Our Story

Boswellia Carterii · Horn of Africa

The longest note.

Frankincense doesn’t announce itself. It lingers — a warm, balsamic note that has drifted through temples, homes, and quiet rooms for over five thousand years. It travelled the incense route before there were maps of it. It was traded weight-for-weight with gold. And it comes from one of the harshest, most beautiful landscapes on earth: the sun-bleached highlands of the Horn of Africa.

That’s where our story starts — because it’s where our family’s story starts. RĒSIN Co. was founded in Ottawa by partners with roots in the Horn of Africa, working directly with harvesters who have gathered resin from wild Boswellia carterii trees for generations. Each tear forms slowly, as the tree heals where it has been hand-scored. Nothing about the process can be rushed. We think that’s the point.

What Grade I means

Resin is graded at origin — by size, clarity, and aroma. Grade I is the first harvest’s largest, cleanest tears: translucent amber, aromatic before they ever meet heat. That’s the only grade we buy. We select at origin, pack by hand in Ottawa, and put a window on every pouch — because resin this clear should be seen before it’s burned.

One source, from resin to oil

Everything we make begins with the same trees. Our resin is steam-distilled at origin into pure frankincense essential oil — the same single source, carried into our body and ritual oils. No fillers, no synthetics, no shortcuts. From tree to bottle, nothing else.

Why we do this

Every purchase supports the harvesters who keep this tradition alive, and helps carry a three-thousand-year-old craft into homes that are just discovering it. Light a charcoal disc. Place two or three tears. Ten minutes — that’s the whole ritual.

Pure resin. Always.

— RĒSIN Co., Ottawa