Hi, I’m Elliott! A clinical herbalist and the owner of Dancing Willow Herbs.
My relationship with this apothecary began in 2015, when I started as an intern and quickly found my way into the medicine-making lab. Over the next several years, I became the lab manager and fell deeply in love with the work — tending plants into medicine and creating something tangible that could support the people in our community.
Those years gave me a relationship with herbal medicine that went far beyond what I could learn from books. I spent my days touching, smelling, tasting, processing and formulating with plants, getting to know them through the physical work of medicine making. I also cultivated such respect for the work that we were doing at Dancing Willow Herbs, sharing these medicines with our community and helping people.
I always knew I wanted to become a clinical herbalist, and in 2020 I finally went to herb school at the Colorado School of Clinical Herbalism.
As I started thinking about what came next, I realized I couldn’t imagine opening a competing herbal business in Durango when I had so much love and respect for Dancing Willow Herbs. This apothecary had already been serving our community for decades, and I had spent years becoming part of it.
So I began talking with Deb Swanson, who founded Dancing Willow Herbs and had tended the apothecary for 30 years, about whether she might ever consider selling it.
As it turned out, the timing aligned perfectly. Her daughter was leaving for college, Deb felt ready for a fresh start, and I was trying to figure out how to build my life as an herbalist here in Durango.
In 2021, I took my final exam in herb school.
The very next day, I signed the papers to become the owner of Dancing Willow Herbs.
And then came the steepest learning curve.
Because the thing was, I was an herbalist. I was definitely not a “business woman.”
Suddenly, I was learning how to manage a team, navigate finances and inventory, rebuild outdated systems, problem-solve constantly and understand everything that goes into running a handcrafted, product-based herbal apothecary.
At the same time, I continued deepening my clinical training with Paul Bergner and Heather Luna at the Acorn School of Herbal Medicine.
Over the past five years, I’ve learned, adapted and grown alongside this business. I’ve reformulated medicines and developed new ones, led herbal retreats, taught classes in the apothecary, rebuilt all of our technological infrastructure, started The Dancing Willow podcast and worked with hundreds of people through my clinical herbal practice.
There have also been countless conversations across the apothecary counter — conversations about plants, health, grief, healing, change and life — that have continually reminded me why this work matters.
And none of it would have been possible without the incredible team that has grown alongside me. Dancing Willow Herbs has never been the work of one person. There are so many hands and hearts behind the medicines that leave our shelves every day.
It isn’t always easy. I still have days when I feel overwhelmed, afraid, or like I should be doing more.
But underneath all of it, I am an herbalist at my core.
My love for the plants and my desire to share their medicine continue to be bigger than my fear of taking risks, being seen, or doing the dang thing! :)
And that is what keeps bringing me back to the work.
So when you walk through our doors, place an order online, listen to the podcast, come to a class or retreat, or tell a friend about us, please know that it matters.
Dancing Willow Herbs is so much bigger than me. It existed for 30 years before I became its caretaker, and I feel incredibly lucky to be one chapter in its story.
But somehow, in tending it, Dancing Willow has also been making me into the woman I’m proud to be becoming.
Thank you for being here and for supporting not only me and my dreams, but the dreams of my beloved team and the greater medicine web that is Dancing Willow Herbs!