Jojoba Oil

Petitgrain-Neroli Solid Perfume

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Bitter orange

Bitter Orange by Kamil Porembiński

This all began because my daughter loves the word Neroli and asked me to make her a “Roli” solid perfume. I do not recommend you make this perfume, quite honestly – because the opening can only be described as “green compost monster!” Argh! But, I’m recording it because mistakes are the best way to learn. The rest of the perfume is fine if not spectacular, but oh my – the terrible top notes. Blech. I blame the orange blossom absolute that I have.

Louisiana - Slidell: Dr. Wagner's Honey Island Swamp Tours - El Guapo

My orange blossom absolute is actually a swamp thing.

Raw Materials*

  • 8 ml Jojoba oil
  • 1/2 heaping teaspoon grated beeswax
  • 10 drops Petitgrain essential oil
  • 16 drops Neroli essential oil
  • 8 drops Orange Blossom absolute <– Warning: Too much OB. Reduce next time and/or use diff OB material.
  • 4 drops Jasmine Grandiflorum absolute
  • 7 drops Tonka Bean Absolute 30%

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop burner)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, add the essential oils. Begin with the base notes and work your way up to the lightest notes: Tonka, Jasmine, OB, Petitgrain, Neroli. Smell after each addition to experience how the blend is evolving. Use a separate dropper for each oil.
  4. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This prevents cross contamination.
  5. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole. Hold the lab casserole over the burner until the wax melts.
  6. Quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture.
  7. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
This one isn’t perfect. I adapted the recipe from the Ambrosial Neroli recipe on White Lotus Aromatics. The formula may not be to blame – I tinkered with the ratios and put it into a solid. Perhaps the original formula is better? Certainly top notes like Petitgrain and Neroli would thrive much better in an alcohol base! Anyhow – here’s the issue with this perfume – I don’t like the Orange Blossom Absolute that I have. I have tried to like it, even thought I loved it at first – but it has a seriously dank, green top note that is a horror (at least to me) for the first minute or so of the blend. Yeck. Once it goes, this perfume isn’t too shabby! But the “green compost monster” phase really needs a tweak. Next, there is a nice moment of Petitgrain/Neroli brightness – but I know better than to put that into a solid! Solids eat top notes. The fact that these survive at all is frankly miraculous. The jasmine sweetens things up prettily. And the Tonka…the tonka is delicate, rich, gorgeous, and tenacious all at once. It has a hay-like bright & fresh quality. It ends up connecting to the jasmine, and so in the dry down this has a light jasmine-y vibe with a little tonka spice which reminds me of…aftershave? I think Tonka is used in a lot of traditionally masculine blends (Fougeres?), so I’ve got a funny masculine association with this. Tenacity could be better. Overall, it’s an odd little thing – and my 5 year old is NOT A FAN.

Oh well.

And the stinking orange blossom! That stuff is a monster. I need to figure out how to work with this material more successfully. Or just chuck it. It wasn’t cheap, though. It’s supposed to be very nice stuff so I’m confused by how much I hate it.

Notes on Notes

  • Petitgrain Bigarade, C. Aurantium var. amara, Paraguay, Organic, White Lotus Aromatics – Green, sharp, fresh cologne
  • Jasmine Grandiflorum Absolute, India, Eden Botanicals – Jasmine, white floral, SWEET, smooth, round, narcotic
  • Orange Blossom Absolute – Fine, Eden Botanicals – Floral, sweet/tart, green & astringent but also honeyed, Honeysuckle, UGH – there is a note to this that is sharp, edge-y, and dank – like vegetable rot
  • Neroli, France, Eden Botanicals – Floral, green, sharp, fresh, ephemeral, cologne, unisex, delicate, pretty
  • Tonka Bean Absolute 30%, Dipteryx Odorata, French extract, Organic, White Lotus Aromatics – Vanillic, new baby doll smell, honeyed, sweet, slightly boozy?, slightly spicy, happy, fresh, hay-like
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Orange-Jasmine-Lavender Solid Perfume

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Jasmine flower

Jasmine flower by Martin Snopek. Rabyne, Central Bohemian Region, Czech Republic

In Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant, she calls this perfume simply “Jasmine,” but it’s more of a lovely dance between Jasmine and Lavender Concrete, while the Blood Orange also adds a delicious and plush fruity top note.

