back when i was still living in oakland, i started noticing these pretty bottles of beautifully-branded, scented soaps popping up in a few local boutiques. i had always been curious about the brand, so i was delighted when juniper ridge recently contacted me and asked if i’d like to test out their newest wilderness perfume. this oakland-based company is in the business of bottling-up the fragrances of the wilderness. they go out on backcountry hiking adventures to collect plants, bark, moss, and mushrooms which they use to distill beautifully-scented colognes and perfumes. their new winter redwood fragrance was inspired by the redwood canyons of mt. tamalpais. this dreamy fragrance has notes of “redwood needles, douglas fir pitch, sea grass, chanterelles cooking on the campfire, wood smoke in the cool evening air, jeans soaked through at the knees.”  it’s not the least bit over-powering, but instead, it lingers gently for only a few hours before i find myself opening the bottle to take a little sniff, and finding myself thoroughly homesick for those beautiful stretches of land just north of san francisco.

photos by me.