Vetiver Oil
This essential oil has a wonderful effect on the mind and body and is useful to dispel irritability, anger and hysteria, while having a balancing effect on the hormonal system and is a great boon for the skin. It is used to reduce wrinkles and stretch marks while nourishing and moisturizing the skin and helping wounds heal.
It has an earthy, musty smell - much like the smell of a damp forest floor and is amber to olive in color.
It is a tall, tufted, perennial, scented grass with long narrow leaves and an abundant complex lacework of underground white roots and is mainly cultivated in the tropics, such as India, Tahiti, Java and Haiti.
The grass was used in Calcutta and Haiti for thatching and awnings, blinds and sunshades, while in Java the roots were used for weaving mats and thatching huts, which not only gave rooms an exquisite fragrance but also deterred insects.
It is a popular ingredient for soaps, toiletries and perfumes and growing the grass protects against soil erosion.
Vetiver oil is also known as the 'oil of tranquility' because of its calming properties.
It is extracted from the washed, chopped, dried and soaked roots and rootlets by steam distillation and yields about 0.5%.
The main chemical components are benzoic acid, vetiverol, furfurol, a and b-vetivone, vetivene and vetivenyl vetivenate.
It is considered a safe oil and is non-toxic, non-irritant and non-sensitizing.
The therapeutic properties of vetiver oil are antiseptic, aphrodisiac, cicatrisant, nervine, sedative, tonic, sedative and vulnerary.
Vetiver oil calms and soothes the mind and helps to dispel anger, hysteria and irritability and neurotic behavior can also be reduced, as stress and tension is reduced.
It revitalizes the body and helps with mental and physical exhaustion and is also used for general aches and pains, especially for rheumatism, arthritis and muscular pain, while relieving insomnia.
Vetiver oil has a calming and soothing effect on the nervous system and is helpful for muscular aches and pains, as well as having a positive effect on hormonal imbalance as well as relieving insomnia.
Although most essential oils blend well together, vetiver oil blends particularly well with benzoin, grapefruit,jasmine, lavender and ylang-ylang.