Mystic of perfume making

[AbdesSalaam Attar, Perfumer Composer]

There are different ways to start the work of composing perfumes, but the spirit of it should be one; “Kodo”, the Way of Scent, the zen of perfume.

In the hebrew mystic all senses bring pleasure to the body except the sense of smell which gives pleasure to the soul.

In the sufi way each “state” is associated with a fragrance, and in semitic languages the word “nice smelling” (Tayyib) is a synonym for the word “good”.

For this reason a would be perfumer should learn his base notes wearing them first of all and, if they are natural, learning it’s properties in olfactory psychology and aromatherapy.

For many people the encounter with pure essential oils and aromatic raw materials is a shock, because they are used to smell diluted fragrances. Observing this I designed this kit as a first step for the very beginners who have only known commercial diluted perfumes.

They can use each base note singly as a perfume to wear, learning it’s effects on their own soul and observing it’s impact on others.

The kit of diluted essences also allows to know and work with notes whose price would be prohibitive if they were pure, such as Iris absolute or Tuberose, and others who are also difficult to find “undoctored”, at the best of their quality.

The spray bottles of this kit are designed to allow their use as a perfume, in the same way as a usual one, and allows to compose fragrances in a very quick way. Each spraying is a little more than a drop, the scents blend immediatly in the vial and you have a fair idea of the final product you would obtain producing an alcoholic base perfume.

I myself use this system to check the result of accords with expensive or rare products, for example I can smell the result of an accord containing Tuberose or iris or sandalwood without wasting precious drops of the pure material.
If I like the accord, I shall work on it with pure absolutes and essences.
Moreover I can check accords with material which do not exist as absolutes or E. O, such as Ambergris or some other tincture I make myself.

Obviously the more advance steps are first, using pure raw materials as personal perfume and second, working with them for composing, but the kit of the aprentice perfumer is just an introduction to the art, even if it turns useful even to a professional composer.

AbdesSalaam Attar
Compositore Profumiere

[AbdesSalaam Attar, Perfumer Composer]

The Kodo way of scent, “listening to the soul” while smelling perfumes, is the way to translate into words the smell itself.
In fact in the Japanese Way of scents the participant should recognize and voice not only the names of the components but also describe the emotions that the fragrance produces on him and the memories it awakens.
The Japanese Kodo is a very civilized olfactory education method.

In fact the base of olfactory education is to be able to name the smells by their name.
One is surprised by the number of persons who smell absolute of coffee or lemon essence and who smile with pleasure over the bottle, recognizing only happy memories associated to the smell, without being able to name these most familiar smells. Part of this first step is to recognize the different ingredients of a composition.

The second step is to listen to the soul and to become aware of the emotions and memories the smell produces, describing them.

The third step is to learn the very special language of perfumers in order to be able to describe a smell as you can describe a scene.
If you never were taught the words “round” or “fresh” or “deep” together with experiencing the specific smells which are typical of these descriptions, how can you describe fragrances or smells of any kind.

The Kodo way of listening to the soul is also the right way of naming of a new fragrance for the perfumer. In fact everything that exists has it’s name, the name of a new perfume is not to be invented (by marketing staff) but rather discovered (unveiled) by adepts of Kodo.

Sometimes, just because the birth of a perfume is like the birth of a song, the perfumer’s starting point is the name of the perfume, for instance “Holy water”.
In that case he will use his ability of Kodo (again “listening to the soul”) to compose a scent who bears that name.

AbdesSalaam Attar
Compositore Profumiere

[AbdesSalaam Attar, Perfumer Composer]

“listening to the soul” while smelling a fragrance is the basic of making perfumes, becoming aware of the emotions it produces and of the memories it awakens. The exercise of describing them by words sums up the method of Kodo (the Japanese Way of Perfume), because by wording, one conceptualizes, and by conceptualizing one intellectually appropriates the emotional experiences.
This rationalization of irrational experiences (olfactory emotions) allows the perfumer to lean on his intelligence while following his emotions during the process of perfume composing.

AbdesSalaam Attar
Compositore Profumiere

[Author]

Posts