Blocks & Building Blocks ~ Humor

by Justine Crane

I don't get it often, that perfumer's block. In fact, I don't believe I've ever really had it. What I get, usually, is perfumer's anxiety. First things first; are there enough of diluted essences A, B, C, D, E, F and so forth to create this olfactory masterpiece? Second, if not, are there enough dilution bottles in stock to make them? Third, if so, how the hell long is that going to take? Fourth, four days later, when all these tasks have been completed to fruition, do I have any damned energy left to formulate?

Jesus said, and I'm paraphrasing here, "Don't stress on tomorrow because today is stressful enough." (Matthew 6:34)* To me, the reference to "tomorrow" can be fifteen minutes from now, when I'm checking volume levels in dilution bottles and realize I have to "whip up" a few extras. Why trip now? I usually call this next step "procrastination". To defer action. To put off till another day or time.

So this is how this creative thing usually goes down: I build a brief or one is handed to me. I think about it a while; a few days, a few weeks, a month or two. I write notes. I dream on it. I might sniff a few bottles. I write more notes. I write a bit of poetic prose to go along with the brief, to liven it up, give it breath, and then I think about the creation some more. I sometimes talk about it to my peers, or to someone I don't know while bagging my groceries at Winco. I discuss it with the Jehovah's Witnesses who come to my door every other Tuesday at 9:30 am sharp. We make trades. I hand them scent strips and they hand me The Watchtower. For the first time in history, they're the ones stepping away from the door hoping I'll close it on their faces.

I converse with my mother's ass as she's face down in her garden pulling weeds. I ask her ass the delicate questions; issues of using champaca golden vs. davana or magnolia. "Patchouli essential oil or absolute, mom?" I ask after explaining their differences. Her ass does not reply.

"Mom?"

She lifts her head from the weeds and says, "When are you taking that damned mimosa tree? Every time I look at it, I just want to weed whack it." Her anger toward mimosa's fragile flowers falling on her carefully manicured lawn shows in a flash. She continues pulling at the weeds. I do not get my answer.

I speak about the newly formulated in my mind perfume with my daughter, sharing scent strips drenched in heart notes. "How is this?" I ask.

"Smells like pickles," she replies. And I remember that this is her patent answer for every scent strip thrust under her nose. In teen-talk it means, "Leave me alone. I'm not the least bit interested in your hobby."

I chase down my grown live-in son, the perfume whore, in hopes of finding a partner in crime. "How's this?" I ask, spritzing his arm as he cringes.

"'S' okay," he says, noncommittally.

"Okay good or 'just' okay?"

"It's okay. Now will you get out of the bathroom? I have to wipe my butt."

So after all this research, writing, and trial formulating, I finally have it. The finished fantastic product. Three years after I started.


*The real verse in King James reads: Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.

NBP Education

A Note from Lisa Camasi, Botanical Perfumer

If you want to take a class, any class, do a little homework first and make sure that the class you take will serve your needs, interests and budget, and will deliver on its promises.

ASK A FEW QUESTIONS:- What are the instructor's credentials, experience, and reputation, professionally and otherwise? If s/he has formal credentials, are they in a relevant field? Are they from a reputable institution? If the instructor points to experience and a varied selection of "one off" courses, one on one instruction/ mentorship/ apprenticeship with another perfumer or perfumers, who are they, and what are their credentials, what is their professional lineage? If the instructor is self taught, how did s/he pursue their studies, and how did s/he arrive at the conclusion that s/he had acquired sufficient knowledge that s/he feels qualified to teach a professional course and charge a professional fee? Is s/he published?

- Can references/recommendations be provided from former students?

- What books/literature is used to support the class, and what is the additional recommended reading?

- What are the educational objectives of the course - what will you have learned and be able to do after the class that you could not do before the class? How will they be achieved? Is there a syllabus from this or previous similar classes that you can view to evaluate whether the course will meet your interests, skill level, and needs?

- Think about how you learn best. Some people do very well reading from books, some prefer lots of graphics and pictures, and still others absorb information best through auditory input and verbal exchanges. Will this class be presented in a way that is suitably accessible to you and your learning style? I have a good friend who is a university lecturer in New Zealand, and one of the courses she teaches is a distance course. It is at the graduate level, and because the focus of the course is in support of the literature survey the students need to conduct for their MA theses in Linguistics, it works pretty well, but she said she can't imagine teaching any of her other courses because so much critical learning happens in the face to face exchange of weekly seminars and working collaboratively on research and data.

