Winter 26

Our rock rose grows wild on the plains of Almaden de la Plata outside Seville, Spain. In late summer, the leafy stems of the plant are sickle harvested and plunged into hot carbonated water. This mixture is distilled to obtain a honeyed, amber resin - labdanum.

Peru balsam is drawn from the forests of El Salvador and Guatemala, where the Myroxylon balsamum tree was once traded through Peruvian ports. The tree bark is gently scored, releasing a dark, honeyed resin, then steam distilled and transformed into an oil that is sweet and woody.

Our coffee beans are grown in Colombia’s famed Coffee Axis. The beans are roasted and ground to develop their natural sugars, giving the essential oil a rich and nutty character. Roasting the coffee bean allows the essential oil to linger longer, anchoring the lighter ingredients.

Our cinnamon is grown along the southwest coast of Sri Lanka, where sandy soils lead to higher quality oil. To produce this scented oil, the inner bark of the cinnamon tree is stripped and hung to dry for five days before undergoing steam distillation.

Our tonka beans are collected by hand in South America, when the fruits of the Dipteryx odorata tree fall during the dry season. The seeds are dried, soaked in rum, then ground and transformed into an oil through solvent extraction.

Olibanum (also known as frankincense) is a resin taken from the bark of the Boswellia tree. At Ffern we use Boswellia carterii. The trees grow wild along the Gulf of Aden in northern Somalia, and the resin ‘tears’ are harvested by local collectors over a period of weeks.⁠ ⁠

Gurjun balsam is a natural resin drawn from trees of the Dipterocarpus genus, native to Southeast Asia. It’s obtained through tapping the tree bark - a traditional extraction method that allows each tree to rest and replenish for months or even years before being tapped again. It carries a woody depth with smooth, slightly leathery undertones.

Our Chinese weeping cypress is grown and harvested in its native China, where it’s known as ‘mourning cypress’ for its traditional planting in temple courtyards and cemeteries.The essential oil is distilled from the bark, and is dry, smoky and unmistakably woody.

Grown in Northeastern Madagascar, our clove trees are lush with reddish brown buds which burst into many-headed white flowers. It is from these buds that our clove oil is extracted - using a water distillation process.

Our lavender is grown by a network of family farms in the hills of Provence, 600-1500m above sea level. This much-loved herb is particularly beloved of Provençals, who have been growing it for centuries. It is often called the soul of the region.

Myrrh is a bitter-tasting gum taken from the small thorn tree Commiphora myrrha. These flowering trees can be found amid dry, rocky hills - at Ffern we harvest our myrrh in the highlands of northern Somalia.

Our nutmeg grows on the Banda islands of eastern Indonesia. The fruit is harvested with handheld telescopic pickers and left to dry in the shade - the seed oil is then steam distilled at source.

Our red cedar wood (also known as red juniper) is grown and harvested in its native Virginia, USA. The oil is steam distilled directly from a cabinet maker’s offcuts. It shares the classic woody notes of atlas cedar, but introduces a distinctive ‘pencil’ facet.

Scentless when fresh and native to Asia, patchouli is a member of the Lamiaceae or Mint family. Our patchouli is hand-harvested on the Indonesian Island of Java. It’s then dried in the shade and briefly fermented, helping to break down the cell walls before the copper still hydrodistillation.

Grown on Calabrian hills overlooking the Ionian Sea, the fruit is harvested by hand and the oil extracted at source. The La Face family planted their first bergamot in the 1930s and have been mastering the craft of producing citrus oils ever since.