The
STORY
I’ve always been a maker. It used to be handbags, now fragrance. I paint, and also make memorial jewelry and sculpture from the ashes of pets and loved ones (let’s talk). It’s all a journey towards some “far-away freedom”. Scent is killer because it expresses what cannot be “said” with words. I always want to provoke a feeling of freedom from time, anxiety, ambition – and shifting ideas about how things should be.
Now I create fragrances to capture and tell a story, because perfume as art roots us in a single moment. Scent stimulates a vague memory or far-off idea (a person, smoke, grade school, lemons, dirt) – relics of experience.
Boathouse fragrances are proprietary formulations made in small batches in our San Juan Island studio. I mostly compound everything myself, unless we’re slammed and I pull in a reinforcement (named Steve). CLICK HERE to shop.
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Life At THE BOATHOUSE
An Unwitting Beginning
My husband Steve and I met as seasonal "summer kids" and forgot to leave (40yrs, three kids and a couple of careers ago). We are deeply rooted here. Steve is an ER nurse, we both volunteer at SJI EMS. Our grown children also also live on the island.
Tiny Living
We live in a 485 sq ft house on San Juan Island in the Pacific Northwest corner of Washington State. We used to have the "kids and dogs" house but they all grew up and out. We do drink a lot of coffee, per the lore (in tiny cups, LOL).
Island Life = Pretty much your life (but no Trader Joe's).
I think we pretty much live like you and my guess is the days look similar - jobs and kids' games and friends, etc. But we don't have TJ which is a big bummer sometimes. Here's a pic with my pals, just FYI.