We believe in infusing intention and affirmations into life through crystals. It's why we’ve collaborated with Canadian brand Essentially High to bring you mindfully designed jewelry pieces—featuring energetic crystals and beautiful charms so you can take purpose and pause with you, wherever that may be.
Our Founder, Andrea, spoke to Sarah Deitcher, the designer and founder of Essentially High—to dive deeper into the inspiration behind our line and the wellness benefits one can experience by wearing crystals.
Andrea: Hi guys! I'm so happy to be here with Sarah Dietcher, the founder of Essentially High. A brand I have long admired for longer than Sarah knows, probably since she launched and has been in my mental vision board since I first saw her brand and product a long time ago. I'm so happy to be here today to introduce Sarah, her brand and our collab together.
Sarah: My pleasure, thank you so much for having me.
Andrea: I thought I'd start by just asking you about the inspiration behind your brand?
Sarah: Well, Covid lockdown 2020. The brand actually started in January or February of 2021. After going through 2020, I had what was called 2020 vision and that was like a great culling of things and friends, desires of material things, my job, and other things. I became a homeschool teacher as many moms did.
Essential oils were always a huge part of my personal practice. And I really relied on them through the Covid lockdowns. I purchased a very small Night and Rhodes Quartz bottle from Amazon that holds essential oils. As I was wearing it, I found it soothing, and my husband said to me, you know, you could sell like a hundred of these.
And I said no. My confidence had just been shaken. I had been working since I was 15 years old and I had just, you know, lost my job, to become a homeschool teacher. The world was upside down. We had the great gift of being able to go down south. And, you know, magic happens when the ocean hits the sand. And you breathe that air in.
Especially from what we had been living through. And I said, I'm gonna do it. And I bought 30 of them. I didn't have the guts to do 100. And I sold out of them in one day. That was how it started, and that's when I knew I was on to something, and the doubt sort of subsided, and I thought that I can really run with this and it was a gift to be able to share with people. The appetite was so strong for anything that was soothing.
I mean, even, I was working from my mailbox, so even people coming to my home, in a mask, and I'm standing at the threshold of my door, and they're standing there, and they're getting, it was 30 seconds, 90 seconds, but it was like we were hanging out. I love that. Nobody was hanging out. But it was like this way to share something that I truly love and people were meeting me on my front porch to pick it up.
Andrea: That's beautiful. I love the humble beginnings of brands that are so deeply rooted in passion and conviction.
Sarah: Yes. And I only bought one item. It came in four colors. And it was one item. And I was just like, I'm not trying to just sell more stuff.
The world doesn't need more stuff. This is one piece that's really special. It can be used in different ways. And that was it, people really were drawn to it. Of course, you know, the oils, that's where the name came from. I was quite sober at the time. My oils were my drugs, so I was essentially high and I used them for absolutely everything.
People who were not even typically into oils or were not open to the idea, all of a sudden were like, you know, sitting in their Zoom meetings telling me they just couldn't get enough of it. I knew then that we were on.
Andrea: You inspired and supported people through a really hard time while supporting yourself, which is so beautiful.
And when I saw your brand during Covid, I felt that intangible energy. I was immediately drawn to it.
Just to give the reader the history, well, there's a longer history, but I reached out to Sarah early this year, 2023. I was so excited to reach out and connect—when we connected, it was such an inspired moment for me.
Sarah told me that she got Halfmoon, b, halfmoon, into Indigo like eight years ago. Eight years ago. So we've actually been indirectly connected for a long, long time. From the moment I saw your product and brand, I knew we would do something eventually and here we are.
So, it's pretty crazy. Our values, we're a business deeply rooted in values and we always have been. It's really what propels us forward and is unwavering for us. I'm going to read them because I don't trust my memory.
b, well - wellness for all
b, impactful - making an impact
b, connected - connection with heart
b, true - living with integrity
Our team represents those values and we work really hard and intentionally to espouse those internally and to convey those externally. I'm just wondering if they speak to you.
Sarah: Yeah, they certainly do and back to what you said, when we met, our personal values were aligned. Just knowing what I know about you and for my personal values, they're interwoven into my brand values. So I knew that when we aligned, the business could just follow or we would be able to trial, error, overcome, or things would just click-because our personal values were aligned. And so, obviously integrity and the connection, like that's really what it all comes down to because you can't have the other values if there's no connection. So, it certainly speaks to me. And we knew from that first coffee date.
Andrea: A match made in essentially high heaven. It's true and that connection and undeniable link makes the partnership easy and we can sort of walk through this together and it's rooted in that connection and trust.
Sarah: You know, from a product perspective, it's not necessary to say that the yoga lifestyle and those who embrace crystals are one in the same, but often there's an overlap or else we wouldn't have felt the connection.
I think it's meaningful too because there'll be some people who say they can do yoga anywhere..standing in an airport, but when you're off the mat, you have these pieces that can be soothing or meditative. Some people often tell me they'll turn the beads, it could just be a reminder to come back to your breath, to come back to your posture, or to come back to some sort of alignment or a mantra. To be able to do that on and off the mat is something that I think is a really good thing.
Andrea: It's a special gift that we can give to a common customer. And we're both crystal fanatics. I love anything aesthetic, which is part of my love for crystals, these products that we've created together are just so stunning, but also an element of ritual for many people.
Sarah: I'm so excited to share them with our community. I was keeping them in my pockets, I was keeping them in my bra, keeping them in my jackets, you know, finding them in the laundry machine, and now they can be on you. Close to your heart, or on your wrist, and you can have them with you always.
