1. style and fashion
2. beauty
3. perfume

 Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer:
Letters to a Fellow Perfumer
(ep. 1)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on S E P T E M B E R 2 8 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
*PREFACE: I was contacted a few weeks ago by Andy Tauer with the idea that he and Mandy
Aftel could publicly share an ongoing exchange with interested readers as to how two
established yet thoroughly independent perfumers might approach common obstacles and
solve creative problems in the process of crafting works from the same starting point.
I was more than happy to provide the forum, and I know that most of you will read the public
correspondence between these two fiercely independent artists with great enthusiasm. Below
are the first of their letters, with more to follow as Aftel and Tauer communicate their thoughts
and experiences throughout the progress of this project together.
From Andy Tauer, Zurich, September 19 2010
Dear Mandy,
I hope these lines find you well.
It is with great pleasure that I write this short letter to you, and –- as this is an open letter — to
an interested round of perfume lovers.
I returned from Pitti Fragranze (THE niche perfume exhibition in Italy) a few days ago. I saw
new brands, existing brands, banal brands, over-sexed brand imagery, desperate trials to
position brands where they do not belong. I smelled some of the industry’s latest creations,
and while several of my colleagues have come up with thrilling new works, most of the
novelties were “acqua banale” . . . at least to my nose. Uninspired, flat, missing the passion of
an engaged creator.
Natural beauty has become a very rare thing in perfumery, something which I have a hard time
understanding.
Thus, I am happy that I can write to you after we corresponded by email a while ago. We
started talking about artisanal perfumery, sharing first impressions on raw materials,
discussing our common feelings and appreciations. It’s like talking to a sister in arms when I
talk to you. We share a passion. Our creations are different as we use different languages
(materials) when creating, but we share the enthusiasm for natural raw materials and we take
the composing of perfumes seriously.
I admit I sometimes feel like a dinosaur — one of a few non-commercially affiliated perfumers,
and on the brink of extinction. When you proposed that we might do a little project together,
like working on a theme and then exchanging how we work, my heart started to sing! The idea
to pick two “natural treasures” (personally treasured natural essences) that we will both create
a piece of work from — one essence from my own range and one from yours — while sharing
how we approach, describe and interpret them in a fragrance, is more than exciting.
Yes, we are not alone and yes, like brother and sister, we are stronger together.
I feel like the two of us are building a bridge between worlds that sometimes seem so far
away, but actually are very close, especially when viewing the world of artisanal perfumery in
light of where the commercial industry is at present.
I feel we have something to say and that there is a great need for what we do, as there are so
few of us left.
I look very much forward to continuing our exchange, publicly, and I want to thank Nathan for
providing a home where we can share our continuing discussion. Merci, Nathan. Merci, Mandy
With fragrant hugs,
Yours, Andy
*Below is Mandy’s reply:
From Mandy Aftel, Berkeley, September 27, 2010
Dear Andy,
Yes, I too was excited about the meeting of the minds that you and I experienced, and am
grateful for this chance to commiserate about the state of the perfume industry, as well as to
collaborate with such a talented and inspired perfumer.
Like yourself, I take such pleasure in the creation of perfume as both as art and product that I
find it heartbreaking to observe what the world of commercial perfume has been producing.
But we can take solace in what appears to be a growing climate of authentic interest and
hunger among consumers for artistic expression in perfumery.
Before becoming a perfumer, I was a psychotherapist specializing in artists and writers. I
constantly read the journals and biographies of great artists, always interested in the
intersection between the creator and the art.
Creating perfume is usually such a solitary pursuit that I love the idea of working together and
sharing our creative processes. Because you know and love so many of the natural-botanical
essences, our palettes share a lot in common. And I treasure our common values – our
passion for these exquisite source materials and our fascination for what the creative process
reveals, inspired by the endless possibilities.
Endless and thrilling possibilities, at least in the beginning; and then each essence that you
add limits what you can do next. I am excited to walk through this creative process with you
hand-in-hand, as we discuss openly how we deal with these choices.
To start with, I have chosen the enigmatic fire tree oil from Australia as my “natural treasure”,
and your selection is the lovely yet tricky linden blossom CO2 that you like from Bulgaria.
These are far enough apart that I will be creating two different perfumes from these starting
points.
With warm thanks to you and to Nathan Branch for hosting our exchange,
Yours in inspired discourse,
Mandy
Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer: Letters to a Fellow
Perfumer (ep. 2)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on O C T O B E R 1 3 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
Dear Mandy:
I hope these lines find you well. I know how busy you must be so shortly before the holiday
season, which is also a fragrance and scent season, so thank you for the time you’re taking to
read my thoughts on the Linden blossom scent.
*Note from Nathan: Wikipedia states that the Linden tree is a species of the Tilia genus, and
is called Lime in the UK (Linden was originally an adjective that meant, “made from limewood”), but the tree is called Linden or Basswood in North America, with neither the name nor
the tree related to the citrus fruit called “lime”.
In a sense, the holidays are also about sharing joy, and perfumes can bring a lot of joy into this
world. Actually, I am convinced that perfumes can make us genuinely happy. It can be a
“simple” cologne that explodes in front of the nose and brings back memories of days long
gone, or it can be the joy of exploring a perfume in all its facets, how it evolves on skin, how it
shines with its different ingredients that melt into fragrant melodies in constant change.
