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Story

North Shore Apothecary & Goods is run entirely by yours truly, Emily Lou (She/Her).

Many people just call me Lou ❁

I'm out there cutting & snipping the freshest plant material to go straight into the traditional copper alembic still and modern stainless steel still. Then formulating, labelling, packaging....everything. I do it! 

 North Shore harvests on the traditional lands of the Anishinabek Territory in what is now known as Georgian Bay - Parry Sound - Muskoka. This area is part of the Robinson-Huron Treaty of 1850. As a settler on these lands, it is important to respect the environment, and the cultures that have known these plants for centuries. North Shore only harvests plants that are abundant and/or invasive to the region. 

Emily Lou takes apart a traditional copper alembics still inside of a cabin that also serves as her apothecary lab

There is no way to do it except the ethical & environmentally friendly way. Any other way makes my job harder. I'd have to travel further to find those elusive pockets of whatever plant I'm looking for. I want to come back year after year to that babbling brook to harvest wild mint, so why would I ever deplete it?! My background in landscape design, aquatic plant fieldwork and native plant restoration helps me do this efficiently and with informed care. 

An outstretched arm holds onto a bouquet of white yarrow against a backdrop of an open meadow on a summer day.

North Shore celebrates an often underutilized sense- the sense of smell. Nature provides some of the most wonderful, layered, complicated and downright lovely smells that can transport us back to our childhood, a place of meaning, or to our emotions. We've been expressing scent from plants, resins, mushrooms, bark & lichen for centuries dating back to ancient Rome, Greece and Egypt. Odorous plant matter was considered heavenly and was highly revered. Somewhere along the way, synthetic chemicals took the place of handcrafted natural expressions of plants. These synthetics do allow scent to last longer, but can also be riddled with chemicals, hormones, and preservatives. If you're like me, modern perfumes cause headaches and the odd but oh so wicked migraine. Natural scents are more gentle, and well, natural. 

During the Summer of 2017, while completing my Masters of Environmental Studies, I undertook the task of renovating a 70 year old cabin near Orrville, ON. The dream was to have a workshop and a place to run the still so it could be connected to a cold water source to aid in the condensation of essential oil during steam distillation. The dream came true! The cabin is situated right by a spring fed lake, and the water for the copper still comes up from the lake, through the still, then it waters the vegetable and herb garden and then eventually back into the lake. Dreamy. 

This is a picture of "cabin lab" empty of people. It has a stainless steel table, an antique white sink and fluorescent lighting. The walls are painted white with stained dark brown stained joists. The walls are white and the floor is army green-brown. The table the forgeound has a few boughs of hemlock on it, and the stainles steel workbench in the back hasa large bundle of mugwort on it. It's not perfect! there are mugs of tea on the , a coffee cup, wires showing behind the table. The shelves are quite cluttered with ntique glassware and mason jars. Jesus...i should clean this up

I can't even begin to highlight the setbacks and costly mistakes I made while undertaking most of the renovation myself. Without fail, for about three months I had some sort of injury, cut, or glob of paint lodged in my hair and all articles of clothing. I got very comfortable going out in public like this. But hey, now if anyone needs help drywalling, painting, building, putting in windows, tongue & groovin', (and most importantly) demolition...I'm your gal! Of course I got help from many talented and kind people, of which none of this dream would have come to fruition without. 

I absolutely love doing this. I love completing the process from plant to bottle, and providing a product that doesn't just smell like the woods.... it actually is the woods.