Here’s what you need to create Orange-Jasmine-Lavender solid perfume:

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Jasmine Grandiflorum absolute
  • Jasmine Sambac absolute
  • Blood Orange essential oil
  • Lavender concrete

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop burner)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out the lavender concrete into the beaker of oil. Aftel’s recipe calls for the lavender concrete in grams, because it is typically a paste. The version I have is liquid, so I added drops until they equaled the required weight. I found that 6 drops matched the gram weight she specified.
  4. Then add both kinds of jasmine, and finally the blood orange. Smell after each addition to experience how the blend is evolving.
  5. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This prevents cross contamination.
  6. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole. Hold the lab casserole over the burner until the wax melts.
  7. Quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture.
  8. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
The blood orange top note is gorgeous! This is a full-bodied, voluptuous orange – and it pairs well with jasmine. I can see why Mandy picked it rather than a thinner or more bitter citrus note (wild orange, bitter orange, etc.). It enhances the rich, fruity, and sweet qualities of the jasmine and this is my favorite phase of the perfume. The two types of jasmine produce a more complex effect, capitalizing on both the lush, rounded sweetness of the Grandiflorum and the greener, fresher, spicier quality of the Sambac. The Lavender concrete provides a soft, herbaceous and green base for everything and is fore-grounded more in the dry down; it’s slightly “soapy” in Mandy’s words, and I have to agree. The Lavender concrete is perfectly fine, but I don’t looooove it the way I love Lavender absolute, which is more floral, so I can’t help but wonder what this would smell like with the absolute instead of the concrete. Better? Or less interesting because less contrast?

I also have to wonder how different my own blend might smell simply due to different natural materials. I contacted Mandy about the Lavender Concrete issue (mine is liquid, her recipe calls for a solid) – and she said her own was a paste which is why she used the weight-based measurements, so she was unsure how mine would compare. I managed to source two concretes – one from Liberty Naturals and one from Samara Botane – but BOTH were liquid. So who knows, maybe it’s just how this year’s harvest behaved? Both companies noted that the consistency of this material could vary. I would love to smell Mandy’s composition and this one side-by-side to discover the difference.

Notes on Notes

  • Jasmine Grandiflorum Absolute, India, Eden Botanicals – Jasmine, white floral, SWEET, smooth, round, narcotic
  • Jasmine Sambac Absolute, India, Eden Botanicals – GREEN, spicy. Smells surprisingly different from the Grandiflorum. Harder to find the flower. Sweet in its own right, but it’s harder to smell the sweetness after being beaten senseless by the Grandiflorum.
  • Blood Orange EO, Italy, Eden Botanicals – Tart/Sour Citrus; “more” than Bergamot. More body. More heft. Less ephemeral. Tart like a grapefruit, but still sweet with a juicier, orangier character.
  • Lavender Concrete, Lavandula Officinalis, France, Liberty Naturals – herbaceous, green, soft

Orange Blossom-Tobacco Solid Perfume

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In Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant, she calls this perfume “Chameleon,” I think because with the alcohol version we are invited to experiment with it by adding touches of various animalic ingredients. In the solid version, this is a a fairly straight-forward orange blossom-tobacco composition, with pink grapefruit top notes.

Here’s what you need to create Orange Blossom-Tobacco solid perfume:

Supplies for creating orange blossom tobacco solid perfume.

Supplies for creating orange blossom tobacco solid perfume.

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Tobacco absolute
  • Orange flower absolute
  • Pink grapefruit essential oil

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out each of the essences into the beaker of oil. Tobacco, orange blossom, then grapefruit. Sniff after each addition.
  4. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol.
  5. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole. Hold the lab casserole over the burner until the wax melts.
  6. Quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture.
  7. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Don’t touch it or you’ll burn yourself and/or mess up the nice smooth surface. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
Wow – I’ve got a yes/no response to this one. I looooooove orange blossom so very much, and the absolute is gorgeous. The tobacco provides an interesting, dense and pungent base – but I’m not sure I’m in love with it. Like the Clary Sage in the Mint Vetiver blend, I find the tobacco overpowering. I want to love this, but the tobacco at this intensity pushes me away. Perhaps I’d like it better at a lower concentration. The pink grapefruit is an easy-going and friendly top note, always welcome.

