Anya's Garden Perfumes + The Natural Perfumery Institute

The outlaw is in the house ;-) I hope y'all have been following the Outlaw Perfume project and it's fired you up to be one, too.  Use that rose and jasmine in appropriate amounts.  IFRA and the EU are getting pushed back at by some artisan perfumers! Well, outlaw or not, you're welcome to submit questions on perfumery today from 10 to 10.

  Soon after I started blogging in 2006, I began to write of the incredibly restrictive and unreasonable "guidelines" of the International Fragrance Association, and the resultant laws from the European Union that effectively killed perfumery.  True, they also ranked some synthetics as "dangerous" (brain disruptions), but the list of naturals, which had been used for centuries without major problems, was overwhelming.  I rarely bother to blog about these issues anymore.  I discovered I was the ONLY perfumer doing so at the time, and it cast a bit of a bitter pall over my blog.  I'd rather be blogging about the beauty and luxury of naturals, so here I am. I passed the ball on to other bloggers! Nine bloggers will be participating this week, and you can find their links at the end of this post. They're all insightful, intelligent and passionate about perfumery.  Their readership far outstrips mine, and the Outlaw Perfume project is a great way for them to...

Ask the Perfumer is open and I'm waiting for your questions about perfumery, especially natural perfumery and natural raw materials.

  How very lovely that two of the four bloggers that grouped together for the Holiday Gift Guide selected my perfumes, Guild, and perfumery courses for inclusion.  I haven't sent any samples to one of the other bloggers ever, and the other in a year or more, so they're not up-to-date on my offerings.  Lucy at Indie Perfumes did make me blush with her praise! I will be offering 10 perfumes come Monday, Nov. 15th, 2010 when I launch Light and Amberess, so that's a little pre-release leak: the 10 will be offered for $65 for the sample size, a wonderful value. Here's links to Lucy and Elena's Holiday Gift Guide picks, so you can read about their choices: http://perfumeshrine.blogspot.com/2010/11/holiday-gift-guide-2010.html http://indieperfumes.blogspot.com/2010_11_01_archive.html#2523908032031520792

The Natural Perfumers Guild is having a membership drive. There are vintage and contemporary perfumery books and article included in the membership, plus many prizes to be awarded in a random drawing of the names of the new members. Fees are marked 20% off the usual rate, and can be found at here . The dozens of books and articles that new members can download are listed here. Deadline to join at the reduced membership rate and be in the drawing is Nov. 30th. Winners may state their choice of prize from the following list: *Five one-year Basenotes Supporters memberships A $59 value* Thinking of starting a perfume business? Take part in the chat on the most active perfume site on the Internet. The Basenotes Plus ( née Basenotes Supporters) is a great way to connect to the community. *One Basic Natural Perfumery textbook A $500 value* This is the textbook for Guild President Anya McCoy's Basic Natural Perfumery course. 349 full-color pages. Winner will be emailed a ...

Turning the clock back has me up early, and I'll get you are, too, with perfumery questions. Ask away!

Ask the Perfumer is open this stormy Halloween day - don't ask anything spooky of me! I will be blogging later today or tomorrow about the new textbooks arriving for my online basic natural perfumery course - with pictures! After looking at it on a screen, and only printing out sections at a time, I am impressed by the book in its glory. 349 pages, many with color illustrations and photos, the most helpful charts I could design, great evaluation and recording forms, including Excel-based ones that can hold all your info - wow. Sorry for the excitement, but I really am pleased with the book, and four get mailed out tomorrow to new offline option students. Happy, happy.

I'll be here on and off all day to answer your perfumery questions. Hope y'all are enjoying the weather and having fun!

Ask the Perfumer is open for questions. I almost forgot to post today, as I was out early and running most of the day. Sorry about my tardiness, but I'm here now, so ask away.

I'm blending new perfumes today - what are you doing? Ask the Perfumer is open for this cool Sunday in Miami.

I'll be here on and off all day to answer your perfumery questions. Hope y'all are enjoying the weather and having fun!

I have been reseraching on the Internet for years, and I stumbled across an article, in French, on the early Grasse perfumery industry.  I laboriously translated it into English, and copied and pasted the twenty or so illustrations into the English version. What a lot of work, but worth it for my students! This image is just so lovely. It's of the pomade room at Robertet in the 1800's. Here's another image: This image is of the Roure Bertrand plant, and those are orange blossoms on the ground, and people with shovels, scooping them up into the distillation units you see around the wall. Neroli! If you click on the image, you will see it in a larger version.

I have a !signed! first edition (1945) of Edward Sagarin's The Science and Art of Perfumery, and I love the fact that I got a lagniappe when I purchased it. Tucked inside was the business card of a Givaudan employee.  I had high hopes that when I scanned the card, the perfume alchemist image would be clear, but age, and the texture of the card worked against my wishes. However, it is still fun to look at, so I'm sharing it with you.

I hope every perfumer who has ever struggled with a perfume that went "muddy" or was overwhelmed by one or two of the aromatics learns some tricks with this podcast.  The trick is learning to evaluate an aromatic and seeing if it might be an "accessory" note.  Accessory notes can be very wonderful in a perfume due to their uniqueness and ability to add a distinctive scent, but because they are also very intense in nature, they can ruin a blend. I'm posting these podcasts on my perfumery education website , and I'm posting them here until I learn how to create RSS feeds there.  Heck, I hope the RSS feed I'm trying to create here works.  If it doesn't just visit the podcast page on the website. UPDATE:  I have the RSS feed working on the AGNPI website, so you can grab it there.