Incense: Writing & Resources
For my writing on incense see the incense tag page. Is this page missing something? Let me know.
Incense making is hard. While parts of the world with strong incense cultures enjoy the intangible cultural heritage represented by many hundreds of years of knowledge and experience in incense making, here in the west expertise is scarce—and often jealously guarded[1]. For this reason, I have compiled here some English-language writing and resources on incense and incense making to ease the journeys of those interested in practicing this ancient art.
Incense Making How-To #
Articles #
- Grinding Equipment Analysis, Dave of The World Makes Scents
- How to Make Incense, incensemaking.com
- Incense “Gingerbread”, Irene of rauchfahne.de
- Incense Stick Making – A Walk Through, Kyarazen
- Making Incense: A Cursory Guide, Nathan Upchurch
- Making Your Own Incense Sticks – Basic Knowledge and Useful Information, Irene of rauchfahne.de
Books #
Resources #
- /r/incense posts flaired with “incense making”—For better or worse, the incense subreddit is the place to go for incense discussion and advice. I’m working on changing that, but it’s slow-going; see the forums / discussion boards section below.
- incensemaking.com—A useful site, particularly for listing many of the aromatics used in incense making. Be careful, however, as not all of the ingredients listed may be suited for combustible incense.
- Jarguna Incense YouTube playlist
- The Incense Dragon YouTube channel
Advanced Incense Making Techniques #
Articles #
- Enfleurage an Esoteric and Ancient Art, Be-en-Foret
- Filtering Conifer Resins, Dave of The World Makes Scents
- Incorporating Soft Resin Into Your Incense Recipe, Dave of The World Makes Scents
- Powder Enfleurage! An Ancient Fragrant Art, Anya’s Garden Perfumes
- Traditional Processing of Aloeswood, Dr. Incense
- Washing Frankincense, Nathan Upchurch
Videos #
Writing on Incense and Related Topics #
Articles #
- A New Incense Bibliography Part 1: History & Art, Incense Apprentice
- A New Incense Bibliography Part 2: Worldwide Incense Traditions, Incense Apprentice
- About the Different Types of Incense, Irene of rauchfahne.de
- Agarwood - The Hidden History of Scented Wood, Eric Hansen
- An Introduction to Japanese Incense, Tezumi
- Ancient Chinese kneaded incense recipes translated from Zhou Jiaxuan’s History of Incense (香乘 / xiāng shèng)
- Bakhour (Turaren Wuta) In Nigeria, Dr Ruqayya Abba Tofa
- Bakhour (Turaren Wuta) in Nigeria (Part 2), Dr Ruqayya Abba Tofa
- Chinese incense ingredient name translations
- Goose Pear Tent Incense, Be-en-Foret
- Japanese Incense Glossary, Sprays of Blossoms, Curls of Smoke
- Japanese Incense Ingredients, Japan Incense
- Japanese Incense Types, Kyarazen
- Post on the history of Koju as it relates to Nippon Kodo
- Pressed Incense Tablets, Kyarazen
- The Wisdom of Traditional Processing Methods, Dr. Incense
Books #
- Censers and Incense of Mexico and Central America—Walter Hough
- Floating Gold, Christopher Kemp—A natural and social history of ambergris.
- The Fragrant Path, Michael Cousineau—A dive into the history of Japanese incense traditions.
Other #
- A list of archived URLs from a now-defunct site with some good information on Chinese incense.
- All of my writing on incense
- Aromasublime Learning Center—Articles on agarwood and agarwood oil.
- incensemakers.org is an invitation-only forum for relatively experienced incense makers. It is not incredibly active, but it does have a number of useful threads visible to non-members. If you are interested in joining, your best bet is to have an existing member you know personally get in touch with me to provide a recommendation on your behalf.
- See the incense, fragrance, and perfumery section of my blogroll for a list of blogs with writing on incense and related topics.
Videos on Incense and Related Topics #
History #
- The Frankincense Trail—Kate Humble follows the ancient frankincense trade route from Oman to Palestine. I have linked to the IMDB page, but this documentary series is well worth sailing the high seas for.
