Tuberose Perfumes – Properties, Distillation, and History
Table of contents
Tuberose botanical name and overview
Tuberose, scientifically known as Agave Amica (formerly, Polianthes tuberosa), is a flowering perennial plant that was originally native to Mexico, now widely grown throughout the world as an ornamental plant. The extracts of tuberose flowers are highly respected and used as a note in perfumery.
Tuberose perfume is among the top notes in natural perfumes. The flowers are consumed as a symbol of purity, peace, and innocence, therefore, are often used in bridal bouquets.
Properties
The natural properties of tuberose flowers and their absolutes would be antispasmodic and anti-inflammatory. Various chemical compounds produce a pleasant smell that relaxes the nerves, muscles, and brain.
Tuberose perfume can help calm the soul and reduce tension, anxiety, stress, anger, and depression. The pleasant fragrance is also beneficial for developing intuition and solving problems.
The tuberose flower is toxic in its nature and inedible like the flower lily. Two varieties of tuberose are majorly used – “Usual tuberose” is used as notes in perfumery for its powerful organoleptic properties. Another variety, known as “Pearl tuberose“, is used to compose floral decorations.
In Latin America, pearl tuberose is an essential part of bridal bouquets and is placed at the entrance of the house to welcome guests with its magical fragrance.
Some studies suggested that Aztecs used to cultivate tuberose for flavoring their chocolate, an aphrodisiac blend of vanilla beans, cocoa beans, and chili.
In India and Bangladesh, women make tuberose wreaths and garlands for temples as offerings and for use as wedding ornaments. Tuberose perfumes are also used in the arrangements of funerals and other occasions. Tuberose concrete is an essential ingredient for making numerous incense mixtures and cosmetics.
In Indonesia, tuberose is a part of delicious cooking.
The smell of natural tuberose perfume is rich and precious. Its rarity comes with its cost. The floral scents of tuberose perfumes are powerful and even hard for the delicate nose. The olfactive spectrum of tuberose perfumes is large and kaleidoscopic.
The scent of natural tuberose absolute is like an explosive bouquet of natural flowers. It’s extremely complex which gives the olfactive illusion of multiple flowers and their extracts. Its green and narcotic notes exude the smells of Narcissus species while its milky notes reveal the scents of exotic flowers such as gardenia, tiare (Tahitian gardenia), and frangipani.
The exotic notes of tuberose may partner with cold spices. The tuberose absolute contains several fatty acid variations such as palmitic, linolenic, and linoleic along with odorless molecules that make up about 20 % of the ingredients. Butyric acid provides the smell of fatty notes. Its sillage is honeyed and sweet such as genet and beeswax absolute that can linger for a long.
Distillation
Previously, it was the practice to leverage the enfleurage (cold) technique. The cold enfleurage technique is suitable for extracting the fragrant oil from the most delicate flowers such as jonquil, jasmine, and tuberose that usually cannot tolerate heat. In the cold enfleurage process, tuberose flowers are kept on a layer of animal fats for around 72 hours. This traditional method is tedious and takes a longer time.
In modern times, with technological advancements extraction methods have significantly evolved while preserving the fragile olfactive quality of the plant.
Concretes are derived by the hexane extraction method from freshly harvested tuberose flowers. From these concretes, absolutes can be extracted either by ethanol or by supercritical CO2 extraction.
History
Tuberose is originally native to southern Mexico and Central America. The flower landed in India through the Philippines. Two other routes were reported to Europe. One was via Spain to France, another via Persia to Provence.
Tuberose was formerly known as Tuberosa Polianthes. It was named “hyacinth of India” which means “flower of towns”. The term “Polianthes” came from the Greek word “polis” which means “city” and “anthos” which means “flower”. The name of its genus refers to the fleshy tuberous root of the plant. Tuberose is among the agave family which comprises around 13 species. Every species of this plant is more or less fragrant.
In recent days, tuberose is widely cultivated in the Comoros, Morocco, China, and India for processing.
It is said that a French missionary brought the first tuberose bulbs in 1530 from Mexico and confidentially grew them in a garden near Toulon. Then tuberose was significantly developed in Italian Liguria, Languedoc, and Provence, across the second half of the 17th century especially for merchants, apothecaries, and glovemakers.
During Italian Renaissance, it was prohibited for unmarried girls to walk through tuberose gardens for their bewitching and erotic power, so they wouldn’t sink into the intoxicating scents of the flowers and men maddened by the bewitching smells. Where jasmine absolutes reveal the joy on the faces, it is said that women who exude the fragrance of tuberose might cause mimicry recalling orgasm.
Tuberose absolute has been used in fine fragrances in the past. Older perfumes containing various amounts of tuberose were mostly created in the early part of the 20th century.
Final words
Tuberose perfumes are popular for their unmatched fragrance and effective healing powers. Unfortunately, tuberose perfumes available in the market nowadays are mostly synthetic. Though synthetic tuberose fragrances smell somehow similar to the natural, you cannot get any healing effect from these synthetic fragrances. Besides, synthetic tuberose perfumes may produce some adverse effects on your body and mind as well.
We highly recommend only natural tuberose perfumes to get maximum benefits of tuberose essence. You can use pure tuberose perfume or mix it with other flower oils to blend your favorite scent.
At La Via del Profumo, we ensure 100 % natural perfumes created with natural substances derived from natural resources such as flowers, leaves, barks, resins, roots ( and animal pheromones for the non-vegan category).
Check out our natural perfumes containing Tuberose
Our Tuberose perfume
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