An Interview With Sara Connell
The idea is simple: If there are flowers, there are bees. And if there are bees, there will be more flowers, and therefore more plants. It is a cycle that feeds back and balances itself naturally. And it has been so for millennia. Excessive human ambition is altering this balance and breaking the cycle.
As a part of our series about “The morning routines and habits of highly successful people,” I had the pleasure of interviewing Ernesto Collado.
Ernesto Collado is the master perfumer and founder of Bravanariz from Costa Brava in Spain.
Ernesto creates wild-crafted, natural, sustainable perfume that is ethically-sourced and small-batch. Deeply rooted in the Mediterranean coastal landscape, Ernesto’s creations are exquisite manifestations of nature’s majestic harmony.
Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! What or who inspired you to pursue your career? We’d love to hear the story.
My grandfather was one of the most popular perfumers at the beginning of twentieth century Spain, but not because he was well-known. In fact, he was a very discreet man. Perfumers, like cooks, worked in the shade in those times. He formulated most of the best seller fragrances, like CANOE and TABÚ for Dana or MADERAS DE ORIENTE and ECHIZOS DE SEVILLA for Myrurgia. He was also an essential oil producer, and he had farms and stills all around Spain. A chemist and self-taught botanist, his curiosity and fascination about the natural world was everlasting. He died when I was eight years old, so I did not have time to really get to know him, but I have a powerful souvenir: the time that I spent with him surrounded by already harvested lavender and steaming stills in the heart of Spain’s countryside. Honesty and integrity were his pillars. He was a true free thinker. He told me not to follow others’ thoughts and opinions, but to form my own. I have a photo of him hanging in my laboratory. He watches over everything I do and helps me to make the right decisions when I’m creating new fragrances.
None of us can achieve success without some help along the way. Was there a particular person who you feel gave you the most help or encouragement to be who you are today? Can you share a story about that?
There are many. My father taught me to be persistent and to pursue my dreams. My mother gave me the joy and sensibility to be open to the world’s wonders. Both of them showed me the necessity of always swimming against the stream.
Then there are books, those enlightening companions, that never abandon you. I still have Montaigne’s Essays laying at my bedside table. A free thinker of his time.
Can you share the funniest or most interesting mistake that occurred to you in the course of your career? What lesson or take away did you learn from that?
When I was studying dramaturgy and acting at the Institut del Teatre in Barcelona, I needed to create a theater company. I loved the idea of a group creating and working together, without a clear leader. The problem was that I assumed that everybody else had the same passion and the same ideas. Riding on my dream of a collective creation, I didn’t listen too much to the group’s needs and ambitions. We were very young and presumptuous. I lost many good friends in that process of creating, and afterwards we dissolved the group. The lesson was clear. Empathy is a helpful quality if you need to work with others. Being able to put yourself in another’s place, despite what most people may think, is a powerful tool for collective projects.
You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
Creativity, empathy and a gift for communicating and spreading my passion for things.
I’m an author and I believe that books have the power to change lives. Do you have a book in your life that impacted you and inspired you to be an effective leader? Can you share a story?
I’m an uninformed person by choice. I don’t read newspapers or watch TV news. Instead of consuming other’s opinions on life, I try to search for original ideas in books. I’m an avid reader. Books are nourishment for my brain. But, like the great Rachel Carson said, first comes experience and then need for knowledge. I’m not a library mouse. Life is too fascinating.
But talking about specific books, since I already talked about Montaigne’s Essays, here are some more examples. First, all the adventure books by writers such as Joseph Conrad, Jack London, Robert Louis Stevenson, and Rudyard Kipling. These books taught me not to always search for the easiest way and filled my childhood with exotic and wild places. That inclination towards adventure and discovery gave me the impulse to be an entrepreneur.
Next, “Walden” by Thoreau and “Leaves of grass” by Walt Whitman connected me with Nature, followed by nature writers including Rachel Carson, Edward Abbey and his “Desert Solitaire,” and Annie Dillard.
Another vital writer in the formation of my faith in humanity and art has been John Berger. I was lucky enough to meet him, and his wonderful personality overpassed all my expectations.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now? How do you think that might help people?