- Consider all the available courses and resources in the context of what you want, what you need, and what you can afford. Look for a class that will teach you skills that allow you to continue learning when the class is over, and leave you feeling empowered and encouraged to do so - rather than enslaved to an expert who claims to hold the key to the vault that safeguards the secrets of the ancient art.

If you're able to spend many hundreds of dollars for an online course, why not spend a couple hundred more and get the benefit of learning perfumery "in the style of the French perfumers" from *actual* French perfumers - ones with the training, experience, materials, facilities and professional acumen to make it worth your while and worth your hard earned money!! (Not to mention the pleasure of spending a week in the heart of Grasse!) There are other classes - Sunrose Aromatics has hosted classes with Gail Adrian in the past, and Linda at the Perfumer's Apprentice is an excellent resource as well.http://www.perfumer sapprentice.com/perfumersworkshop/

DO A LITTLE RESEARCH:- Polish your bloody google, yahoo, dogpile skills. Be willing to dive down a few rabbit holes as you follow the links within links.  have found some of the most useful and relevant information this way - as well as some wonderful and wonderfully obscure materials.

- Don't rely entirely on the internet, and remember that it is still largely unregulated and there is as much unreliable information as there is factual and useful information.

- Check out a few books at the library, and if your local library doesn't have what you want, ask if they can get it for you through inter library loan. If you live near a university, especially a public one, see if they provide library privileges to the local community -most do! You will be able to gain access to books through the university that are unlikely to be available any other way -especially out of print books.

- Safety... Don't rely on IFRA exclusively for this information, it's not reliable! Read the MSDS for your materials and take a little time and familiarize yourself with Pub Med http://www.ncbi. nlm.nih.gov/ sites/entrez/you will get much more reliable information and you will learn a lot more about your materials!- There are a bunch of sites that will provide hours and hours of reading (tons of useful information) about naturals and their chemical components, as well as synthetics and compounds - here are a few of myfavorites:http://www.thegoodscentscompany.com/http://www.leffingwell.com/http://www.bojensen.net/http://www.ars-grin.gov/duke/

Bookmark these sites and spend some time following the links and becoming familiar with the information (and additional links/resources) they provide. Most vendors well known on this list (Eden Botanicals, Natures Gift, Sunrose Aromatics, White Lotus) also have copious amounts of information and links on their sites. I am sure others here could add many more but this is a start.

- Whatever you do, don't believe the assertion that making perfumes using aroma chemicals is the same as using naturals and that you can learn everything you need to know in a class that only covers naturals!! There is a lot of overlap in general technique, but if you are going to use aromachems, do yourself (and your pocket book) a favor and, as is good practice with naturals, learn how to use them effectively and safely. Aromachems can be very unstable and sensitive to degradation due to light and temperature, they often require solvents other than alcohol, there are compounds as well as individual aroma chemicals and the dilutions at which you would use them varies wildly.

CHECK OUT SOME OTHER GROUPS:- Give your chemophobia a rest (and brace yourself for the equally irrational and perverse chemophelia you will encounter) and bring an open mind! While I do not personally use aroma chemicals or synthetics, my time on these lists has definitely honed my skills and technique, and has made me look at naturals with a renewed interest in their active chemical components and infused my creative efforts with much needed precision, analysis and discipline: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/perfumemaking/Perfume Making is Jenny's group, there's a wealth of informative files and links, and she has put together a couple of excellent power point presentations. Discussion is lively, enthusiastic and fairly ad hoc, though Jenny is great about introducing specific topics and questions, and generating more focused discussions as well.http://groups.yahoo.com/group/mfd_ of_perfumes/Manufacture and Design of Perfumes is Jo's group, and has more of a collaborative classroom format. Class sessions might focus on a discussion of a half dozen materials (natural and synthetic), a pop quiz on some aspect of the history of perfume, or a discussion with exercises on fixation, tincturing or solvents.

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/EarlyPerfume/Early perfumes is Sally's group, and focuses on more academic and early historical creation and use of perfume and scent. She has written an excellent book and is extremely knowledgeable.

- Regardless of the group(s) you join, once there, spend some time digging through the archives. This will give you an idea of the range of topics that have been discussed, answer lots of questions before you have formed them, and will make the questions you do ask once you join the discussion more specific and useful. Do this with any group you join but especially one that has been around for a while or has substantial archives - hell - join NP and mine those archives (if they have not been deleted or selectively culled for the exclusive reference of the owner.) The first couple years of posts on that group are a wealth of information from some VERY talented and accomplished perfumers (including industry professionals incognito) who have long since moved on, weary of all the drama and politics that can hijack the best of groups.

