It Begins With the Women Who Came Before

I didn't learn about plants from a book.

I learned from my mother — a certified nurse midwife and nurse practitioner — who reached for the herb garden before she reached for the medicine cabinet. Teas for fevers. Poultices for wounds. Foods chosen as carefully as any prescription. She taught me, without ever making it a lesson, that the body knows how to heal when you give it what it needs.

I learned from my grandmother — a master gardener and herbalist whose hands seemed to understand soil the way other people understand language. She was the kind of woman who could walk through a field and tell you what every plant was for. She passed that knowing on to me, the way such things have always been passed — quietly, practically, in the doing of it.

This is the lineage Rainroot Apothecary grows from.

The Herb Nursery, the Baby, and the Beginning of Everything

About twenty years ago, my grandmother and I started an herb nursery together — shortly after my youngest daughter was born. It was one of those seasons where everything was beginning at once.

And then my daughter got sick.

At just a few months old, she developed severe eczema and a cascade of health issues that led to a diagnosis that would reshape everything: she was allergic to all fragrances. Doctors advised us to avoid synthetic chemicals broadly. The products lining pharmacy shelves — the ones marketed as gentle, as safe, as made for babies — were suddenly off the table.

So I made her something instead.

My grandmother had already been teaching me to make soap and herbal preparations. I went deeper. I studied. I formulated. I learned which plants soothed inflammation, which oils supported the skin barrier, which ingredients were genuinely safe for a body as sensitive as hers. I earned my certificate in herbal studies and nutrition from the American College of Healthcare Sciences, adding formal training to the generational knowledge I'd been absorbing my whole life.

The products worked. Not just for my daughter — for everyone who tried them. Friends started asking. Then buying. Then buying entire batches at a time.

That was the beginning, even if I didn't know it yet.

The Farm, the Knowledge, the Craft

Today I farm organically in the Pacific Northwest, growing many of the botanicals that go into every Rainroot product. What I don't grow, I wildcraft or source with the same intentionality I bring to everything else.

I am a medical researcher by training and a content creator by practice — which means I read the studies, I understand the mechanisms, and I can tell you exactly why each ingredient is in each formula and what it's doing there. Nothing goes into a Rainroot product without a reason. Nothing goes in that I wouldn't put on my own daughters' skin.

Every product is made by hand, in small batches, with the kind of attention that simply cannot exist at scale.

Why "The Village Wisewoman"?

Every village had one — the woman who knew the plants. Who people came to when the medicine ran out, or when the medicine wasn't working, or when what they needed wasn't medicine at all but knowledge. She was the herbalist, the midwife, the keeper of remedies passed down through generations.

I am her, in this time and this place.

And Rainroot Apothecary is what she makes.

The Writer

I'm also a novelist. I write near-future solarpunk fiction about communities that survive—and thrive—by rebuilding the very knowledge this apothecary is rooted in. The systems I test on this land end up in the books. The books inspire people to build their own nodes. If you're curious, you can read more at brianamontagne.com.

What We Believe

🌿 That plants are medicine — not a replacement for modern care, but a profound complement to it, with thousands of years of evidence behind them.

🌱 That what you put on your skin matters — your skin is your largest organ. It deserves the same thoughtfulness as what you put in your body.

✋ That small batch is not a limitation — it is a commitment. To quality, to freshness, to the kind of care that disappears at scale.

🌲 That the land is the source — we grow here, in the rain and the soil of the Pacific Northwest, because place matters. Our plants carry this place in them.

The Kitchen

My commitment to ingredient transparency extends beyond the apothecary. I manage histamine intolerance and other health challenges through careful, allergen-free cooking, and I support my mother through complex dietary needs following major surgery. Food is medicine too—and I document that work at aipfoodie.com.

THE VILLAGE & THE TIMES

"The wisewoman was never more needed than when the village was uncertain."

The Village & The Times

What This Means for You

Every jar of Rainroot Apothecary you purchase does more than nourish your skin.

It funds a farm. It supports a wisewoman who is actively working to grow, preserve, and share the knowledge that communities need right now. It is a small, concrete act of choosing rootedness over dependence — of saying that you believe the old knowledge still matters, and that the people who carry it deserve to keep doing so.

And if you want to go further — if you feel the same pull toward self-sufficiency, toward community, toward learning what the plants can do — we want to hear from you.

The node is forming. There is room for you in it.

Explore the Rainroot Resiliency Node

Join us on Patreon

Read the solarpunk novels at BrianaMontagne.com

A Note From Briana

I make these products because I needed them, and because the people I love needed them. I make them because my grandmother taught me how, and because her grandmother probably knew things she never got to pass on. I make them because there is something quietly radical about choosing plants — about trusting the old knowledge alongside the new.

I'm glad you found your way here.

— Briana, The Village Wisewoman

     Home, Washington