Since the beginning of the BRAVANARIZ, I have always had the need to give something back to the landscape that gives me so much. The landscape does not need us to be what it is. But landscapes shape us much more than we want to admit. I wanted to do something about it, to make a gesture of gratitude and humility.
For this reason, I created BEE BRAVE, a project that aims to boost biodiversity in our region.
The idea is simple: If there are flowers, there are bees. And if there are bees, there will be more flowers, and therefore more plants. It is a cycle that feeds back and balances itself naturally. And it has been so for millennia. Excessive human ambition is altering this balance and breaking the cycle.
BEE BRAVE wants to restore this cycle, at least on a local scale, by focusing on two vectors of the equation: the bees and their habitat.
On one hand, we recover some semi-natural habitats of great biodiversity and in total regression in the Empordà, called Prats de Dall (Mowing Meadows), and thus, we ensure the health and good nutrition of our ecological hives. And on the other hand, these bees help with their pollination task, the recovery and maintenance of these valuable semi-natural environments.
Bees are incredibly generous beings. By working for them, they do more work for us and for the health of the Planet.
Can you please share your optimal morning routine that can create a positive trajectory for a successful, effective, productive, and efficient day. If you can, please share some stories or examples.
I wake up very early, since I have three kids. It’s the only way to have time for myself. The first thing I do is make fruit juice for everyone at home. I do it and I keep it in the fridge for later. Then, I start my 35 minutes Pilates routine. It’s necessary to keep my back healthy and my mind clean. After feeding the animals (cats, chickens…), I go for a morning walk in the wild. That’s vital to keep me connected with the seasonal changes in nature. I always collect a little bouquet of flowers and aromatic plants. We use them later to put a piece of our landscape in all our online orders and it’s nice to give everybody working in Bravanariz, the pulse of time and the changes in the landscape. Then, a good breakfast with my family, drinking a wonderful already-made fruit juice. At 8:30 am, I’m already working.
Speaking in general, what is the best way to develop good habits? Conversely, how can one stop bad habits?
To create a habit (good or bad) has to do with constancy and persistence. A good habit would be the one that makes you feel better. But this is absolutely subjective and can lead you to mistake. To smoke a cigarette with your coffee, every morning, can be a pleasure, and maybe helps you to be more awake, but it can also ruin your longs and nerves. It’s difficult to say what is a good or bad habit. I see habits like a sort of homes, “places” where you feel comfortable and welcome. Specially in the morning, we all want a nice sensation to start with. Everyone has their own.
Doing something consistently “day in and day out” can be hard. Where did you get your motivation from? What do you use to motivate you now?
I need a certain continuity. I’m not very square. In fact, I’m quite chaotic, and improvisation is my common state. But for this reason, more than ever, I need to structure my day a bit. Doing the task first thing in the morning is the best way. After, time and circumstances put me back into a constantly changing flow. I’m a very digressive person.
In this sense, nature is my biggest motivation. It is ever changing, but at the same time is constant, like how the sun rises every morning. There is no digression there.
What other resources would you suggest to our readers?
If you have a hard time doing things for yourself, do them for others. For example, feeding animals or taking care of your partner or family members, is a beautiful motivation that makes you feel automatically well.
Ok, we are nearly done. You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good for the greatest number of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.
I’m obsessed with the idea of changing people’s point of view about Nature. The way we relate to nature needs to be revised if we want to stop the imminent disastrous impact of climate change. Nature is not something separate from us, something we can contemplate, study, exploit or protect. Rather, WE ARE NATURE. A much more emphatic and inclusive way of relating to nature has to arise. I chose the sense of smell to help people reconnect with nature, because to me, it’s the most primitive and animal of our senses, and for this reason, the best vehicle ever to create a much more intimate and powerful connection.
We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch with, and why?
I would love to have breakfast with Robin Wall Kimmerer, the writer of “Braiding Sweetgrass,” or with the great filmmaker, Akki Kaurismäki. I would also love to have a silent morning walk with Werner Herzog (I love the way he looks at things) or a talk with Greta Thunberg.
How can our readers further follow your work online?
www.bravanariz.com specially on our Field Notes, or watching the PLANT STORIES
Thank you for these really excellent insights, and we greatly appreciate the time you spent with this. We wish you continued success.
Ernesto Collado Of Bravanariz On The Morning Routines and Habits Of Highly Successful People was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.