of this precious species.

Learn More and Purchase the Sandalwood Oil of Sri Lanka Here

For your enjoyment and education, I am posting a few short excerpts from a piece I wrote about sandalwood which has not been published yet. When we know and understand how precious an aromatic treasure such as this is, and what it represents both in terms of what we are losing and what we should value and preserve for future generations, I am sure that you will agree that this oil should be used with reverence and gratitude.

David Crow

Sandalwood: Fragrance of the Gods

(Excerpt from the upcoming release)

“If the tranquil heaven of sages gone to bliss had a fragrance, it would be sandalwood. If purity of being, openness of heart, and loving kindness born of inner peace had a smell, it would be that of the finest golden oil suffused throughout the heartwood of the oldest sandalwood tree growing in the deepest forest of tropical India. If there was a single aroma that evoked the memories of devotion, remembrance of the Divine, and aspiration toward enlightenment within the collective soul of the innumerable beings that have passed through this world, it would be that of sandalwood’s blue-gray smoke curling upward from the temple censer.”

“No other aromatic tree has played a more central role in Asian spiritual culture, religious ceremony, perfumery, and medicine than Santalum alba, the ‘true’ sandalwood. No other aromatic tree faces as uncertain a future, a future of almost insurmountably complex ecological and economic pressures. No other aromatic tree is causing as much distress and concern among those who know its value than the rapidly dwindling population of old-growth sandalwood. And nothing would represent such a triumph of long-term environmental wisdom and sustainable forestry than sandalwood groves planted today yielding their treasured nectar eighty years from now.”

“The history and probable fate of sandalwood is a story of irony, while its potential role in the future global garden depends on nothing less than mankind achieving an evolutionary ability to think of coming generations’ wellbeing. While representing the quintessence of compassion, generosity, and all that is good within the human mind and heart, wild sandalwood trees have nonetheless been decimated by greed, corruption, mismanagement, and ignorance. This small sensitive evergreen, that refuses to flourish without specific symbiotic and parasitic relationships with other plants, has been loved to near-extinction in India by religious-minded seekers and by enjoyers of beauty everywhere, who have unknowingly created and supported an uncontrollable black market of poaching, bribes, and smuggling.”

“It is written that sandalwood is one of the oldest incense materials in the world, and that for at least 4,000 years its soothing aroma has filled homes and temples. But people have lived in and around sandalwood forests longer than the imagination, let alone recorded history, and when people dwell in such intimacy with nature they know well the plants and their uses. Over the millennia the tree was carried from its original primeval setting in Indonesia to China, India, Australia, and the Philippines, eventually taking its place on the world stage. Ever since, its wood and oil have been sought after, traded, and utilized for a wide range of purposes, from house-building lumber impervious to the jungle’s voracious insects to the fixative base note of fine perfumes.”

“To a Balinese carver it was a fine-grained hardwood waiting to become a statue or an elegant rosary to accompany the prayers inhaled and exhaled by those absorbed in meditation. To a Siamese temple builder it was an enduring wood with a calmative smell disliked by destructive white ants, whose terrible tiny mandibles reduced structures of other materials to pulp and sawdust. To a Persian physician it was an oil with a slightly bitter resinous taste and pronounced antiseptic and anti-inflammatory powers. To an Indian attar maker it was the unsurpassed liquid receptacle of distilled floral essences, an alchemical medium of such unique digesting, aging, enhancing, and stabilizing properties no other perfume base would suffice. To a noblewoman of the early Roman Empire or an aristocratic Athenian of Aristotle’s Greece, it was a viscous pale yellow treasure carried in amphoras by sail and caravan from distant shores, an unctuous delicacy with a soft, sweet, woody, and slightly animalic balsam aroma, most pleasant for anointing oneself for events both social and sensual. To a woman of a Burmese village it was a paste to gently cover the body, bringing relief from the searing tropical heat. To a Chinese herbalist it was an ingredient of decoctions that cured hyperacidity and intestinal spasms. To a Japanese incense maker it was a beige-white powder the consistency of talc, the foundation of numerous subtly nuanced recipes to be rolled into sticks and cones and sold to common householders and palace priests.”

Learn More and Purchase the Sandalwood Oil of Sri Lanka Here

Tags: essential oil, old growth, sandalwood, sandalwood oil, Santalum alba, Santalum album, Sri Lanka

This entry was posted on Friday, February 5th, 2010 at 10:50 pm and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.