Welcome to a perfumer's blog on perfumery

The W.-factor has become operative and supportive. Yesterday’s visit of the foam company resulted in 5 samples, two of which are out of question. Three are ok with parameters being black or white, little pores, easy handling (for the foam company and us) , price, material.

The favorite is a cross-linked polyethylene foam, nitrogen foamed, containing less plastic than your coke PET bottle,  not CO2 neutral, but probably better than what I had before. And to be honest: If I truly want to worry about CO2 then I worry about my car, my plane flights, my apartment’s heating and my sending perfume bottles around the globe by plane. Once you start thinking about these things you get all confused; sitting in Zurich, evaluating foam from a British company, for perfumes built around fragrant oils from India and other places, in bottles from Austria, that are boxed in Switzerland and shipped later to Australia….
Anyhow, we decided after long and serious debate and half an hour thinking in bed before 6 am: The white one, somewhat stiff plastazote inlay. This will be it. Next step: Get a quotation for the customized inlay…. yupieh! The FAQ about the foam says “The shelf life of the foam is limitless. In most applications the foams have withstood many decades of use without failure.” Thus, you will be able to enjoy my inlays in centuries to come. Welcome to the big exciting world of plastazote…..
If you are curious to learn more about this fun material: here’s the link.

Picture: three foam qualities, black and white. To the left you see  a whitish bubble foil pack. This is what we used, wrapped in white paper, as inlay for the boxes.

After a most pleasurable evening yesterday with lots of chatting on fragrances, here we go back to the real world:
Below you see a picture of what will keep us busy for a while… Tauer’s sample box tower.

When everyone else was rushing downtown last Saturday to celebrate Street Parade 08 (a gigantic party with some 800′000 participants, dancing in the streets to the rythm of a few gigawatt and enjoying live, I attended the first parades when finishing my phd, celebrating with a few ten thousand back then….) I headed north, hit the mall and searched for the ultimate solution to my sample storage problem. I realized that I need larger stock, kind of of buffer, and a less spacious storage option.

Coming home with a few plastic boxes we have solved this one.
The challenge for the next few weeks: Fill this baby! In the mean time, today, the W.-factor is on his way to a nearby town, talking to a company there about custom made, closed-pore, foamed inlays for my white cardboard boxes, replacing the little home made cushions.

We are all thrilled…
Picture: The sample storage tower, room for 6x 300 samples.

Yesterday, the moment was there and the vetiver dance stock solution went into dilution to 25 lt.

This is the moment of truth, every time when I dilute a stock solution the first time. Mixing a large batch (2.5 liter) of stock and letting things mature undiluted with ethanol might lead to minor changes. Well, if anything changed, then it was to the better this time. After dilution I took an aliquot and sprayed it on a paper strip, went jogging for two hours, came back, and realized how Vetiver dance filled the room. Lovely.

Other activities this weekend: Order stuff like ribbons that go around the sample discovery set that sells in the shop of Pascal (Medieval art&vie in Zurich) like hot bread.
And one of the biggest moments of joy this weekend: Adding a new comment on the bottle on a journey! Yes, the bottle is still traveling (I have given up, to be honest). But yesterday, I got a mail from ComDiva and could upload the newest comment on my website. Here is the link to ComDiva’s comment on the hyacinth and a mechanic scent still traveling in the US.
  Picture: The moment of truth… diluting Vetiver dance into 25 lt drums.

And a quick update on the flyer for the vetiver dance: Done!

Here is the preview of the final version (front and back), following my limited Corporate identity. It will go to the printer shop asap, at the latest next week.
Vetiver dance flyer front side

  Vetiver dance flyer back side
The text says:

A twirling dance,
notes revolving,
joyfully around vetiver.

Fresh top notes of grapefruit, black pepper,
green clary sage leaves and brilliant
lily of the valley circle around a heart of
dark vetiver from Java, embracing crisp
cedar wood and soft ambergris with a hint of
cistus and tonka beans in the base.

This first three lines I have in mind since quite a while, since July 9 to be precise, after having read Dimitri’s post on the fragrance. Thank you, Dimitri!

I am getting the back side of the flyer for the Vetiver dance ready. This translates into: Calculating the percentages of 76/768/EWG allergens for the EU conform declaration of allergens according to the EU directives. Uff.

Basically, this translates into sitting in front of excel and type in number of percentages of allergens per fragrance ingredient and then later do the math to see whether you are above for instance 0.01% in the final mix.

I will then use this information to label the flyer’s back side. When looking at my rose absolute from Bulgaria (which is yummie! ) then suddenly this precious oil develops into what seems to be a toxic liquid.
So here we go:

Rose absolute in Vetiver dance undiluted master mix: 3%

Containing: Limonen, Linalool, Neral, Geranial, Citronellol, Geraniol, Benzylalcohol, Methyleugenol, Eugenol, Farnesol. All in amounts to be eventually considered for the label as we have to sum things up.
Be aware: my fragrances contains rose absolute!

And the mind starts to wonder, flies away, dreaming of true freedom.

  Picture: A sea gull seen in the sky over the Normandy, uploaded by Andy.

The Vetiver dance bottle label is there! Yesterday was exciting for several reasons. I got the latest order of bottles delivered to my house and I am -when it comes to bottles- ready to hit X-mas and have my peace of mind there. And I got the label for the Vetiver dance bottle. It looks like expected.

More than expected: The German version of the sample discovery set is selling like hot cookies; and the W-Factor and me found us yesterday evening making more samples, and preparing discovery sets, for my preferred and only point of sales in Zurich….Medieval art & vie.

And the shelves of what I thought is a fabulous stock of l’air du désert is almost empty.
Thus, busy days ahead.
Here, I would like to share with you a few thoughts and pictures, while visiting the Normandy, on the way south to the Bretagne.
  We have cycled a lot of beaches in Normandy. And it is these shores where Europe was saved.
Visiting the American cemetery of WWII at Omaha beach is heart breaking.
  The price for freedom paid by so many…
allowing us to live our life in peace .

hullu…I am back, from a wonderful vacation. And guess what: I am digging through a pile of paper and mails right now, which lets me place just a little “hello world” post right now..
An indication on how nice it was: I made about 1 photo every 1.5 km. Statistically, of course. Thus, I ended up with something like 600 photos (Yep, got a new shiny 8 GB flash card before leaving), lost a few pounds and have made a few more turns on the carousel of life…

Picture: Uploaded by Andy, carousel, seen in the Normandy at night.