Ingredients / About #
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Agarwood (YouTube)
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Bulgarian Rose Oil (YouTube)
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Ceylon Cinnamon (YouTube)
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Frankincense And Myrrh (YouTube)
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Jasmine Oil (YouTube)
- Business Insider’s So Expensive: Sandalwood (YouTube)
Ingredients / Convervation #
- Saving the scent that may soon disappear from Earth (YouTube)—a documentary on New Caledonian sandalwood.
- Scent From Heaven (YouTube)—a documentary from Al Jazeera on agarwood.
Introductory #
People & Culture #
- Da Ching Incense Making Factory (YouTube)
- Explore 500 years of Tibetan incense making at Tashi Lhunpo Monastery (YouTube)
- Fragrant China (YouTube)
- In the Heart of Shambhala Ep.2: Tibetan incense-making (YouTube)
- New China TV: Traditional incense-making helps Tibetan villagers live better life (YouTube)—a short look at traditional Tibetan incense making.
- Sacred Tibetan Incense (YouTube)
- ‘The Scent of Sakai’ 堺の香り - Handmade incense stick craftsman (YouTube)
- Tibetan Incense Making | 香格里拉藏香制作 (YouTube)
- Turf Peat Incense (YouTube)
Production #
- Baikundo’s incense-stick making process (YouTube)
- Japanese incense made with a waterwheel (YouTube)
- Nag Champa - A Documentary Film (YouTube)
- Shoyeido Factory Works (YouTube)
- The Scent of Heaven: Inside Vietnam’s Incense Village (YouTube)
Reputable Suppliers of Aromatics #
- Apothecary’s Garden (Canada)—Absolutes, Extracts, Herbs, Tinctures, Oils, Resins, Woods
- Frontier Co-Op (USA)—Herbs, Spices
- HerbCo (USA)—Herbs, Spices
- Jarguna (Italy)—Herbs, Oils, Resins, Woods
- Jeomras Räucherwelt (Germany)—Herbs, Oils, Resins, Woods
- Liberty Natural Products (USA)—Absolutes, Extracts, Herbs, Tinctures, Oils, Resins
- Mermade Magickal Arts (USA)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
- Mothers Goods (Germany)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
- Mountain Rose Herbs (USA)—Extracts, Herbs, Tinctures, Oils, Resins
- New Mountain Merchants (Australia)—Oils, Woods
- ResinaeBotanica (UK)—Resins
- Scents of Earth (USA)—Absolutes, Herbs, Oils, Resins, Woods
- Tame the Spirit Herbs (USA)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
- The Incense Dragon (USA)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
- The World Makes Scents (USA)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
- Youherbit (Greece)—Herbs, Resins, Woods
Studies on Incense and Related Topics #
Health #
Ingredients #
- Odor Tenacity of Perfumery Materials, Hayato Hosokawa and Takayuki Shibamoto (PDF, 158.8 KiB)
- The History of Tabu Powder as an Ingredient in Incense Sticks and Mosquito Coils (Machine Translated), Hiroaki Fujii (PDF, 1,011.3 KiB)
- The History of Tabu Powder as an Ingredient in Incense Sticks and Mosquito Coils (Original Japanese), Hiroaki Fujii (PDF, 2.5 MiB)
Production #
Use #
Forums / Discussion Boards #
- Reddit (/r/incense)—Unfortunately, this is currently the place to discuss incense and incense making on the English-speaking internet. If you would like to avoid a platform that spies on you and uses your writing to train AI, you are welcome to help me bring some life to the following alternative option (currently pretty much only populated by me):
- Lemmy (lemmy.ml/c/incense)—Lemmy is a free and open source alternative to Reddit on the fediverse. If you’re new to the fediverse, the easiest way to participate is to create a Lemmy account and subscribe to the /c/incense community. You can also subscribe and participate from other Lemmy instances and other federated platforms such as Friendica.
- Ouddict—Mostly focused on agarwood (oud) oil and wood, incense threads can and do appear.
- The Incense Makers’ Guild—An invitation-only forum for experienced incense makers hosted by yours truly. Currently pretty quiet, but some good info can be found there already.
Fun #
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Here I am referring to traditional incense making, using actual plants as aromatics. There is certainly no lack of knowledge or production of “dipped” incense here, an extremely easy to make category of incense which is considered the absolute bottom of the barrel in terms of quality. ↩︎