Meet The Maker: Rhiannon Mapstone
Meet the maker of our new natural perfume, Flora Bohemia – Rhiannon Mapstone, Founder & Natural Perfumer at YALU.
Perfume is one of the most ancient luxuries that we know of. We love that Rhiannon has preserved the fine art of blending therapeutic natural ingredients to create the most sublime fragrances that have a profound resonance with body, mind, and spirit.
To celebrate the launch of our natural perfume collaboration, that coincides with our recent launch of Sunday Somewhere, we talk to Rhiannon about what really goes on in the magical world of natural fragrance and of course, talk Sunday diaries.
WHAT DOES A SUNDAY LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?
Well, it’s been an interesting time for us through Covid. We are loving our lazy Sunday with walks around the beautiful Yarra Bend, coffee and fresh warm croissants from our local. It's been our saving grace during lockdown, just to be in nature it helps in times like this. Before lockdown, we'd usually head out of Melbourne city and into the countryside. There are so many beautiful places to visit. Gosh I miss the adventure and all the glorious smells! Fingers crossed we get a little more freedom come springtime. It's such a romantic time of the year when everything starts to bloom again, hopefully we will too.
DESCRIBE THAT SUNDAY FEELING.
Restful, reflective.
A good Sunday involves very little planning and mostly just meandering.
WHAT WAS THE CATALYST FOR CREATING YALU NATURAL PERFUME?
Yalu came from a creative time in my life when I needed to transform to thrive. I'd just come out of many years working as a Naturopath and felt a strong urge to change my direction and set sail to the land of perfume. This led me to creating nurturing products that I believed would benefit people in my community.
Yalu Natural Perfume is the result of this creative journey; building a relationship with natural botanicals and diving deep into making beautiful scent compositions. I'm a real hermit nerd. So you'll find me most days researching my latest scent tangent, or exploring ways to create something unique. It's been the best choice of my life so far and I feel lucky to have found it.
WHERE DOES THE IDEA FOR A NEW SCENT ORIGINATE FROM?
So many different beautiful things about life inspire me to the perfume organ. Everything and everyone has a story, I'm just elaborating on the parts I find most captivating. A lot of my new collection comes from a place of poetry, music, travel and a deep love for nature. My life before Yalu and Naturopathy was as a singer/songwriter. So I'll always have a song in my head or gravitate towards the beauty in life, in a moment and connect it back to the art of perfumery.
Perfume is one of the most ancient luxuries that we know of. We love that Rhiannon has preserved the fine art of blending therapeutic natural ingredients to create the most sublime fragrances that have a profound resonance with body, mind, and spirit.
To celebrate the launch of our natural perfume collaboration, that coincides with our recent launch of Sunday Somewhere, we talk to Rhiannon about what really goes on in the magical world of natural fragrance and of course, talk Sunday diaries.
WHAT DOES A SUNDAY LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?
Well, it’s been an interesting time for us through Covid. We are loving our lazy Sunday with walks around the beautiful Yarra Bend, coffee and fresh warm croissants from our local. It's been our saving grace during lockdown, just to be in nature it helps in times like this. Before lockdown, we'd usually head out of Melbourne city and into the countryside. There are so many beautiful places to visit. Gosh I miss the adventure and all the glorious smells! Fingers crossed we get a little more freedom come springtime. It's such a romantic time of the year when everything starts to bloom again, hopefully we will too.
DESCRIBE THAT SUNDAY FEELING.
Restful, reflective.
A good Sunday involves very little planning and mostly just meandering.
WHAT WAS THE CATALYST FOR CREATING YALU NATURAL PERFUME?
Yalu came from a creative time in my life when I needed to transform to thrive. I'd just come out of many years working as a Naturopath and felt a strong urge to change my direction and set sail to the land of perfume. This led me to creating nurturing products that I believed would benefit people in my community.