Notes on Notes

  • Blond Tobacco Absolute, Nicotinia Tobacum, France, Nicotene-Free, Liberty Naturals – Viscous amber-brown. Clean pipe tobacco. Earthy, dry, only lightly sweet, RICH, thick/powerful.
  • Orange Blossom Absolute – Fine, Eden Botanicals – Love! Honeysuckle, green-white floral, a little sharp, intense, refined, sharp green leading edge
  • Pink Grapefruit EO, Citrus Paradisi, USA, Eden Botanicals – happy citrus, sunny, sweet, acid, tart

Frankincense Solid Perfume

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Now it’s time for Experiment No. 5 from Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant: Frankincense Solid Perfume. This perfume claims to be all about Frankincense – but the true star is the amazing deliciousness of Fir Absolute. Heaven! This smells like a walk in the forest in the best possible way.

Here’s what you need to create Frankincense solid perfume:

Frankincense Solid Perfume Supplies

Supplies for creating Frankincense Solid Perfume.

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Frankincense essential oil
  • Balsam fir absolute
  • Lavender absolute
  • Frankincense CO2

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Curette (for scooping viscous fir absolute out of jar)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels.
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out each of the essences into the beaker of oil. Start with the fir absolute. It’s incredibly viscous (like tar) – so what you need to do is use the curette to scoop out a drop-sized blob of it, and then stir it into the oil. It won’t dissolve – that’s ok. It will melt when you add it to the beeswax. Then, use the eye droppers to add each of the other essences.
  4. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This will prevent cross-contamination and also dissolve any EOs left on the dropper to make clean up easier.
  5. Once you have your oil blended, switch to working with the beeswax. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole.
  6. Hold the lab casserole full of grated wax over the burner until the wax melts. You don’t want to burn it, so keep the temperature at “medium” or lower.
  7. When all the wax has melted, quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture. The fir absolute should melt just fine! It may leave some sediment, but that’s okay – it still will look fine as a solid perfume.
  8. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Don’t touch it or you’ll burn yourself and/or mess up the nice smooth surface. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?
Oh my stars in heaven, this stuff smells AH-mazing! You really get the fir absolute, supported faintly by the lavender. It’s very sweet and balsamic, almost edible. Love, love, love it. This was a more challenging solid perfume to create simply because working with the fir absolute is a hassle – but WOW, is it worth it! The frankincense I can’t detect as much – but interestingly, this DOES remind me somewhat of the way a chunk of frankincense resin smells (sweet, balsamic, piney). Whereas Frankincense EO doesn’t have precisely the same character as the resin itself. So it’s almost like this is a recreation of the raw material. But, frankly, better. Did I mention I am now in love with fir absolute? It’s strangely edible. A magical edible pine forest of wonderfulness.

Notes on Notes

  • Frankincense EO, Organic, Aftelier – Pinenes. Piney. Turpentine, but cleaner. Pinesol. After it’s been on the strip awhile, it mellows and becomes soft, balsamic, nicer. On the Aftelier web site, this is described as, “This essential oil, from boswellia neglecta, is my favorite frankincense for perfumery. This light, but tenacious, base note is fresh and fruity with hints of lemon.”
  • Balsam Fir Absolute, Abies balsamia, Canada, White Lotus Aromatics – Sweet, jammy, edible, balsamic, pine forest
  • Lavender Absolute, France, Liberty Naturals – Beautiful. Soft but also very intense. Blanket quality. Calming. Herbaceous. Cooling. Soothing.
  • Frankincense CO2 Select, Somalia, Wild Harvest, White Lotus Aromatics – Similar to the EO but more pleasant. Piney. Still very pinene-y but more ethereal.

Next time I get Frankincense, I want to use Enfleurage. They seem to be Frankincense experts and I’d love to sample their stock. I’d like to try the Frankincense from Oman, boswellia sacra.

Mint Vetiver Solid Perfume

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Tah-dah! It’s Mint Vetiver solid perfume, experiment No. 3 in blending along with Mandy Aftel’s book, Fragrant. Designed to highlight humble spearmint, this blend is both zingy and earthy.

Here’s what you need to create Mint Vetiver solid perfume:

Supplies for making Mint Vetiver solid perfume

Supplies for making Mint Vetiver solid perfume hanging out un-glamorously on my kitchen counter.

Raw Materials*

  • Jojoba oil
  • Grated beeswax
  • Vetiver essential oil
  • Clary sage essential oil
  • Ylang Ylang extra
  • Spearmint essential oil

*Out of courtesy to the author, I’m leaving off the amounts of each raw material. You can find them in her book.

