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So, I worked on the lavendel thing again, experimenting with the absolute, the concrete and some essential oils that I have got from all over the world. I am always very reluctant to work with my concretes for entirely practical reasons.  

Concretes are rather waxy, due to the fact that these waxy plant components are very soluble in the aliphatic solvents used for the extraction process (like hexane). They are less soluble in alcohol, which results in precipitation respectively a non-dissolution of the waxy part of the concrete. When doing experiments which will later result in just  a few bottles : Easy! However, the filtration of lots of ethanol diluted concrete can become somewhat troubling. 

But, as always in life, there is another side to it. Concretes are wonderful to work with. They often are the closest you can get to the natural scent.

So, I figured out a while ago that working with the essential lavender oil will probably not bring me there where I want to be. Nor will the absolute do the trick. Why is this? Because the concrete brings in the best of the two worlds. A fresh green spicyness with a campherous woody line and a dark green flowery note with a sweet tenacious coumarin line. Well, then: Be it… So, I am trying something new, because… I am not pleased with anything I got so far.  More to follow for sure

Findomestic Jazz Experience Vol 2 on both ears, playing hypnotic drugstore, some memories and ideas in the grey wobbly fat matter that sits in between the ear plugs, a somewhat thrilling week in my bones and a labtop in front of me….. no way around it: I have to do some thinking soon with decisions associated to it that I did not bother taking so far.

A mail from Germany, Berlin, a shop right in the middle of everything in Berlin, sounds like a top location and a top place to be… woke me up this morning, asking me for distribution conditions. Whether it is gonna work out later next year or not, does not matter here: We have a distribution channel issue.

In Zurich we face it, too. People want it, L’air du dĂ©sert marocain. Generally, we tried not to grow too fast in the past, saying no to a couple of potential distributors abroad. Sounds strange to you? Well, trust me…looking at what is at the heart of this Tauer Perfumes thing, this makes perfect sense: On one hand it is Tauer, on the other hand it is ….joy. Joy of doing the absurd and almost impossible, joy of playing…

I still feel it is funny thinking that there is somewhere in Zurich a guy, doing this perfume thing of his, in a world where there is a rain of perfumes begging for attention everywhere with multimillion Dollar adds, like there was rain around Noah when he finally took care on Mr. and Ms. Beaver to safe them for future fur coat designers.

Well, be it. I will finish this day which started so nicely with a look at the paypal account and the mail box that contained a few friendly mails from fellow perfume lovers. And then there will be plenty of time to think. 
Already here: A fragrant weekend to you’ll!

Not much to post today….

Hence, I send you fragrant wishes, out of a train driving through Switzerland, l’air du dĂ©sert marocain rising from my shoulders, bringing up images of sand dunes and souks with camels and donkeys, memories of last year in Tunesia with this old man on his old donkey, both about the same size, or the rotting dead camel that we found when jogging on the countryside, or the rose geranium that was growing all aroung us in the hotel, and the bundles of jasmine flowers that you could buy on the beach;

mixing with a landscape passing by the train window,  here in middle Europe where things are soft and green, and a gentle sun rising behind some clouds on the horizon, without rotting camels and jasmine bushes.
Fragrant wise, this day started perfectly.

Everything is clearing up again, the nose, the mood, the brain. Praised be my antibodies and T-cells that work silently but most efficiently, fighting there way up. There is light on the horizon and a few scents in the nose.

The moon over Zurich saw a hyacinth note last night, a flowery chypre from a  composition point of view, unbalanced somewhat, modified with more rose absolute and a touch of orange flower, emanating from a bedroom, transforming an innocent September night into the scented picture of a vibrant May lust.
The perfumer applied some of this diluted! fragrance trial and W., innocent and honest, commented the next morning that this night was like sleeping next to a huge, gigantic, bombastic bouquet of flowers; Well, in order to be honest, W. said a dying bouquet of flowers. Somewhat too much, W. said, and trust me, we are not starting from zero here!

Thus, bottom line: Smells nice, with a line in it that tips towards not agreable because it is too much. I know exactly what I have to do here… bring out the Chypre base, soften and reduce it and and and… now: I can not really tell you why I bother about it. It is -again- just something to follow on the side, pure joy of playing, of creating this bombastic flower which is so lovely green, bringing a smile on a moon, with memories of spring.

I forgot to mention (although I am kind of somewhat proud….):

March posted on the orris scent. Here you can read her review.
I especially like her commenting on the orris, agarwood, frankincense/sandalwood combo, as this theme is one of my key issues in the fragrance , one of my key troubles in creating it, too. Enjoy and please visit her blog….

Fragrant wishes! The nose is not free, yet. Thus, no scent adventures. But…. once the little smelling bud is there again I am curious to sniff my latest trial of the lavender scent. I constructed it based on my memories and on my last meeting with Vero. In this sniffing exchange meeting, we figured out the differences between my last versions and how what components influences what in which way.
Basically, I tried to build a new trial, bringing in what is good from two different sets. So far, I got a faint picture of this new trial, as the nose is really blocked. It is going to be truly exciting, as usually I do not follow my Excel formula in a strict sense, I tend to modify on the go, but not this time: No nose, no changes…..

It is the season again; yes, it is autumn, or it feels like it at least. You can sense it in the morning, when waking up in the dark, you feel it in the colours of the first morning light and you are remembered in it when trying to make a deep breath through a swollen nose.
You got it: A cold with associated symptoms affects a perfumer’s well being right now.

