Ask the Perfumer - Sunday, January 30, 2011 - 10 a.m. to 10 PM EST

-
It's a beautiful day for perfume talk. I'll be gardening outside today, and thinking up new ways to extract scent from the lovely aromatic plants. What's your perfume question?

Comments

  1. Felicia1/30/2011 12:34 PM

    Hi Anya,

    My question has two parts:

    1. Do you have any formal education in perfume (meaning, did you take 'perfume classes')?

    2. For someone for whom formal studies aren't really feasible, what would be the best way to direct one's work so that one's perfumes are, more and more, 'fine french perfume', and less and less 'health food store'.

    Thanks!

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnyasGardenPerfumes1/30/2011 1:02 PM

    Hi Felicia

    No, I am self-taught. I studied on my own since 1976, when I got my first perfumery books that laid out the basics. After that, I expanded my skills through artistic and scientific techniques that I eventually found out were those taught in the exclusive, somewhat secretive French perfumery schools. I am also self-taught in Middle Eastern and Indian perfumery.

    As far as your second question, I could recommend following the path I did, which takes many years, or taking a course online or distance, working at your own pace. There does need to be structure, otherwise, it is extremently difficult to elevate to the fine French perfume level.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnyasGardenPerfumes1/30/2011 5:18 PM

    Hi Readers:

    I noticed that after my brief hiatus from the blog, that readers are writing me privately with questions. They're all new readers, and I've had to explain that the posts should be here. Their questions were answered, but please post them here, so that everyone can see what I'm posting as an answer.

    Thanks,
    Anya

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Boxgasm - for perfumers, aromatherapists, bath and body manufacturers, chandlers. What the heck is a boxgasm? Well, read below and you may have one.

-
Image
Project Boxgasm Announcement: If you are an artisan who makes perfume, bath & body products, aromatherapy products, candles - you can now make your own custom boxes! The Natural Perfumers Guild wishes to share this discovery with everyone, so please share the link to this blog with other groups, forums and chat places you may frequent.  The more the merrier - let's upgrade our products to the next level, with lovely, custom boxes!  I am the President of the Guild, and I like to roam social media sites and check out, and "like" the various projects and announcements of the Guild members.  Little did I dream when I visited a Facebook page of one of our members, a page that only had 21 followers, since it's new, that I'd discover something that can help all artisan small business owners. But there it was, an iconic image out of South Africa - custom perfume boxes! When I called some members of the Natural Perfumers Guild and told them about the discovery th...
Read more

Natural Isolates and the Natural Perfumer - Being the Captain of Your Own Fragrant Ship

-
Image
Get a cup of coffee or tea - this is a long blog post, with lots of twists and turns and surprises - good surprises!  Please see the blog post yesterday on the Guild member vote on the definition of natural isolates if you have not already read it. Backstory Do you ever wonder why I never taught a course in natural isolates or began to sell them on my website? After all, I was the pioneer natural perfumer who first used them in my MoonDance and StarFlower perfumes, both best sellers and award winners. Something told me that I needed to do a lot more research because a wrong move, the wrong isolate sold, could ruin the creations of lots of perfumes made by my (natural perfumer) customers. I have a duty as a trusted authority in natural perfumery, a person who heads the Natural Perfumers Guild, and who started a Yahoo discussion group on natural perfumeryin 2002, to be responsible and proceed slowly. Currently there are no regulations that address natural isolates, or ...
Read more

Ask the Perfumer Sunday Oct 21, 2012

-
Image
Ask the Perfumer - and an Ambergris hypothesis Guild member Lisa Coburn posted a link on Facebook that took me to a video on how cephalopods--squid, cuttlefish and octopus, are masters of disguise.  As I watched it, I made a perfume connection, straight to the elusive, mysterious, rare and valued ambergris, a gorgeous material used in perfumery. Photo of the famed 'Yeti' chunk of ambergris. Ambergris is produced by the stomach/intestinal secretions of the sperm whale to protect its insides from the sharp beaks of the squid and cuttlefish, two main items in its diet.  The whale evacuates the chunk of ambergris when it becomes large enough to be an irritant on its own, albeit a softer, rounder irritant compared to the beak and cartilage of the squid or cuttlefish.  As a perfumer, I often have to gently remind excitable newbies ;-)  that the scent of the ambergris is secondary to its major contribution to a perfume, which is its ability to 'marry' and a...
Read more