Equipment

  • Box grater (for grating beeswax)
  • Measuring spoons (for beeswax)
  • 80 ml lab casserole (for melting beeswax)
  • 10 ml graduated beaker or cylinder
  • Glass eyedroppers (1 per essence)
  • Small glass of alcohol for cleaning eye droppers (place them in it upright after use)
  • Stirring rod
  • Hot plate (can also use stovetop)
  • ½ oz tin (for storing perfume)
  • Paper towels

Steps

  1. Cover your work surface with paper towels (unless you are way neater than I am).
  2. Add the Jojoba oil to the graduated beaker.
  3. Next, measure out each of the essences into the beaker of oil, using a separate eye dropper for each one. Start with the base notes and work your way up to the top notes: Vetiver, Clary Sage, Ylang Ylang Extra, Spearmint. Stir after each addition, and sniff to experience how the blend is developing.
  4. When you are done with an eye dropper, place it in the glass of alcohol, and pump it a few times to clean it, and leave it sitting full of alcohol. This will prevent cross-contamination and also dissolve any EOs left on the dropper to make clean up easier.
  5. Once you have your oil blended, switch to working with the beeswax. Measure out the grated beeswax into the lab casserole.
  6. Hold the lab casserole full of grated wax over the burner until the wax melts. You don’t want to burn it, so keep the temperature at “medium” or lower.
  7. When all the wax has melted, quickly pour the essential oil blend into the liquid wax. Working over the heat, stir the blend into the wax for about 10 seconds until it’s a smooth mixture. Do this as quickly as possible so as not to burn off the top notes.
  8. Finally, pour the molten perfume into the ½ oz tin, cap it, and leave it alone for 15 minutes to solidify. Don’t touch it or you’ll burn yourself and/or mess up the nice smooth surface. Finis!

How did it work? How does it smell?

Once you try it once or twice, making solid perfume is extremely easy! This blend is super simple – all the materials are very easy to work with. As for how it smells…well, this one is not my favorite. It’s very medicinal, and my best friend nailed it when she said it was reminiscent of Tiger Balm. The mint gives it that same menthol-y vibe. That said, this has a unique earthy-rooty depth from the Vetiver, and the Clary Sage fuses it all together. The Ylang Ylang more or less disappears, rounding things out. While I don’t love the Clary Sage in it personally – I enjoy the earthy freshness of the Vetiver. It seems like it might pair well with lemon or another citrus? Perhaps something to experiment with in the future.

Notes on the notes:

  • Vetiver Essential Oil, Haiti, Wild Harvest, White Lotus Aromatics – Earthy, rooty, powdery – but soft & scratchy. A fuzzy, furry, tannic sort of vibe. A little bit bitter? Definitely not sweet. Viscous and golden liquid.
  • Clary Sage EO, France, Organic, White Lotus Aromatics – Ok, it seems as though Clary Sage and I do not get along. The first whiff of this made me nauseous. It was so overwhelming and strong! It’s slightly minty and herbal, but with a faintly tobacco base. There’s something a little dirty about it. Somehow it reminds me of menthol cigarettes. I thought perhaps the nausea was from smelling a powerful EO undiluted – but it still made me nauseous in the final solid perfume. Ugh.
  • Ylang Ylang Extra EO, Comoros, Organic, White Lotus Aromatics – Sweet, rich, white floral. Tropical. Edible. Banana. Fruity. Ever so faint “plastic” note that I sometimes get with white florals, but it’s barely detectable here. Overall, this smells heavenly!
  • Spearmint EO, South Africa, Organic, White Lotus Aromatics – Yum! Spearmint. Reminds me of my mother’s garden. Sweet, bright, crisp, phenolic?, mint, zingy, happy.

