Shock and Disbelief

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 because in the case of the "whole" material, mother nature usually includes the antidote. (For example did you know that raw unpasturized milk contains the enzyme necessary to digest milk, this enzyme is killed during pasteurization, interesting eh?)
So what's happening in the EU is that it is is going to be mandatory to label products and comply with IFRA standards, which hitherto was optional. This will make it impossible for a natural perfumer like myself to stay in business, as it will mean hiring a team of chemists to monitor and regulate and measure every molecule of natural material I use in a perfume. This in itself becomes an insurmountable task because it will be nessesary to take into account changes in a natural material based on weather, crop, storing etc. (Have you ever read the nutritional analysis on the back of a carton of milk? It always says that the values are approximate and can vary depending on season, herd etc)
Go to this page to read more about it.
Synthetic v Natural: The Battle is On
In my opinion this change is happening because the chemical cosmetics market are losing a large percentage of the market share to the smaller companies producing natural products. It dawned on me yesterday that I haven't heard of any consumers crying out for tougher labelling policies, and more stringent tests done on cosmetics and perfumes. I think that by and large the public believe that the natural choice is the better one, and that is a major worry for big chemical cosmetic and perfume industries.
I have great faith in the likes of Liz Tams, Tony Burfield, and Dr Robert Tisserand, pioneer of aromatherapy and others, that they will guide the rest of us as to where to go from here.
Support is needed here, I fear that upon finding my path in life, it will be made impossible or even illegal for me to follow it.

Would you please go to the Perfumer & Flavourist
site, and vote for Cropwatch in the Cropwatch vs IFRA poll / (scroll down to bottom left hand
corner of page).
In the words of Tony Burfield:
"A good showing for Cropwatch would maybe allow us
natural product lovers, to gain more credence in these issues."

Good News & Bad News

Well, I think I will tell you the good news first. A customer who purchased White Witch Gold solid perfume, called me up the other day and told me, that while she was standing in a que a woman approached her and remarked "that's a lovely perfume you are wearing. Where did you get it?" It was so rewarding for me to hear this. We all like to wear clothes and perfume that gets us noticed. Have you ever worn a new top that somebody compliments you on, and asks you where you got it? If it happens to me it puts that item of clothing automatically on my favorites list.
Now the bad news. The little hand made, hand dyed packets which contain my muslin wrapped perfume sticks are proving not to be the most user friendly. I am very quickly going to have to come up with an alternative. I am looking at some wonderful porcelain containers, and also silver. But I have to find something that is unusual, and something one would keep and get refilled.

Later Today: There is a wonderful shop in Galway called Cobwebs, it has always been one of my favorite shops. It has been years since I was in there. I found the most wonderful genuine Lamoges boxes from France, they are hand painted with real gold leaf. I am going to use these Lamoges boxes to contain my solid perfumes. They are already for sale for the very special price of €120.00, please click here to view.

The Power of Sandalwood

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 the sensual perfume is almond oil infused with red sandalwood powder. When the bars were set they were a beautiful shade of rich orangey amber. I was amazed at the power of sandalwood to dye things, the muslin I used to strain the infusion was dyed a lovely shade of pink and my measuring jug is pink too. I must admit the massage bars do smell sexy, sort of hot and yummy, ya baby!
I am working on an idea for a perfume which is suitable for pregnant women. You see I was asked if I would make a lotion bar for pregnancy and stretch marks, so that raises the issue of safety and which oils and essences to avoid and which ones might be beneficial. I could just go the aromatherapy route but I think I will make a fragrance, seen as I love making perfume. I want to go for a light balsamic base and a fruity/floral middle and a refreshing citrusy top.
Some of the essences I have selected are: a base of labdanum, frankincense, myrrh, orange flower water absolute, maybe immortelle absolute, and for the heart I have chosen orange blossom absolute, neroli, davana or boronia, lavender absolute and blue chamomile, the top will be tangerine, sweet orange and mandarin. How these will work together I don't know, if I use the perfumery skills I have learned I might be able to make a good perfume. I have a concentrated infusing of st johns wort and horsetail, these herbs are very beneficial to the skin. The horsetail in particular is high in silica and will help the skin retain it's elasticity. The infussion has a very basey smell all on it's own so I will need to work from this, and build my perfume around it...challenging!

Oh the Possibilities

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 that be for a marriage?
For my three sisters, mmmmh it would have to be 3 classics...rose otto, ylang ylang and lavender, but what top notes could I use, I could try corriander, rosewood and maybe bergamot or grapefruit? I would like to choose a fourth essence for each layer also, with the top will try I think a black pepper I have that is lovely to add just a little spice. In the heart I think I would like to try a greener note, perhaps violet leaf or rosemary or tarragon abs. Then with the bases something light to balance the heavy male scents, frankincense or sandalwood perhaps. And then I really want to choose something else, something to marry them all together, like a honeymoon essence, I could use honey abs.....or jasmine?

No Blending

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."

Beginners Luck

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 stays behind the scenes until well into the dry out. Then he enters in a very delicious way with the vanilla base. Frankincense adds the perfect lift and a more serious note to the choc and vanilla. The perfume lasted all day yesterday, and I kept waiting for it to dissapear so I could apply another perfume. But it's staying power amazed me. I am wearing it again today.

Scent Strips "Piano"

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 did. I closed my eyes and tested myself, trying to recognize each scent as my nose came upon it. Another usful thing I discovered using this technique was which notes smell the strongest and must be used gingerly in a blend. This technique could also be used to help to build the shape or structure of a perfume. By moving the strips around, and for example placing the africa stone tincture near the araucaria instead of the myrrh I get a different composition completely. I could also add a third strip of an essence that was there already to get an idea of what it would be like to use more of it in a blend. Or I could take one of the strips away to get an idea of using less.
I got such a kick out of this idea, I hope you like it too!