Thank you for being here, reading, engaging.
My name is Elsie Lopez — a polymathic philosopher (BA in Philosophy & Religion, 2011), bioregional herbalist, gardener, textile enthusiast, Indigo artisan, writer, and educator — and some of you may know me as the creator of Gold Water Alchemy (now known as Studio Azua), a multi-faceted endeavor and entity that is continuously revealing itself to me.
I’m writing a book. This book wants to be about everything, so as I narrow the focus, I’ll be sharing research that factors into writing it alongside other things I write / have written. Whatever the case, the book will feature plants and draw inspiration from my materials practice.
This is a digital garden, an archive and document of cultural memory, an experiential education process of soul retrieval.
Full of information about seeds, plants, flowers, fruits, and fungi of all sorts, and how they are and become food, medicine, art, and language. Replete with stories of my experiences with them and other ethnobotanical anecdotes. Read : simultaneous ‘somatic excavation’ and ‘OBE’ (out of body experiences).
Because I spend so much time between gardens, preserves, and kitchen, plenty of recipes & food memories are shared here, many which feature foraged finds & grown goods.
My current focus is also particularly informed by previous studies and the crafts of my predecessors, namely my grandmother who was a seamstress and designer and several relatives who maintain intimacy with the land through deep witnessing and listening. For the time being, this is being expressed through my research project Ecologies of Color.
The newsletter for Studio Azua will be sent through here and is free for all subscribers.
There are also paid options which include other goods and furthermore support my research and writing process (i.e., the more paying subscribers there are here, the more posts I am able to put out) —
$9/mo or $99/year — newsletters, Earthascopes (i.e., Herbascopes, Florascopes, Fungascopes, Frutascopes), poetry, recipes, food and fruit history, materials research, sensible science
$215.99/year — to become a founding member which includes all of the above + 1 potion mailed to you at the beginning of each of the 4 seasons, and also 20% off all online classes for the full year
The bioregion I study, grow, live, & work within is Southeastern North America, primarily Florida and the Caribbean.
Recurring series include:
Indigo Ethnobotany
Indigo Investigations
Earthascopes
Remedy Recipe
Thank you for supporting this work as I archive research and expand on writing projects.
note : it is recommended that you read the posts on a browser or in the app, as opposed to via the email, as edits are often made and will not show up in the email version.
please consider donating to my land, research, and writing fund — click here