- Be willing to put in the time with your materials - books are excellent references, and lectures can be tremendously informative, but nothing, and I mean *NOTHING* takes the place of sitting down and actively working with the materials: experimenting, formulating, blending, evaluating, sharing, reformulating. .. the hours and days and weeks you spend actively engaged in working with aromatics will be the real education. Everything else - books, research, discussions, groups, lectures - they are all optional.

- Work with your materials in dilution - it will save you unimaginable amounts of money and will give you a better sense of how your perfume is developing as you create it. I personally recommend using 5-10% dilutions of most absolutes and 10-50% dilutions of eo's - it depends on the odor intensity of the material you are working with. Create your formula using these dilutions first, then add sufficient alcohol to bring it to the appropriate strength (parfume, EDP, EDC, etc.)

- Invest in a scale sensitive to a hundredth of a gram, and learn to use it - you will get infinitely more precise and reproducible results if you do! Jen at lotioncrafter has a decent selection as well as a useful comparison you can read to help you decide which one you want.http://www.lotioncr after.com/store/Scales-Accessories-c-262.html

Ebay is also a great resource for equipment, from lab glass to ultrasonic cleaners/baths to use in tincturing and as an aid in finishing/melding dilutions and perfumes.

- Form a local study group, or find a couple local partners in crime. Swap perfumes, offer each other feedback, collaborate on a perfume,or a collection of scented balms, or put together a tincturing/infusing workshop. It builds community and supports your habit, and happens to be a lot of fun to boot.

- Try a variety of materials, from a variety of vendors and regions. All lavenders/vetivers/ lemons/roses are not created equal, nor are the aromatics that are derived from them.

- Don't limit the development of your nose to the perfumer's organ! Take a wine tasting course. Learn to cook outside your comfort zone - take an Indian, Mediterranean, Asian cooking class. Plant a fragrant garden. All of these will propel you along the path of training your senses inform your work with aromatic materials. Last, but most certainly not least - don't be afraid to think for yourself. The more stridently anyone insists that *they* are the expert and that *you* need the training or information they are selling, the more you ought to slow down, look around, and consider all your options first. If you think this is useful information - please feel free to forward it to aspiring students, post to other lists, blogs, etc.

Happy perfuming!

Lisa

Hints on Perfume Compounding (1938)

The part played by chilling in the production of a high-class crystal-clear perfume is not always appreciated to the full among perfumery manufacturers in this country (England). Briefly, the technique of manufacture is as follows:

In the first place, there are two chief methods of compounding. One is based on the idea of the alcohol as a separate unit, and consists of pre-fixing (or deodorising) the spirit, prior to dissolving in it the finished compound. This procedure, which is known also as the English method, is described admirably in detail in Poucher's Perfumes, Cosmetics and Soaps, Volume II. There is, therefore, no need to enlarge upon it here. The alternative, or French method, consists of building up the perfume from 10 percent alcholic tinctures of the various raw materials.

The latter method is usually to be preferred, so far as the quality of the finished perfume is concerned, but it has the greatest disadvantage attaching to it of causing a much larger bulk of raw materials to be left about the premises, instead of the more convenient procedure of keeping the solvent and other constituents apart, until the final mixing and maturation.

When the English method is employed, the proportion of raw materials (i.e., essential oils, synthetics, natural absolutes, fixatives, etc.) should not exceed some 10 to 15 per cent of the quantity of solvent used. With the alternative method, a mixture is simply made of the various alcohol tinctures.

The possible addition of water, which in the cheaper perfumes amounts sometimes to as much as 20 per cent, lends itself very readily to the precipitation of the less soluble bodies. In any case, filtration is essential, if it is desired, to obtain a really crystal-clear product.

The mode of filtration shows little variation. Filtering may be effected either through filter paper, or through one of the special mineral products that are now being offered. The latter are used in conjunction with such improved pieces of apparatus as the Seitz filter--this being a popular type on the Continent that may be obtained for use either with or without pressure.

After filtration has been properly carried out, a perfectly clear and brilliant solution should be obtained, but unless the solution has been chilled prior to filtration, there is still most likely to be a progressive precipitation over a period of months, particularly during cold weather. This is especially the case with certain synthetics, and also with perfume concretes that still contain traces of wax and other impurities. The latter are frequently soluble in essential oils and alcohol at normal temperatures, but are precipitated as soon as the temperature is lowered.