Supplies for Creating Perfume

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Perfume Organ

Perfume Organ, Fragonard Perfume Museum, Paris by Nico Paix

Beginner’s Kits

Raw Materials – Naturals

  • Aftelier* – Quirky selection of unusual perfumers botanicals. Fast shipping. No minimum.
  • Aqua Oleum – Excellent UK source for essential oils from Julia Lawless.
  • Aromatics International – Expensive oils connected with the Aromahead Institute. Site has excellent information.
  • Eden Botanicals* – EOs, CO2s, Absolutes. Excellent quality, wide selection, no minimum purchase.
  • Enfleurage – Aromatics from the natural world. Specialize in Frankincense. Also offer hydrosols and more.
  • Liberty Natural Products* – Amazing selection. Includes isolates and more. $50 minimum.
  • Mountain Rose Herbs – Wide selection. Somewhat expensive shipping. (Mentioned more often by home aromatherapists than perfumers. Never tried.)
  • Nature’s Gift – Just tried them for the first time for more aromatherapy-type oils. Also have wide selection of hydrosols, carrier oils, waxes and butters. Well researched and reasonable prices.
  • White Lotus Aromatics* – Gorgeous, superior quality naturals personally sourced from around the world. $100 minimum.

*Companies with an astrix * are the ones I order from most frequently. Eden Botanicals is my “go to” supplier.
Also helpful: Providence Perfume offers a useful review of some of the best/worst essential oils she’s ever purchased.

Raw Materials – Synthetics

Beeswax

Carrier Oils
Carrier oils are for making oil-based perfumes, solid perfumes, or other body products. Do not add them to alcohol-based perfumes (they will separate and make a mess). Some carrier oils will go rancid fairly quickly. Fractionated coconut oil and Jojoba oil are two of the longest-lasting.

Alcohol
For alcohol-based perfume, use perfumer’s alcohol a.k.a specially denatured (SD) alcohol, which is 95% ethanol that has been denatured with an additive. The denaturing is done for regulatory reasons to prevent consumption. When purchasing perfumer’s alcohol in the United States, use 40b, which is denatured with t-butyl alcohol & Bitrex. Do not use 39c, because it contains diethyl phthalate (DEP), a.k.a. phthalates for which there are serious health concerns. For natural perfumers, there are also organic alcohols that have been denatured with natural materials. If you are not planning to sell your perfume, you can also use Everclear / Pure Grain Alcohol instead of Perfumer’s Alcohol. It should be 190 proof (95% alcohol) ethanol. In the USA, PGA is available for purchase in some states but not all. Some natural perfumers will also use Vodka for perfume, but it’s not as desirable as Everclear/PGA due to the lower alcohol content. For cleaning, you can use Isopropyl alcohol, Vodka, or PGA.

Dipropylene Glycol (DPG)
DPG is an odorless, colorless synthetic carrier oil that is perfect for diluting fragrances to 10% or 1% to be used for sniff tests / educating your nose. It is oil-based, but water and alcohol soluble.

Bottles and Packaging

Grapefruit Rose Solid Perfume

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Ella's Grapefruit RoseMy 5 year-old daughter loved the Bulgarian Rose when we were doing the “Rose sniff test” and asked to make a solid perfume out of it. Why not?

I originally wanted to do something with top, heart, and base notes, but the only scent she liked other than the Bulgarian Rose was Pink Grapefruit. Everything else – from Benzoin to Ylang Ylang – elicited a strong, “Blech. Yuck Mommy!”  Or even, “That one smells like tulips sprayed with skunk powder!”  So! Grapefruit and rose it is. Here’s how we made it.

Ingredients
8 ml Jojoba oil
1/2 tsp grated beeswax
14 drops Bulgarian Rose Absolute
10 drops Pink Grapefruit Essential Oil

Steps

  1. Pour the Jojoba oil into a small beaker.
  2. Add the essential oils to the beaker and stir with a glass stirring rod.
  3. Next, add a heaping 1/2 tsp of grated beeswax to a small lab casserole (or other porcelain or glass container), and melt it over a hot plate or double boiler.
  4. Then pour the oil into the melted wax and stir to combine as quickly as possible. You don’t want to overheat the perfume and burn off the top notes.
  5. Pour the liquid perfume into a 1/2 oz tin or other container. Close it immediately and let it sit for 10-15 minutes to cool before you touch it.

How does it smell?
Sweet, happy, and round, and very rosy. At first it’s hard to detect the grapefruit relative to the rose – they blend together well – but it’s there. I wouldn’t really call it a perfume so much as a “pleasant scent.” My daughter loves it though – and that’s what’s important.

Notes for Next Time
This blend is relatively safe for children – rose and grapefruit are two essential oils that are very kid-safe with positive effects on mood (this is a super happy scent), though I think the concentrations in the solid perfume are a bit high compared to standard aromatherapy dilutions. I’m not too concerned since my daughter just dabs a little on every once in awhile.

