Incense Explorer: A Deep Dive into Incense History, Culture, Ritual and Lore · Alyssa Severeid

Exploring the Fragrant Forest with Bonnie Kerr

·50 min·3 clips

Alyssa says fragrance can be “the voices of plants,” not just a smell.

1. Incense Explorer: A Deep Dive into Incense History, Culture, Ritual and Lore centers on Bonnie Kerr’s approach to incense, plants, and forest-based aroma. 2. Alyssa Severide hosts Bonnie Kerr, who is introduced as an herbalist, incense maker, perfumer, and founder of Esprit de la Nature. 3. The episode asks how Bonnie’s life in the boreal forest shapes the incense she makes and why heated incense matters to her. 4. Bonnie says she was born in New Jersey, grew up in the countryside, and spent time roaming forests and fields as a child. 5. She describes 15 years in New York City, where she worked in the arts and absorbed what she calls intense art energy. 6. Bonnie then moved to the Caribbean and Maui, where snorkeling, ocean air, and Hawaiian culture changed how she understood plants and spirit. 7. She says learning ancient hula from a Hawaiian elder around age 78 shifted her view toward animism and the idea that everything is alive. 8. After coming to Canada with her husband, Bonnie and her husband built a 16-by-20 cabin on 24 acres with solar panels and no running water. 9. She describes gathering water from the sky and melting snow in winter, including a year when she harvested standing deadwood on snowshoes during a solar minimum. 10. Bonnie says incense is a way to reconnect with nature because an aromatic plant carries the work of rain clouds, birds, and growth into a home. 11. She calls fragrance the “voices of plants” and uses the term “scentscapes” for blends that recreate a forest or another remembered place. 12. Bonnie says she harvests plants at different times of year because edge-of-forest plants and deep-forest plants smell different. 13. She notes that people in Quebec often have positive childhood memories of forests, and she says her incense can bring back those memories and visualizations. 14. Bonnie explains that she specializes in incense you heat rather than burn, which produces no smoke. 15. She says she does make thin Japanese-style incense sticks sometimes, but she avoids heavy smoke because many clients cannot tolerate it. 16. Bonnie names bakur, niriko, and Greek church resin incense as forms she makes, and she says she prefers whole botanicals over essential oils. 17. She distinguishes whole frankincense resin from frankincense essential oil, saying the resin contains compounds and aromas the oil does not carry. 18. Bonnie also discusses balsam fir, spruces, pines, tree mosses, mushrooms, lichens, and cottonwood buds as materials she studies and blends. 19. The conversation keeps a calm, exploratory interview style, with Bonnie and Alyssa moving between personal biography, plant chemistry, and ritual practice. 20. Listeners interested in plant aromatics, forest harvesting, and incense craft would likely stay engaged, while people wanting fast practical product talk may not.

As heard by us

A patient, sensory conversation that turns incense into history, craft, and lived ritual.

Bonnie Kerr's conversation with Alyssa Severide treats incense as a living practice, with plants, smoke, lore, medicine, sacrament, and sensory pleasure held in the same frame.

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Why you'd press play

You want incense lore rooted in plant craft, myth, and ritual.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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