Thread The Light
An exciting collaboration with The Swell Season
I’m emerging from a 5-month-long intense beautiful process. I imagine this is what an author feels like after writing and editing a book that is finally being published. Or a musician- after writing, recording, mastering, and releasing an album, for that matter! This was a project that was proposed to me in early February and proceeded to completely shift my perspective about what is possible within my work.
I got a text message in early February from my friend Marketa telling me that she and my friend Glen (known musically together as The Swell Season) were going back on tour this summer and she wanted to know if I would be willing to create a scent and/or a candle for their merch. These particular friends are ones I am connected to on a soul-level, they’ve been in my life for over 16 years and I love them deeply. So to be asked to formulate a scent that captures them was a task I instantly knew I not only wanted to do- but I needed to do.
Roots & Crowns is about to turn ELEVEN. I’ve been doing this for a long time and I love what I do, but there are ebbs and flows. Times that are lacking in inspiration, or straight up that feel volatile. Any small business owner or artist will understand this. So when something exciting or unexpected crosses my doorstep, it can feel a bit like a life line.
Glen and Marketa know my work, they know what I do and they weren’t asking for anything different. But something about the request made me realize that I wanted to make something extra special. I thought about how I have a complicated relationship with scent- since I began my business, I’ve kept to making fragrances solely made from essential oils up until now because my impression was “aromatherapy is healing.” “I want everything to be natural.” I was turned off by the ubiquitous fragrance oils used in scented candles and other “synthetic” materials. But I’ve also always been curious how perfumery actually works. Because there are rare but significant perfumes that I’ve noticed and had in my life over the years even if I haven’t worn them, simply because I actually found them beautiful despite myself and my (partially misconceived) notions about what “synthetic” meant.
I can speak more to this top of natural v. synthetic in fragrance, perhaps in a Substack, but the bottom line is, this request for a scent catapulted me into an intense, all-consuming study of perfumery. For nearly two months I disappeared into this study, and I learned so much. Anyone with propensities toward hyper-fixations can understand what this means! I turned my writing room into a perfume lab burgeoning with more and more dilutions of a growing collection of raw materials. My previously-held understanding of fragrance was somewhat humbled, I worked hard and blended and studied, and by the end of March I met Marketa and Glen in NYC to show them 9 different options for the perfume. They finally chose one, and alongside a (different but complimentary) scented candle– and I’ve spent the last several months working on the design, the packaging, getting all the pieces together. This was a massive feat. And now the first batch of the candles and fragrance are in their hands, beginning the US leg of the tour tonight!
A little bit about the inspiration and intuition behind the scent. I’ve known Glen & Marketa for many years. If you’ve seen the movie Once, you’ll recognize them. If you haven’t watched that film, I highly recommend it! The Swell Season is the band they created after winning an Oscar for their film, and they’ve played together as time/their lives allowed ever since. When I thought of Glen as a scent, I thought of patchouli, warm wood, mossy forests, animalic musks and gorgeous familiar mystery. When I thought of Marketa, I thought of rose, frankincense and myrrh, and a potent dose of the ethereal. My task was to bring these together in sensual (scentual) harmony. While I was working on the scent, I listened to a lot of their music. One song on their self-titled album (The Swell Season) is called In the Arms of this Low, and it has a repetitive singing of the lyrics “thread the light.” I thought Thread the Light would be a really nice name for the fragrance. Because of this song, (all music, really), a call of action for our times, and also because it speaks to this beautiful bond between us. So when they chose “GM7,” it became Thread the Light. What’s interesting, is that whenever I’d smell this scent, I noticed that it smelled like a golden orb to me, I can’t explain it- it just did. And I thought that was funny given how many earthy notes there was in it. When I was making the first big batch of the perfume to begin production for the first order, I was delighted to see it turn to a golden orb in the beaker! I guess this is a bit of synesthesia.
The Swell Season just released their newest album (their first in 16 years!) today! Forward is heart medicine. They also begin their US tour tonight in Virginia and are traveling all across the country. I cannot recommend going to see them perform live enough. They have something extremely unique and special that will make you feel something deep and beautiful. While you’re there you can visit the merch stand and smell/purchase what I’ve made for them yourself!
And if you want to order it directly from me, they’re allowing me to do that.
So please welcome The Swell Season collaboration to the shop! Go see them on tour! Thank me later!