Aesthetically, if I were to do this again, I’d add more top notes (since solid perfumes pretty much devour top notes) so the grapefruit is more prominent and decrease the rose. I’d also add a base to increase longevity. This vanishes in about 30 minutes to an hour.

Amber Spice Solid Perfume

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IMG_4179

Experiment No. 1: Amber Spice Solid Perfume from Fragrant by Mandy Aftel. Out of respect for the author, I won’t publish the amounts – you’ll need to buy the book for that. But I will tell you what supplies you need, how to do it, and and how it turned out. What I like about Mandy’s recipes is that they are the perfect “experiment” size. They fit neatly into a 1/2 oz metal tin. No waste!

Raw Materials

  • Labdanum Absolute
  • Cinnamon Essential Oil
  • Rose Absolute (optional)
  • Lime Essential Oil

Carrier Media

  • Jojoba Oil
  • Beeswax

Equipment

  • Fragrance tester strips
  • Cheese grater (for grating wax)
  • Measuring spoons
  • Glass eyedroppers or pipettes (minimum 1 per EO)
  • Tiny graduated beaker or cylinder – smallest graduations you can find
  • Glass stirring rod
  • Lab casserole dish (80 ml size works great)
  • Hot plate (optional – you could also work over your stove)
  • Paper towels
  • Shot glass of Vodka or Everclear for dropper cleanup

Packaging

  • 1/2 oz flat metal tin
  • 1.2″ circle label

Steps

  1. First, I tested each of my raw materials by placing a single drop on a labeled fragrance tester strip. It’s helpful as I’m learning to smell each oil individually – to discover the shape of the material itself, its intensity, longevity, etc.
  2. Next, I set up my work area and laid out everything I needed in easy reach. Paper towels everywhere in case of spills.
  3. I poured the Jojoba oil into the graduated beaker, and then added the essences to it. Be very careful to use a new dropper for each oil, and put used droppers into the shot glass of alcohol to clean them. You want to be extra careful not to cross-contaminate your oils.
  4. I added grated beeswax to the lab casserole, and melted it over a hotplate. Once melted, I added the oil + essences, and stirred together as quickly as possible and removed from heat.
  5. Finally, I poured the perfume into the tin, capped it, and waited 15 minutes for it to solidify. Finis!

Notes on Materials

How did it smell?
Quite nice, actually. It’s amazing how well the scents meld to create a new thing. The top and base notes were most prominent to my nose.  A good strong hit of lime up top that fades fairly quickly, and the labdanum makes a sweet, leathery, ambery base that is apparent throughout the arc of the perfume and into drydown. At first, I had a hard time picking out the cinnamon – where was the cinnamon? But I realized it had been transformed into a sparkling, hot brightness that did not read as “cinnamon.” Nice. I could not find the rose at all. Perhaps it was rounding things out, or perhaps it was simply buried. Overall, it felt unisex – perhaps leaning slightly masculine. Wears soft and close.

My husband (not a fumehead) had an interesting insight. One sniff, and he said, “Cherry coke!” That puzzled me for a minute, then I looked up the formula for the original Coca-Cola – and sure enough, there was a lime-citrus-cinnamon combo.

Coca-Cola Formula

2 drops lime essential oil
2 drops orange essential oil
1 drop lemon essential oil
1 drop nutmeg essential oil
1 drop cinnamon essential oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

– From Fragrant

Mistakes and Questions

  • I spilled the Jojoba. How on earth does one pour out of a Boston round without sloshing?
  • Need to be careful to get all the perfume oil out of the beaker.
  • Cheap hot plate was ok but it smoked unpleasantly – need to clean?
  • How do you clean the droppers?! I got a trace amount of cinnamon oil in the cap of a dropper, and then after bathing them in Everclear, I ran all my droppers and caps through the dishwasher to sterilize. Now ALL of the smell like cinnamon. I curse you, cinnamon!

What Worked

  • 80 ml lab casserole was a great size to work with
  • Vintage 10 ml graduated beaker with 2 ml increments was also perfect choice
  • 1 eye dropper per raw material, with a shot glass to park them in afterward
  • glass stirring rod
  • 1/2 oz tin and 1.2″ circle labels = perfect size
  • OXO grater with attached box = awesome for grating beeswax and storing it
  • Paper towels = unglamorous but vital

That’s all for now!