Custom Perfume Design

Custom designing perfumes is my greatest love…

the whole process of finding the perfect Scent to match a persons personality is a real delight…and probably the ultimate gift you can give yourself or a Loved One!

It is a pretty involved process, starting with a detailed questionnaire that gives me insight into your basic likes and dislikes, covering everything from colours, moods, conventional fragrances you have previously worn and a chapter on aromatherapy so your perfume can be tailored to your physical and emotional needs, as well as on a purely scentual basis.

It’s a very interesting artisitic process…a combination of personality profileing, Healing and Perfumery all rolled into one!

As a perfumer, this is my greatest challenge and greatest delight! Seeing the look of happiness on a persons face when I’ve got it “just right” is such a pleasure….

I’ve found I can now often pick the scents that will suit a person simply on meeting them the first time. Natural essential oils and absolutes have personalities of their own, and it’s a bit like being an olfactory marriage broker really….you just know which oils and which people will really hit it off together!

I’ll often pick 2 or 3 central oils on which to base the scent which in themselves are perfectly suited to the person the scent is being crafted for….

From there the process is a matter of finding accessory notes which will bring out the best in both the chosen base aromatics and the person who will be wearing them.

Sometimes I will start with a particular accord…in this case the young man who the cologne is being designed for wanted something with a leather note similar to his italian leather jacket.

This is a wonderful old fashioned note in perfumery…very masculine and both sexy and comforting at the same time…and a fantastic base that can be varied in so many different ways…in this case we decided to go with a bright citrus note to give it a fresh twist and make it a good cologne to wear every day. He wanted something he could wear to the office that would make him feel good, as well as being an attrative scent to others around him, both men and women! This is a really important aspect to a custom perfume: You need to have an idea of who you want to wear it around….will it be at the office? or at a private intimate dinner? Or do you maybe want something seriously in your face sexy to wear to bed with a lover?

Perfume can be subtle and freindly…or it can be intenslely intimate! And you need to have an idea of the effect you want it to have on others as well as yourself…

The bottles on the left are a varity of versions of a custom designed cologne I’ve put together for the young man, who is coming to the workshop to try them out on his actual skin, and from there I can fine tweak them with various nuances and notes till we’ve got it exactly right!

What you can see here is a workbook with notes I’ve taken on the Scent as it’s been developing, some of the ingre

dients I may use to give the working blends a final “tweak” and 6 sample bottles with variations of the actual scent I have made up for the client to try. In the background you can see the round glass bottle with one of our signature velvet leaves that will be used for the finished cologne.

And here he is smelling the effect on his skin. No matter what a scent is like in the bottle, there’s no substitute for trying in on the actual skin of the person it is designed for. Your skin will change a scent and bring out different nuances…

In this case, the base needed to be fine tweaked and ramped up a little as the young mans skin brought out the citrus top notes very strongly.

He was delighted with the scent by the way! masculine, elegant, fresh and understated with a beautiful italian leather base that is really timeless.

You can almost see him back in Venice in the 1800′s. A young Italian count going out for a nights revelry….

In the next installment, we’ll give you some feedback on how those around him reacted to his new cologne!

If you want more information about our custom perfume design service, contact us on

info@perfumebynature.com.au

Vintage perfection!

I’ve got it! Finally after over 2 years I have found the missing ingredients and achieved the blessed balance I was looking for!

What was missing was sweetness, …I kept missing it because I had a masculine fragrance in mind, and was avoiding anything sweet or in the least girly…

But there is a nother kind of sweetness: the deep, ripe, mature sweetness of late summer fruits, apples at that point where they have reached warm, tart yet soft sweetness that is perfect for making cider..

The perfume now starts with a refreshing headnote of white grapefruit, clear as a cool autumn morning, then warms to a lovely cider sweet middle with notes of foresty spruce freshly rubbed between your fingers, darkening to a deep woody base which wraps around you like you granfathers hug…..

I’ve been dancing around the house all mornsing sniffing my wrist as the warm, woody,, tart smell which has so many yummy layers it’s just…..sigh…

I’m happy now……

Only problem is I’m going to need another name as another perfume house has brought out a perfume called “Vintage”…I need a name that encompasses everything my grandfather stood for:

Honor, Respect, Kindess and caring for all living things…a real maturity and wosdom that comes from a deep understanding of life…..and above all Integrity.

Maybe I should make it a contest: Anyone who comes up with a perfect suggestion to name this perfume will get the first bottle!

Creating Natural Perfume

Well, today as always I’ve been pottering around my workshop. Filling orders, rearranging the wall that is covered in shelving and hundreds of bottles of various tinctures and extracts from every flower and herb imaginable….and fiddling with the various experiemental blends I’ve got going.

The one dearest to my heart has got the working name of “Vintage”.

It’s based around my memories of my grandfather. He was one of those true gentlemen you don’t find very often. The kind of person who made you feel as though there was actually something wirthwhile in the world. He had real integrity, solid, kind, reliable and with an air of authority and strength with it that made him someone people admired and trusted. And he used to make up the most amazing stories to tell me as a kiddy, as I sat on his big lap and snuggled into his chest and breathed in the soldi, warm scent of him.

I’m creating a perfume that would suit him. Something solid and real, that makes you feel , well, that things are right in the world.

I’m using white grapefruit as a topnote, because it’s fresh without being sweet, coupled with fir because there is something incredibly clear and clean about all of the conifers. And fir is the gentle, mellowest of them. And the base is deep and woody, with musky undertones to give you that feeling of solidity I’m looking for. Not a flower in sight in this one! Nothing sweet or playful, I want a “Real” scent, that any man would be happy to wear. Mind you, I’ve been wearing the various trial versions myself for a few months now….this is going to be a truly unisex scent I feel.

I’ve got around 10 variations sitting on the “work in progress” shelf in their own carefully labeled bottles. All of them smell great. But I’m not quite happy with the balance as yet…..In some of them the grapefruit just takes over, in others the base is so heavy that you lose the fresh notes…and some are just a tad too sweet…..but it’s getting pretty close!

Hello world!

Welcome to the world of Natural Perfumes!

My name is Ambrosia and I am a Perfumer who specializes in Perfumes created using traditional ingredients. Real Rose absolute, honey comb distillate, all the beautiful things Mother Earth has given fragrance to.

In this blog I will be writing about these ingredients and sharing my adventures into the world of perfume creation.

You can also have a look at our online Perfumery where we sell some of our creations!