A Natural Perfumers Journal

I have been in shock for the last few days. It has transpired over the last few days that the EU are bringing in new legislation, based on IFRA standards, that in short could put the natural perfumer out of business. First of all it took me a while to read and understand the official type documents (I hate them) and then it took me another while to understand the implications. At first I felt shock, then disbelief, then confusion (well confusion was present most of the time) then understanding and finally motivation to action. You see the IFRA standards are standards set in place to protect the consumer, that's fine with me. But the thing is that while it is easy to regulate and monitor synthetic fragrance materials, because they are always the same molecular structure, it is not so easy when it comes to the complexity of natural materials. Not only that, but isolating a chemical compound in an essential oil for example and saying that it is dangerous, doesn't always apply bec...

Diversing from my story of romance for the moment...yesterday I made a batch of foot lotion bars, using natural aromatherapy essential oils of peppermint, tea tree and lavender. Aromatherapy is very different from the art of perfumery, I just put equal amounts of each essential oil, and I was generous, the oils will do what they are supposed to do and they smell fresh and clean like they are meant to. I then started on a batch of Sensual massage bars, now these are perfumed with my first simple perfume. It has top notes of orange and mandarin, cinnamon and ginger, a heart of ylang ylang, two lavenders and clove absolute, the base is, mysore sandalwood, peru balsam and dark patchouli. I have to go back and get out my notes and follow the recipe, I count out a hundred drops of lavender absolute, 33 drops of clove, 33 drops of cinnamon 33 drops of ginger. The sandalwood I add a full 20mls, too many drops to count! The patchouli is carefully measured, 30 drops only and so on...the base for...

This morning my ethanol arrived, I am going to spend the day creating accords. My pipettes need cleaning, it was so frustrating for me just not being able to blend. You see I can't use water to clean the pipettes, it just doesn't work. And I can't blend with dirty pipettes, that would make my perfumes muddy. I have been using surgical spirits to clean my tools but I didn't like the smell it left behind. It's not that easy to obtain pure undenatured ethanol but I did it. Now where do I start? My heart is beginning to beat faster at the thought of all the possibilites open to me. While I was waiting for the ethanol to arrive I was doing loads of test strip smelling, here are some accords I would like to try, corriander, rosewood and something else; another one is, immortelle, tarragon and coco absolute; another accord I would like to try is boronia absolute, neroli, and tuberose; oh and I want to blend the three brothers (remember them?) with three sisters, how would ...

I have been having a few days when I am not blending, I'm waiting for my ethanol to come from Limerick. I am using the time I have to get intimate with some essences I don't really know very well. One of these is araucaria, which I don't really know anything about at all. I have the absolute. When I first opened it, it reminded me of clean bandages, clean, sterile, very light and ethereal. I am going to do a little internet search and see if I can find out more about it's origins, back soon.Well I found an image, and I also discovered the common name for araucaria is the monkey puzzle tree. I also found a description of the perfume note on Aftelier.com . Here is what Mandy Aftel says about it: "This rose-woody, spicy middle note from Spain has a crystalized consistency. Araucaria has good fixative properties and will not overwhelm perfumes with light floral middle notes."

I wonder if there is such thing as beginners luck when it comes to perfumery? I let my 15 year old son Jay (see the photo on left) have a go with my essences about 3 or 4 weeks ago. I said he could try 3 times. So he made a Jay 1 a Jay 2 and a Jay 3. I made him write it down and made him stick to twenty drops per try. We bottled his blends and left them to mature. I tried his Jay 1 yesterday. It's lovely! It reminds me of something I can't quite place. I will try to describe it, the top notes have an unusual twist, also hard to place, ok maybe the top needs a little tweaking but it's a nice blend of rosewood and corriander which really go well together and to my nose share similar nuances. The heart is floral but not at all cloying, unisex I would say, creamy notes of jasmine, ylang ylang and orange blossom, nothing unusual there, but there is a fresh green hint too, I swear it's as if I am smelling an actual blossom, it's a bit like carnations. The chocolate note s...

I was exploring some of my more unusual essences yesterday evening. The technique I learned from Mandy's workbook works very well. I place a single drop of an essence on a labeled scent strip and write down the time of application in my notebook. Then I decribe the scent. I wait 10-15 minutes and I label strip number two and then place a drop of the same essence on that strip. Then I compare the two strips. I was looking for a place to leave the first strip while it was drying out and I decided to put it in under the little drawer on my "organ". See the photo above. It hung there very nicely. I carried on with my explorations. I did the base notes first then the middle...then I had a realization. They were all hanging there and reminded me of the keys on our piano. I leaned in a little and started from the base notes end, I smelled up, and then I smelled back down. The effect was quite extraordinary. I could tell which notes did not belong and I could tell which notes ...