Journal

Your Guide to the Andean Cosmological Calendar

The Andean year is not held by the Gregorian calendar. It is held by the sun, the stars, and the movement of the earth. Eight moments hold the year. Four solstices and equinoxes. Four cross moments...

The Feline - Guardian of Thresholds

In the iconography of Chavín de Huántar, no being is more present than the feline. It appears everywhere - as the dominant face of supernatural beings, as the fangs that frame every sacred mouth, a...

Pachamama Raymi - The Day of Offering

August 1. In the Andean world, this is the day the earth opens. This is not metaphor. It is cosmological fact. Pachamama Raymi - the Festival of Patsamama - marks the moment the earth is understood...

Quru - The Smaller Serpents

Not all serpents are the same. In Áncash Quechua, Amaru and Quru name distinct beings - and the distinction matters.

The Artisan - What It Means to Make by Hand

Every piece in the KANTU collection is held by hands you will never see. They begin in Peru, drawn from the iconographic language of Chavín de Huántar. Then they travel to Bali, where the orfebres ...

Amaru - The Cosmic Serpent

In the Andean cosmovision, the serpent is not a symbol of evil or temptation. It is something far more complex, and far more beautiful. The Amaru is the great cosmic serpent of Andean tradition: th...

The Winter Solstice - Andean New Year

Today is June 21 - the Winter Solstice in the Southern Hemisphere. The day when the axis of the earth reaches its furthest tilt from the sun, and then - in the same moment - begins its return. In t...

On Pilgrimage - Walking the Intention

In the Andean tradition, pilgrimage is not travel to a sacred place. It is the act of becoming the path. To walk to Chavín is not to visit a monument. It is, as the tradition teaches, caminar la in...

Before the First Piece - Taking the Samples to the Temple

Before a single piece was sold, before the website existed, before the packaging had been decided or the photographs taken - I took the samples to the Temple. Each one. Wrapped carefully. Carried t...

The Kantuta - Flower of the Andes

High in the Andes, above the treeline, where most things struggle to grow, there is a flower that thrives. Vivid, hanging, red and yellow and sometimes purple - the kantuta, or Cantua buxifolia, ha...