a cabinet of impossible things
a few curios, drawn and described — and none of them for sale.
Vaporarium volans · "the aether-breather"
A brass censer that will not stay on the shelf. It levitates a hand's-width above any table, breathing slow curls of foraged-herb aether — mint, sumac-leaf, a rumor of pine. Wind it with the little key and it hums; the wings are decorative and, the shoppe insists, load-bearing.
impossible runs on aether
Not for sale — it would only fly away.
Cerevisia rhoïs · "the foragers' ruby"
Long before hops, people steeped the red drupes of staghorn sumac in cool water for a tart, rose-lemonade drink — "sumac-ade," "Indian lemonade." Let a jar of it sit warm and wild yeasts will find it; the shoppe bottles the result and calls it a brew, which is a stretch it is happy to make. Ruby, sour, faintly astringent, smelling of a hot roadside in late summer.
foraged plant, wild-fermented
Not for sale — brew your own, it grows by the road.
Pigmentum rhoïs · "roadside ochre"
Sumac is a dyer's plant for real — its leaves and bark are heavy with tannin, and tanners and dyers have used it for centuries to strike tans, warm browns, and, with a pinch of iron, a deep grey-black. The shoppe grinds it into a rust-red paint that smells faintly of tea and dries the color of a late-summer field. Earthy, matte, a little astringent to the nose.
plant-dye tannin, real
Not for sale — a curio, not a tested pigment.
Tinctura unguium · "the dusty rose"
Follow the dye one step further and it stops being paint and starts being cosmetic — a plant-tannin tint the shoppe brushes onto a nail: a dusty, muted rose-brown, the color a rose goes when it dries in a book. Invented, this one — no real bottle behind it, just the idea that the roadside plant could color a fingertip as easily as a fleece.
invented plant-tint
Not for sale — and never patch-tested; admire, don’t apply.
What this is. A cabinet of curios — a few things drawn and described because they were fun to name. None is a product, and nothing here is for sale.
The flying vape is impossible and breathes only invented aether — no tobacco, no nicotine, nothing you’d inhale. The three sumac curios lean on a real plant: staghorn sumac (Rhus typhina) makes a genuine tart infusion, and its tannins really do dye and tan (tans, browns, a grey-black with iron). So the brew and the paint stand on real foraged practice; the nail tint is invented outright. Either way this page sells you none of them, and the tint especially is a drawing, not a tested cosmetic — admire it, don’t brush it on.
If you forage, identify carefully — the edible staghorn sumac has upright red cones; avoid the unrelated, white-berried poison sumac entirely.