fragrance notes: the art of scent

Ever since I read the novel Perfume by Patrick Suskind, I've been fascinated by the art of fragrance-making. Creating a perfume is really an art form, though sometimes you wouldn't know it by the influx of one-note celebrity fragrances out there today. (Lovelies, perhaps with the exception of SJP's Lovely, I have yet to find one celebrity fragrance that is the least bit interesting.) But some perfumers have bucked the trend to layer everything with vanilla (a la Thierry Mugler's Angel) and returned perfume to its artisan roots.
Consider Ineke Ruhland, for example. A perfumer based in San Francisco, Ineke creates perfume stories, each with a time of day or mood in mind. After my Own Heart (my personal fave) is a romantic concoction of bergamot and florals, capturing "the scent of fresh lilacs on the early evening breeze). Balmy Days and Sundays, meanwhile, captures the scent of that first warm day of spring, when you want to loll about with a book, with notes of fresh-cut grass, honeysuckle and freesia. It's a lovely, clean scent, that doesn't seem at all contrived.


Frederic Malle Editions de Parfums, meanwhile, is a line of fragrances by some of the best "noses" in the business, including Maurice Roucel and Dominique Ropion. This is true perfume-lovers' perfume, and not for the faint of heart. Carnal Flower, for example, is an unabashedly floral scent, featuring a heady mix of sensual tuberose, jasmine and bergamot, with a trace of musk. Perfumer Ropion crafted the fragrance in such a way as to easily comingles with the wearers' own scent. And if you want to get your sexy time on, Roucel's Musc Ravageur is a good place to start. Roucel is known for his streamlined aproach to fragrances, keeping only what is essential, and this one is a bold and spicy Oriental skin scent, with notes of tangerine and cinnamon against a backdrop of musk, amber and vanilla. It's a fragrance of contradictions, with Roucel wanting to communicate a scent that is at once sensual yet generous. Succumb to the warm, spicy embrace of this ravishing fragrance - resistance is futile!