Andrea: Couldn't agree more. Tell me about the crystals themselves that you intentionally put into these products.
Sarah: So there's a large variety, in the Rainbow Protection Necklace in particular, which is one of my favorite pieces, it kind of covers it all.
The stones are natural, they're not plastic, and I use everything from turquoise to malachite, sodalite, aventurine, dalmatian jasper, amethyst, and then we do have some really beautiful color injected agate for that awesome pop of fun because, you know, you gotta live a little.
Andrea: Beautiful. And you taught me a lot about cleansing crystals like there's just so much integrity around your product and deep knowledge behind crystals as well as oils, which I really value
Sarah: Yeah, thank you. Yes, of course, they absorb a lot. And so keeping them clean is important to me in my practice. I take a lot of care when I bring them in and when I make them for whoever ends up wearing it.
Andrea: Our manifesto is deeply rooted in the inspiration that nature brings and the reality that nature is always speaking its truth. Nature is unable to lie. And I'd love to hear from you.
How does nature inspire you? And correspondingly, how do you live and speak your truth?
Sarah: Even the story that I was telling you about when I started the company, being near the ocean sometimes, I find it's when I can get my most creative. So certainly it inspires me literally, when I see color combinations or things in nature that might give me an idea. I know when I'm stuck where I need to go—nature. Sometimes it's just my backyard and we spend a lot of time in Vermont, when I'm out there, I get pretty quiet, barefoot, in the moss, and that's when I get my most creative.
Andrea: I love that. That's so beautiful. And in speaking your truth, do you find your business is an extension for speaking your truth? Or are there other kinds of rituals and elements in your wellness practice that support you in speaking your truth?
Sarah: Big question. Age plays a large role. Wisdom? Age? You know, you tend to sort of become more unapologetically yourself as you age. So perhaps that's part of it. But I tend to mind my own business and that helps. I don't want anyone to live their own truth because what others think about you is their business.
Andrea: That's great wisdom. And it's true. I mean, with age comes a lot of that. Freedom. And the culling. To be true to yourself.
Sarah: Yeah, the culling. The 2020 vision got things pretty clear. And, you know, who stayed, who left, who was around, who wasn't around.
Andrea: Yes. The culling.
I truly see your pieces, your art, your business as an extension of you and like a creative expression of your truth. That's what I see. I just think it's so beautiful and inspired and true to you. So that's what I see.
How about wellness? Do you have a favorite wellness ritual? How has wellness evolved and played a role in your life?
Sarah: So wellness. It's probably, well definitely something that's been in my life since before that word really became part of the modern vernacular before I even knew what to call it.
You know, I have a reiki practice that is personal to me, I don't do it with others, but for myself, that I use all the time. My essential oils are part of my practice, which I love to do with breathwork. And I try, you know. There's always something every day, even minding your own business can be part of a wellness practice.
Andrea: I firmly believe in the value of micro moments and breaking it down.
Sarah: That's my favorite practice—breathwork. I fully agree with that. You cannot underestimate the accumulative potency of 10 seconds here or 20 seconds there. You know, I've been up since 6 o'clock this morning and that was the first conscious breath I've taken. How many have I taken since I came up? That was the first one. I may not get to another one today consciously, but I did it now. The oils are great because I use them a lot, they’re probably my favorite product.
If I'm working and then I want to shift roles, I go from like, work, Sarah. Now I'm transitioning into school pickup, mom, Sarah. Then you take a deep whiff of Cypress, the oil of motion and flow and might be like, okay, I'm closing now, mom, Sarah, I'm transitioning into my new role.
Andrea: I am adopting that starting Monday.
Sarah: So simple. It's an offering to you. Take it.
Andrea: Thank you. I'm inspired. I have to do this right now. Please. Oh, it's gorgeous. Yeah. It's a carnelian, carnelian crystal roller. Oh my god. It's my favorite.
Part of our manifesto speaks to finding the light in every day. So, I mean, the metaphor between the moon rising and setting and the sun rising and setting. But we place huge value in fun, in being lighthearted, in levity, in those elements of life that sometimes we lose.
I'm curious to know from you, how do you find the light, hopefully, in every day?
Sarah: So I have two young boys. That helps a lot. You know, with seeing children do things that are joyful. I'm really lucky that my work is something that's joyful, 100%. I'm so grateful for that every day. Especially when I'm doing custom pieces. I have the most incredible customers. I have people that truly will say to me, you know, just make me something. It’s so fun and it brings me such joy to be able to create for people in that way. The trust that they have in me, that fills my bucket.
Andrea: That's a huge gift. Do you find that making the pieces is meditative?
Sarah: It is most definitely meditative. It's really pieces that I was making for you, because they were multiples, each one is still unique in its own way because the natural stones have always a unique variance to them. There was something about the repetitive nature that, in one sense for another company it may have felt like mass production, but, I felt it was the repetitiveness that was soothing and sort of meditative.
Andrea: I just had a vision of us doing like a make your own workshop in due course with our community. That would be so fun.
Sarah, it was an honor to connect with you and this forum. I'm so beyond thrilled about our partnership together. This is just the beginning. So amazing, thank you.
Sarah: Thank you. Thanks for having me.
We believe each piece of jewelry has individual spiritual and energetic benefits. Stack and adjust your pieces to embrace the collective power and beauty of each one. Shop b, halfmoon x Essentially High jewelry here.