An old trick of the trade, used in conjunction with the English method of compounding, is to dissolve the concentrate in three-quarters of the alcohol, plus any water that has to be incorporated. The perfume is then chilled, filtered, and subsequently the other quarter part of the alcohol is added. This, as one would expect, is a very effective guard against further precipitation.

It should be particularly emphasized that chilling is an essential part of perfumery production, and a refrigerator adapted for the purpose should be installed in every factory.

Reprint: Horse Chestnuts

Horse Chestnuts

by Lisa Abdul-Quddus

It happens often yet I still get amazed at how simple actions can spark inspiration and discoveries. Take, for example, a conversation back in January 2009 between Natural Botanical Perfumer Justine Crane and one of her Antiquarian Perfumery students, Pauhla Whitaker. Pauhla started a discussion about a subject totally different from where that discussion ended. Basically, she casually mentioned the smell of horse chestnuts and very briefly described what they were. Justine suggested she tincture them, and voila! The Natures Nexus Academy of Perfuming Arts students had begun a journey in horse smells. Pauhla generously supplied the students with horse chestnuts and there began the experimentation.

If you do a search for horse chestnuts you will most likely find links to Aesculus hippocastanum, a tree that bears fruit containing seeds or nuts, referred to as chestnuts or horse chestnuts. So to give a brief description of what horse chestnuts are for those unfamiliar, they are the soft knobbly bits or growths found on a horse above the knee area of the front legs and below the hock of the hind legs. They grow normally over time in layers and can be easily peeled or shaved off. If horse chestnuts grow too big they can be unsightly but cause no harm to the horse. Pauhla says think of them as toe nails. When your toe nails grow too long you clip them. If left alone horse chestnuts can peel and fall off on their own. Often though they are taken care of by a farrier during regular grooming. And being that they grow from the horse's body they carry within them a mildly horsey more leathery scent. As a bonus for those that use animal essences in their natural perfumes horse chestnuts are cruelty free.

When I evaluated the horse chestnut tincture I found it to be cool and actually somewhat fresh. It is rustic for sure, but not fecal. Definitely animalic, sweaty, but not like stepping into a barn where horse scents can be concentrated. A chestnut is but one element taken from a group of other horse related smells, most notably lacking the warmth or heat that I would guess comes more from the horses own body heat than anything else. In conducting my own experiments with this tincture I found it gives my blends a 'lift' and cuts some of the sweetness of various essences while adding an agrestic note. I found this happened when added to a blend that was dominant in jasmine sambac.

I randomly selected a few essences to test with horse chestnut tincture added and these are some of my findings.

Patchouli - 10% dilution - ratio 1:1 Patchouli alone has a warm earthy, woody scent. With the addition of horse chestnut tincture it became almost boozy like congac with a light leather. Over time, and as the alcohol evaporated the leather note became stronger.

Tobacco absolute - 1% dilution - ratio 1:1 Tobacco absolute is warm, sweet and smoky. Adding horse chestnut tincture gave this a lift with a faint animalic note that blends well with the richness of the tobacco absolute. Think a campfire, burning tobacco, leather saddles and of course the horses.

Cilantro - 1% dilution - ratio 1:1 Cilantro is fresh, bright and herbal, like drawing in the aroma of a fresh cut bunch from a garden. The horse chestnut tincture overpowered the cilantro at the 1% dilution, although the cilantro was still detectable. These two together made for a very fresh, cool combination that actually pulled a tiny bit of sweetness from the cilantro. 

I've found that when added to heavier base notes the horse chestnut tincture takes a back seat but still makes its presence known. With lighter notes it can take over but will diminish over time letting the lighter notes shine through while still adding an animalic element to a blend. One must also factor in the dilution percentages of the essences being used as well as the strength of the tincture. For those interested in animal smells horse chestnuts are worth adding to your palette if you can obtain them. Experiment with various essences to see what this tincture can add to your blends.

******************************************************************************

Lisa Abdul-Quddus, Owner of Blossoming Tree Bodycare on Etsy, Third-Year Student/Mentor NNAPA Antiquarian Perfumery Course

Justine Crane, Natural Botanical Perfumer, Owner of The Scented Djinn, Tutor for Natures Nexus Academy of Perfuming Arts

Pauhla Whitaker Consultant, AmimOils, essential oil therapy for animals, Third-Year Student/Mentor NNAPA Antiquarian Perfumery Course