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OFFICINALIS

Single herbs · one species to a bag

A herb brewed wrong is a herb wasted.

OFFICINALIS is a herbal apothecary in the plain sense of the phrase: 24 medicinal plants, each from one named origin, cut and dried on its own terms. The preparation is printed on the label with the batch number, because most of what goes wrong with a herbal tea goes wrong in the cup and not in the field.

Open the Herb CabinetRead the Harvest Calendar
Plate IHarvest May–Jul
Matricaria chamomilla L.Flos Chamomillae
Herbs in the catalogue
24
single plants, never blends
Drawers by indication
8
filed as a dispensary files
Named origins
18
each printed on its label
Wild-gathered
8
33% of the catalogue
Peak of the harvest
Jun
15 herbs gathered

The House

What the house actually does

We buy single lots, cut them here, and dry each one at the temperature the plant will tolerate rather than the temperature that empties the drying room fastest. Chamomile goes into the shade at 40 °C so the volatile oil stays in the flower. Thyme is rubbed off the stem instead of chopped, so what you weigh is leaf and flower and not woody stalk. Fennel is sold whole, because the oil sits in the seed coat and starts leaving the moment it is broken.

Nothing is blended. One plant, one bag, one origin, one batch number — which is the only way a herb can be traced back to the field it came out of.

We would rather sell you one herb you brew properly than four you brew like teabags.

Two people buy from us, and they want opposite things from the same bag. One is treating themselves at home and has never been told that marshmallow root is ruined by boiling water — so the preparation has to be on the label, in full, before they open it.

The other is a naturopath or a pharmacist who resells, and needs the drug name, the batch, the origin and the net quantity written where they can be copied into a dispensary record without a phone call. Both get the same label. Neither gets a marketing name for the plant.

Filed by indication

The Herb Cabinet

Not by plant family, and not by what sells — by what you would reach for. A herb is filed in every drawer it serves, so these counts deliberately add up to more than the 24 species in the catalogue.

Selection

What we would put in front of you first

Not best sellers — we do not publish those. These are the ones we hand to someone who asks where to start: 4 plant parts across 4 drawers, from the flower you keep covered while it steeps to the fruit you crush before you pour.

All 24 herbs — 19 more in the cabinet

The preparation · the argument

The preparation is the product.

Marshmallow root and mallow flowers sit in the same drawer — Airways — and are often taken together. Pour boiling water on either and you have destroyed the one thing you bought them for. Hawthorn, two drawers over, wants exactly that boiling water and then far longer than anyone leaves it. Same shelf, same kettle, three different answers.

Radix Althaeae

Marshmallow Root

Althaea officinalis

20°C

Brewing temperature · 60 min

Cold water, or you have made starch water. The mucilage that does the work is destroyed by heat, so this root is left to stand at room temperature and only warmed — gently — once it has been strained.

Notice

  • May slow the absorption of other medicines — leave a gap of an hour either side.
The full preparation

Flos Malvae

Mallow Flowers

Malva sylvestris

60°C

Brewing temperature · 30 min

Hand-warm at most. Take it hotter and the mucilage flattens; the blue-grey colour goes with it, which is the tell.

Notice

  • May slow the absorption of other medicines — leave a gap of an hour either side.
The full preparation

Folium Crataegi cum Flore

Hawthorn Leaf & Flower

Crataegus monogyna

95°C

Brewing temperature · 20 min

Boiling water, and then patience. The procyanidins are slow to leave the leaf, and this is a herb taken as a course of weeks rather than as an afternoon drink.

Notice

  • Speak to a doctor before use if you are being treated for a heart condition or take cardiac medication.
  • Seek medical advice for chest pain, breathlessness or swelling of the legs.
The full preparation

Read the year first

The shelf follows the field

Nothing here is made to order. A flower cut a fortnight late is a different drug, and a root lifted before the plant has pulled its stores back down is mostly water — so the catalogue fills and empties with the year rather than with demand. Both readings below are counted out of the same file the shop sells from.

Harvest Calendar

The gathering year, read as a ring

Each spoke is a month, and its length is the number of herbs in the cabinet cut in it. The year is lopsided on purpose: 15 of the 24 come in during Jun alone, when leaf and flower carry the most oil and the window to catch them is measured in days.

Roots run against that. All 4 of them are lifted between Sep and Nov, once the plant has pulled its stores back underground. 3 months carry nothing at all — the shop lives those weeks on what was dried.

A herb gathered across three months is counted in all three, so the ring totals more than the 24 it is drawn from.

Harvest calendar: herbs gathered per monthA ring of twelve segments, January at the top running clockwise. Each segment runs outward in proportion to the number of herbs gathered that month, from 0 to 15, and darkens as the count rises. The table below carries the same figures.51015JanFebMarAprMayJunJulAugSepOctNovDecJun15Herbs

Hover, tap or tab a month

Herbs in the catalogue gathered in each month, and which ones
MonthHerbs gatheredNames
Jan0None
Feb0None
Mar1Dandelion Root & Herb
Apr2Nettle Leaf, Dandelion Root & Herb
May7Chamomile Flowers, Sage Leaf, Ribwort Plantain, Nettle Leaf, Hawthorn Leaf & Flower, Elderflower, Rosemary Leaf
Jun15Chamomile Flowers, Lemon Balm Leaf, Peppermint Leaf, Sage Leaf, Calendula Flowers, St John's Wort, Linden Blossom, Ribwort Plantain, Thyme, Nettle Leaf, Hawthorn Leaf & Flower, Yarrow, Elderflower, Mallow Flowers, Rosemary Leaf
Jul11Chamomile Flowers, Lemon Balm Leaf, Peppermint Leaf, Calendula Flowers, St John's Wort, Linden Blossom, Ribwort Plantain, Thyme, Yarrow, Lavender Flowers, Mallow Flowers
Aug11Lemon Balm Leaf, Peppermint Leaf, Calendula Flowers, Fennel Seed, Ribwort Plantain, Yarrow, Lavender Flowers, Milk Thistle Seed, Hop Cones, Aniseed, Mallow Flowers
Sep9Valerian Root, Sage Leaf, Calendula Flowers, Fennel Seed, Milk Thistle Seed, Hop Cones, Aniseed, Dandelion Root & Herb, Rosemary Leaf
Oct4Valerian Root, Marshmallow Root, Liquorice Root, Dandelion Root & Herb
Nov2Marshmallow Root, Liquorice Root
Dec0None

Stock-take

The cabinet, counted

Nothing on this page is a marketing figure. Each number below is counted out of the same file the shop reads from — take a herb out of the cabinet and the count drops with it.

Species in the cabinet
24
Indication drawers
8
Named growing regions
18
Plant parts stocked
6
Wild-gathered
8

By plant part

6 of the 8 parts a pharmacopoeia names are represented. The part decides almost everything downstream — when it is cut, how hard it may be brewed, how long it keeps.

  • Flos
    6
  • Folium
    6
  • Herba
    4
  • Radix
    4
  • Fructus
    3
  • Strobulus
    1

24 herbs · one part each

Gathered against grown

8 of the 24 are taken from the wild rather than sown, which is why their harvest windows are short and cannot be moved.

8 of 24 species are wild-gathered (33 percent), shown hatched; 16 are cultivated, shown solid.
Wild-gathered
833 %
Cultivated
1667 %

Every bag leaves with its instructions.

Read the temperature before you fill the kettle. Everything else — what to measure, how long to leave it, what not to take it alongside — is on the label and repeated in full on the product page.

See all 24 herbs

Prices €5.40 – €9.40 per bag