Old and new myth of perfumery

From my house in Lefke

Fixative ingredients are one of the strongest myths of perfumery.

If what you intend by fixative is a single molecule that will smell on your skin for hours after all the rest of the perfume has disappeared, then fixatives exist; they are called calone, macrocyclic musks, and so on… The more persistent, the more incompatible with your biology and the more dangerous to your health, I affirm.

If by fixative you intend an aromatic product that will carry your whole perfume over time, give it persistence on your skin without leaving pieces of it behind, then listen to Guy Robert.

The author of Madame Rochas, Caleche, Equipage, Gucci Parfum and Dioressence says: “Lasting power is not easy to reach, nobody knows how and why this is happening. I hate and find stupid that theory of “fixateurs”.   We all know these many little songs we are hearing anywhere and forgetting almost immediately, but, from time to time, one of these songs sticks to our ear and we go on whistling it the whole day … I can assure you the author of these successful songs do not use any “fixatives ingredients” to get that result …”.
“Nobody knows why this is happening…”

He just explained how a few musical notes put into a melody can have such a power that you can hear it all day in your mind.
How does this happen? Surely not with a fixative note in the melody.
Likewise, a few perfumery ingredients blended into an accord will produce a perfume that will last all day on you.
“Nobody knows how this happens,” he says to his emeritus colleagues in his address, “certainly not with a fixative ingredient.

This is food for thought. Remember how often you heard about fixative ingredients from apparently competent and qualified persons.
More competent and qualified than Guy Robert.

“Lasting power is not easy to reach…” he says. I would say that it can be reached mostly by sheer luck or maybe by inspiration. If by “lasting perfume,” you intend the last molecule of Calone or Sandeol that sticks to the skin, you still have to smell an authentic long-lasting fragrance.