Yalu Natural Perfume is the result of this creative journey; building a relationship with natural botanicals and diving deep into making beautiful scent compositions. I'm a real hermit nerd. So you'll find me most days researching my latest scent tangent, or exploring ways to create something unique. It's been the best choice of my life so far and I feel lucky to have found it.
WHERE DOES THE IDEA FOR A NEW SCENT ORIGINATE FROM?
So many different beautiful things about life inspire me to the perfume organ. Everything and everyone has a story, I'm just elaborating on the parts I find most captivating. A lot of my new collection comes from a place of poetry, music, travel and a deep love for nature. My life before Yalu and Naturopathy was as a singer/songwriter. So I'll always have a song in my head or gravitate towards the beauty in life, in a moment and connect it back to the art of perfumery.
WHY DO YOU DO WHAT YOU DO?
I love getting witchy with nature. It's what first drew me to Naturopathy and herbalism. The idea of understanding all personalities of healing herbs was always so exciting to me. As a Naturopath I loved working with herbs and essences, the detailed plan of creating a tincture to help someone heal, it's a little similar to creating a natural perfume. Years of research and understanding go into learning your ingredients and creating harmonious blends.
Some of my earliest memories as a kid are playing with roses and lavender to make potions. We'd squish the flowers into a hanky, soak them in water and try to sell them out the front of my friends house in Essendon. Now I'm just a big kid that does the same thing but in a more grown up way ....and it smells better.
WHAT ARE YOUR DAILY RITUALS TO HELP YOU RELAX, REVIVE & RECHARGE WHEN IT’S NOT A SUNDAY?
- Naturally, I start each day with perfume on my pulse points. Mostly it's something new I've been working on and I want to see how it's coming along.
- Music! Lots of music! Dancing in the studio in between scent work and answering emails. It's been really helpful for shifting those funky moods during lockdown.
- Actually something that has really been working for me is taking soothing showers by candlelight. It helps me to switch off from the day and slide into relaxation mode. All that steam and soft light, it's perfect. I highly recommend it. I have this body scrub I made with lots of lavender, bergamot, and cypress. The scent quickly fills the air and envelopes you. I like to imagine I'm at some fancy day spa.
- Just because things are a little stressful lately, I've been taking medicinal Saffron, Rescue Remedy, and my own blend of Ashwagandha/Reishi/Siberian Ginseng. It's been a huge help.
- I Always have fresh cut flowers in the house. Lately it's been clippings of Golden Wattles from our daily walks by the river.
YOU KNOW IT’S NOT 100% GOOD FOR YOU, BUT YOU’RE NOT GIVING IT UP – WHAT IS IT?
My obsession with Henry Cavill and Margaritas hahaha. Come on! and sometimes they go together.
THERE’S SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE TO SUPPORT SCENT’S POWERFUL CONNECTION TO OUR BRAINS AND ITS POTENTIAL TO HEAL, SOOTHE AND DELIGHT: WHAT’S THE BLEND THAT TRANSPORTS YOU TO A PLACE OF PURE BLISS?
Oh this is easy, I’d have to say our new perfume Crystal Visions. It’s rich warm floral notes of amber, saffron, oud, musk and rose. They are heavenly to me right now. I can't get enough of it! It also has some beautiful Spanish saffron that I collected in Granada last year. This perfume always takes me back there and sunsets over the Alhambra.
WHAT’S THE SOUNDTRACK TO YOUR SUNDAY?
Music is everything in the Mapstone house. My husband Gerry is a talented Flamenco guitarist. Every Sunday you'll find him at our kitchen table jammin' out something beautiful. So I guess he really is the official soundtrack, but we've also been getting into Lianne La Havas new album, Arlo Parks, Donny Benét, Lime Cordiale, Lastlings, Michael Kiwanuka, Annie Hamilton, Black Pumas, Christine and The Queens, Friendly Fires and some daggy romantic 80's tunes that make us feel like we are in a movie montage.
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Shop Flora Bohemia online now.
For more on the alchemy of natural fragrance follow Rhiannon @yalu_naturalperfume
