Lana Workshop: How to make Filipinx medicinal oil

Curious about Filipinx ancestral plants, animism and spiritual practices ? Want to learn how to make medicinal coconut oil using traditional methods? Join us at Magenta House on Saturday 11 October for a hands-on Lana making workshop facilitated by Nawa Sybico and Argo Theoharis from Bangka Healing Arts. Explore the precolonial world of herbal medicine, plant allies, animism and Filipinx healing modalities as we gather together to create the sacred Filipinx oil, known in the Philippines as ‘Lana’. Sourced from coconuts and containing a variety of tanom/halaman/plant ingredients, Lana is a powerful oil used for rituals, medicine and cooking practices across the archipelago.

For this interactive half-day session at Magenta House, Nawa and Argo will teach you about the ancestral frameworks of herbal medicine, plant allies, animism and Hilot, also known as traditional Filipinx medicine. They will guide you to prepare, cook, and store Lana using methods passed down from Filipinx ancestors. Together, we'll imbue this mixture with our intentions and spirit and choose a selection of tanom/halaman/plant allies: ginger (luy-a), lemongrass (tanglad), guava (bayabas), & moringa (kamunggay/malunggay). We’ll then move through the elements of pressing and pounding herbs (yuta/Earth), milking and extracting coconut milk, and cooking herbs and coconuts together using fire (kalayo), before finally setting the medicinal oil. 

During the day,  you’ll enjoy home-made meals, snacks, and refreshments prepared by Mariam Ella Arcilla from Magenta House. She'll feed you ancestral recipes and key ingredients from the workshop, like coconut, hibiscus, ginger & moringa. The session will conclude with a Tawas & Hilot demo. All participants will receive resource handouts and a jar of Lana to assist with practicing passed-down ancestral methods at home.

No prior experience in herbal medicine or cooking is required. 
Due to the nature of this session, placements are very limited to keep interactions intimate and invested.

What to expect at this workshop:

🥥Teachings about herbal medicines with a focus on Filipinx Medicinal Systems (Hilot). 
🥥 Retelling of the creation story of the coconut and why it is the Filipinx Tree of Life.
🥥 Lessons from the diwatas (deities) from the archipelago known as the Philippines
🥥 Stories about how our ancestors were guided by the moon, and other rhythms in nature when engaging in healing and ritual.
🥥 Making Lana oil and experiencing a live demonstration of Tawas & Hilot.   
🥥 Filipino meal, merienda/snacks, and refreshments 
🥥 Medicinal jar to take your Lana oil home
🥥 Illustrated Workshop Handout PDF of ancestral methods and ingredients

Details

🥥 Lana Workshop: How to make Filipinx medicinal oil
📆 Saturday 11 October, 10am-3pm
🪺 Magenta House, Redfern (address provided to registered attendees).
💵 Cost: Solidarity: $150 / Waged: $120 / FN: Free

Fees go towards materials, lana ingredients, meals, and labour, with 20% proceeds to Pay the Rent.
Limited unwaged tix for this session have now been exhausted.

About the organisers

Nawa Sybico or Gat Neya Kilaw Sa Kalasangan (Hilot Binabaylan of Diwatang Kilawneya) is a first generation Bisaya immigrant settler living on Mumirimina and Muwinina country in Nipaluna, Lutruwita (Hobart, Tasmania). Their practice revolves around ancestral technologies such as herbalism, somatics, astrology, and death care. Through these healing arts they weave together a decolonial and liberatory practice, by embodying holistic and non-linear ways of problem-solving for inhabiting neo-colonial space. Their anti-oppressive practice centres marginalised communities as an organising strategy for confronting inter-generational burnout and trauma inside of social movements. Nawa acknowledges and honours the mentors and lineages they carry. 

Argo Theoharis or Gat Tisedel Sa Yuta (Hilot Binabaylan of the Diwatang Deltise) is a first generation immigrant settler on Jagera & Turrbal country in Magandjin (Brisbane, Queensland). Their ancestral lineages hail from Greece on the Paternal side and on the Maternal side Sibuyan Island, Romblon in the Visayas of the Archipelago known as the Philippines. Their Lola (Maternal Grandmother) was a practicing Arbularyo on our island, and people from across Romblon would travel to her for ritual and healing. It’s this lineage that inspires Argo to explore how our Indigenous ancestral medicines and philosophy can be used to address ongoing histories of colonial violence & oppression.

Mariam Ella Arcilla is an arts worker based on unceded Gadigal land. She runs Magenta House, which sees her partnering with artists, cooks, educators, and culture workers to stage programs and resources that support emerging artists, experimental practices, and equitable arts ecologies. For Mariam, the meaning of tahanan (home) is a reworlding and co-nurturing exercise. Mariam was raised by her headstrong creatrix Lola (grandmother) in a household of artists and cooks in Quezon City, Philippines. Her Lola passed on life disciplines that enabled Mariam to spiritually self-anchor during a time of family separation and domestic turbulence. For the next decade, Mariam was ping-ponged through foster homes in Philippines and Singapore before immigrating to Australia at 16. All this time, Mariam remained hopeful that she'd one day find her way back to her Lola’s kitchen–the place she felt most safe. As an adult, Mariam eventually returned to the Philippines to reunite with her Lola, savouring her final years on this Earth. This experience inspired Mariam to grow a multimodal arts practice that translates knowledge-circulation, communal feeding and domestic hospitality into creative acts of service. She strives to carry her Lola's legacy by making Magenta House an artistic safehouse for kindreds to congregate, learn, rest, nurture and seed together.

Workshop images by Anna Hay, Lana-Making Workshop, May 2025, Magenta House.