My stock of Le Maroc pour elle is down to some dozens bottles and hence there was an urgent need to remix another stock. As the last two weeks saw me waiting for some raw materials used in Le Maroc and as I did not want to mix it when still not feeling ok (I had sort of a cold for the last three weeks): It took a while until the circumstances were right. Yesterday they were.

So you see: Le Maroc pour elle was my first scent that I created 8 years ago for the little bookshop in Zurich that is still exclusive for Zurich/Switzerland: Medieval art&vie. It is a debut novel, telling an epic and dramatic story of opulent roses and jasmine from Morocco, mixing bright citrus sparkles with dark and sensual patchouli, exclusive sandalwood (think: Mysore) and cedarwood from the High Atlas.

I haven’t calculated production costs since years. Yesterday, when I poured and weighted and mixed, I figured, I should. Prices for essential oils have changed drastically the last 8 years and I guess I am in for a suprise there. So besides enjoying the thick essential oils and absolutes, I was thinking “prices”, and “formula”: Mixing an old formula following a print-out from Excel is like a time travel. To be honest: I would never do Le Maroc pour elle the same way again. I guess, I marched quite some miles these last few years and today, le Maroc pour elle would probably be a bit less dramatic, a bit less “fifties style” but I would definitely stick to Cedarwood essential oil (Atlas variety).

Le Maroc pour elle is the only scent from my line where I use cedarwood from the High Atlas. In other scents I use cedarwood essential oil, like in the Air du désert marocain, but there I use the Texan variety that is totally different. What is sweet and a bit clingy in the Atlas variety is dry and vibrantly woody in the Texan variety. Actually, there is one exception: the COLOGNE DU MAGHREB, there you find Atlas Cedarwood essential oil. But the cologne is not part of my regular range, thus you find it online at Indiescents.com and First in Fragrance. (It is an all natural botanical rich cologne)

So I mixed Le Maroc pour elle yesterday, in my mixing room, shutters half closed, into a 12.5 liter aluminum vessel, through a large funnel. The vessel looks a bit used outside, but inside it is all polished and clean. It is lot/batch 014, this means that since its launched Le Maroc I have mixed juice for about 3500 bottles. Yep: Le Maroc pour elle still comes in small batches of 12.5 liters, contrary to scents like Incense extrême or Air du désert or Orange Star that come in 50 or 60 liter batches, Le Maroc pour elle was never going big scale. That’ s very fine with me. It is niche in my artisanal niche in the niche corner universe.

While mixing, I took the picture of today, against the light, contours faded, with the sun breaking into sparkles through the essential oil of Cedarwood from Morocco. It felt like the sun was inside the liquid.