Anya's Garden Perfumes + The Natural Perfumery Institute

  How to Sample Perfume by  Anya McCoy  |  Aug 30, 2015,  |  Anya's Garden Perfumes ,  natural perfume  |  1 comment I just revised the insert card that I include when customers buy my sample box of 12 perfumes. I decided years ago that it’s best to make a suggestion about the sampling process, and the parallel to wine sampling. If you’ve ever visited a winery or attended a wine-sampling event, you’re familiar with this process. At the wine event, you’ll be given the light, crisp whites to experience first. You inhale the bouquet (smell) and then taste the wine. Then you’ll move on to a more robust white, something like a Chardonnay, and so on, through light reds, to deep, full-bodied reds. Why? Because the fuller-bodied, deeper, more robust wines will dull your taste buds and sense of smell a bit, overwhelming them so that if you taste a lighter wine afterward, all the nuances of that wine will be lost. Light first, then move on through the ...

  How to Make Perfume – Why I don’t enfleurage golden champaca by  Anya McCoy  |  Aug 28, 2015  |  Anya's Garden Perfumes ,  enfleurage ,  How to Make Perfume ,  natural aromatics ,  natural perfume ,  raw materials of perfumery  |  6 comments When you make perfume from flowers, there are several ways to extract the scent. I love to enfleurage rare flowers. Enfleurage is placing flowers on a bed of semi-hard fat, such as shortening, or rendered leaf lard and suet. The next step in the process is to “wash” the fat in alcohol. This post isn’t about enfleurage, except to point out why I don’t enfleurage a flower that seems ripe for the process. Some flowers, even though they emit a lovely fragrance, shouldn’t be enfleuraged. There are several reasons for this. Orange blossoms are fragile and would fall apart in the enfleurage tray, requiring laborious deleveraging process – picking the petals out, one by one, with tweeze...

  How to Make Perfume – Excerpts from my textbook by  Anya McCoy  |  Aug 9, 2015  |  How to Make Perfume ,  natural perfume ,  natural perfumery course ,  Natural Perfumery Institute ,  study perfumery  |  5 comments Slow Study Making perfume takes time and lots of thinking and introspection. As I work through adapting my textbook for my new website, I am finding many passages that are very helpful for anyone who wants to make perfume, or is already making perfume, whether you stick to 100% natural ingredients like I do, or if you use aroma chemicals. I’ve decided to excerpt some passages on a regular basis because I believe they can inspire and help others on this path. My first excerpt deals with the fear and indecision that every perfumer faces. If you don’t face it, I challenge you to challenge yourself, you’re too complacent. Springtime image from the Rodin Museum in Philadelphia, my hometown. I grew up knowing and loving ...

  A Historic 19th Century Cologne Recipe Recreated by  Anya McCoy  |  May 6, 2015  |  natural aromatics ,  natural perfume ,  raw materials of perfumery  |  11 comments THE PROJECT AND PROCESS BEGINS In November 2014, I was contacted by  Dr. Claire Shaw , Borough Council President, on behalf of the  New Hope (Pennsylvania) Historical Societ y. They were referred to me as a natural perfumery expert and someone who may be able to assist them in deciphering a cologne “receipt” (also known as a recipe back then, now called a formula) for a cologne that was written in 19th-century apothecary script. Society Historian  Wendy Gladston  discovered the document when searching through the books and records of the  Parry Mansion , the most revered historical landmark in New Hope. At first, it was believed the recipe was from 1800 but was later clarified to 1859. Parry Mansion, is one of the oldest homes in New Hope, PA, and...