Nothing to worry, though: The perfect time to care about long due print stuff, such as a joint flyer of Medieval art&vie, Brahim tours (walking through the Saharan desert with camels, in small groups, three times a year, never did it, but sounds wonderful) and Tauer perfumes. As always: Design by Tauer, corrections by Medieval art&vie. The bottom line of this leporello: All about Morocco; living in Morocco, travelling in Morocco, books and craftmanship, and two perfumes.

It is kind of an experiment, in cross-selling and connecting different potential entry points.

The word Morocco Marokko “al-maghrib” in Maghribi-writing.
© Daniel Reichenbach www.arabische-kalligrafie.ch

I wish you all a fragrant autumn Sunday!

(decorated table at Basman Vernissage, Sept 06)

At the end of this week it is time to look back. There was a time before yesterday’s event with lingering questions such as “will it work? what will they say?” And there is the time after it, with some of the questions answered.
Will it work?-> yes and no. It surely was appreciated what we did. Our guests loved to sniff what we brought them, the perfumes as well as the individual natural delights that I brought twith me: Sandalwood, Vetiver, Patchouli, Cederwood, Jasmine, Rose, Mandarin, Bitter Orange. I had some really interesting discussions about perfumery in general and -of course-about my perfumes. The room, where we were in, was transformed into an oriental place, a jasmine field, the spices of a souk nearby and Texas calling around the corner… There is a “but”, though. I think, it was a little bit too much. Scentwise, and also the whole evening. The music (which was really cool, wonderful rythms), the food (gigantic), the vernissage of the new cloths (see the perfumer wearing happily his Basman T-shirt), the lecture and the perfumer with his perfumes. There is a limit of things you can combine. We sure reached the limit!

What will they say?-> Amazingly, I got a lot of questions about the price for my natural delights, that I have diluted in ethanol, at about 5%, this is funny, and wonderful in a sense, because it shows how appreciated these absolutes and essential oils are. Then, again interestingly, there were a lot of questions about the lonestar memories. I had one lady who tried it and then said it reminded her of a wide land, of freedom. She said this before knowing the name or anything else of the Lonestar Memories perfume. That felt good, for sure.

Finally, I got quite some questionmarks. People can’t believe that you can make perfumes without a multi million dollar pillow to sit on…

I fooled around with Phenylethylalcohol lately, when Guy Roberts “Le sens du Parfum” came to my mind again, where he describes Coty’s little trick to bring in oakmoss absolute into his Chypre, without it becoming too dominant in the body, without it covering everything with a sticky oakmoss layer. Coty seemed to have made an oakmoss - ethylalcohol tincture, at boiling temperature equilibrated. Other perfumers and perfumery houses of these times often used phenylethylalcohol as solvent, for instance for benzoin. I was amazed when I read it the first time that Coty boiled his oakmoss. Interesting: Coty basically cooked his crude oakmoss absolute in alcohol, for how long?, what was his oakmoss absolute like? I have to try this once, too. On the other hand…with our modern restrictions on the use of oakmoss there is not much danger anymore of having too much oakmoss in your perfumes.

Here the rought translation of the original text (below)

“Coty realized that the absolute of oakmoss was too monolitic for the use he had in mind in his Chypre and in L’Emeraude. As a matter of fact, Oakmoss absolute is a product with a heavy initial note. It smells in a sense a bit like varnish, but with such a staying power and a strength that it would simply “eat up” the base of any perfume that contains a significant amount of it. He therefore figured out to treat himself the crude oakmoss absolue; dispensing the oakmoss in ethylalcohol and by heating this mixture up to the boiling point….and by filtering it finally. This way he got a product that was the head note of oakmoss, but without its staying power. This, in the case of his Chypre, allowed him this harmonious grouping of the three woody notes, being Sandalwood, Vetiver and Patchouli. Without this little “trick”, the sandalwood and the vetiver would have been completely hidden by the ominpresent oakmoss absolute, and the patchouli would have been too present (dominant)”

“Coty….avait remarquĂ© que les absolues de mousse de chĂŞne Ă©taient des produits trop « monolithiques » pour l’emploi qu’il voulait en faire dans son Chypre et dans l’Emeraude: en effet, la mousse de chĂŞne est un produit au dĂ©part puisant. Il a une sorte d’odeur de vernis, mais d’une tĂ©nacitĂ© et d’une puissance telle qu’elle « dĂ©vorait » le fon des parfums qui en contenaient de façon substantielle. Il imagina donc de traiter lui-mĂŞme la mousse de chĂŞne brute en la faisant baigner dans de l’alcool Ă©thylique et en chauffant ce mĂ©lange jusqu’au Ă©bullition ….en le filtrant aussitĂ´t. Il obtenait ainsi un produit qui Ă©tait la note de tĂŞte de la mousse de chĂŞne, mais qui n’avait pas sa tĂ©nacitĂ©. Cela, dans le cas de son Chypre, lui permit cette harmonieuse association des trois notes « boisĂ©e » que sont le santal, le vĂ©tiver et le patchouli. Sans ce petit « truct », le santal et le vĂ©tiver auraient Ă©tĂ© occultĂ©es par le fond omniprĂ©sent de l’absolue de mousse de chĂŞne, et le patchouli aurait Ă©tĂ© trop prĂ©sent !”

Guy Robert, Le sens du parfum.