Yesterday, I visited a large (very large) perfume department of an enormous shopping
destination in London, though it could have be any major city in the world. I was searching for
that element of joy and found it disappointingly absent, with other terms coming to my mind,
instead: “luxury” in the sense of shiny packaging and high prices (the retail price, not the cost
of what’s inside the bottle), with an almost neurotic fixation on “bling-bling” and the use of
oversexed models for marketing.
I talked to a few of the sales assistants going through their sales pitch routines, and one guy
was actually, truthfully sharing his joy. You could feel it. So there is hope. But maybe there’s a
simple question that anyone shopping for a perfume should ask him/herself before buying:
“How much joy will this fragrance bring into my life?”
But before drifting completely away from the original subject, I want to take the opportunity to
share with you my thoughts on the linden blossom extract. When I smelled it the first time, my
immediate association was: honey. But it didn’t remind me of a heavy, dark and viscous honey
that you get from bees in the forest. No, it’s a gentle honey note that reminds of an acacia
honey — almost clear, with exceptional fluidity.
*Note 2 from Nathan: Linden blossom nectar is prized for the pale but mildly spicy monofloral
honey it produces. Many honeybee colonies are purposely located near Linden groves for this
reason.
This first impression was based on sniffing the unopened aluminum bottle, which is, in a
sense, sniffing the head space over the flacon. Putting the carbon dioxide (CO2) extracted
essential oil onto paper strips, the picture becomes more complex. First, the scent is incredibly
delicate. Faint. And it doesn’t last very long on paper. It’s the scent of Linden blossom in
combination with the scent of Linden blossom tea.
I look at it as a combo, but I care more for the “blossom” than the tea; thus, to my nose, it is a
top to middle note, but a soft middle note that needs a very careful hand, otherwise this
blossom will be crushed.
Second, there is something odd about it, an undertone that is not bitter, not powdery, but
somewhat “dark and low”, and even damp in a sense. My vocabulary is not sufficient here, but
it reminds me faintly (and vaguely) of damp wool. It is a side note, but I feel like I need to blend
this out.
Photo of Linden tree with blossoms by Andy Tauer
We have in German a song that goes like “Am Brunnen vor dem Tore, da steht ein
Lindenbaum” (literally translated this means, “At the fountain close to the door, there stands a
Linden tree”); thus, I smelled the Linden blossom extract and imagined sitting by this fountain,
with the tree blooming in early summer. I see the little flowers — you would hardly recognize
them as flowers (they are totally unsexy and non-bling bling) — perched on the tree, with each
part of the whole emitting a tiny little burst of perfume, all summed up in a wave of warm,
sweet Linden blossom.
I realize that I may use this Linden blossom extract to bring back for a fleeting moment this
fragrant picture. I do not think I can, nor want, to make a soliflore that is solely a linden
blossom scent. I would guess there are bases available from XYZ that might provide exactly
this, but comparing the linden extract with this picture in my mind (fountain, door, tree, early
summer), I realized that I need to pump up my linden extract to make it more radiant, more
expansive, less shy.
And I figure it needs to become a bit “bloomier” — in a sense of more blossoms and less damp
wool. To make it shine and add more bloom to it, I think I’ll build a rose into it, with rose
absolue (not the oil, or if then, only the gentlest whiff of the oil), since Rose absolue has a
honey quality to it, too. If adding a bit of Geranium, citronellol and especially phenylethanol,
both naturally occurring ingredients in rose absolue, the rose/linden combo will hopefully start
to bloom.
To make the Linden blossom less shy, I could use a gentle line of Neroli. Neroli has, for me,
an effect that is uplifting, adding buoyancy, vibrancy and sillage to the middle of a perfume
built around the linden blossom. Rather quickly associating with Neroli (a new love in my life,
by the way . . . I feel I’m entering a neroli phase right now), I imagined the head notes to
feature a classical cologne accord: lemon, bergamot, with traces of other citrus, but not so
much as to disturb the middle notes.
Still unsolved in my head is the base of this fragrance. I figured a sandalwood base that helps
fix the flowers at the heart without becoming dominant, but a first experiment showed me that
sandalwood tears everything down. I tried the neroli, linden, rose chords and I can see that it
might work (I am always and utterly optimistic when creating perfumes). After a nice opening,
however, the sandalwood dulls the fragrance, so I’ll need to add a twist, maybe building a
contrast to the flowers’ bloom while adding some vibrancy to the base, maybe using vetiverol,
irone alpha and Atlas cedar.
Perhaps I’ll include a bit of depth and a whiff of sexy dirt by a hint of vanilla, extracted by
carbon dioxide? Ultimately, I realize that I need to pump up the linden per se. Here, I feel like
adding a bit of Lilial, and maybe even some ionones might help. Both are molecules that are
simple to use as they don’t suffocate other compounds, adding volume and brightness instead.
I hope I’ve been able to provide you with an insight into my first ideas and how I approach this
flower extract that is, like so many naturals, incredibly tricky to work with, yet so rewarding.
Let’s see where we’re heading with this — I find it quite thrilling.
I send you fragrant greetings, with warmest regards.
Andy
Berkeley, October 14, 2010
Dear Andy,
I appreciate your evocative memories of Linden blossoms – while I have no memories of my
own, one of my early custom perfume clients did. Even though I was a therapist for 20 years
before becoming a perfumer, I never ask “psychological questions” or scent associations when
making a custom perfume, since the client cannot help but reveal their deepest thoughts and
memories as they smell a selection of essences from my perfume organ. This one woman
turned suddenly dreamy at my linden blossom absolute: “Now I remember, from decades ago .
. . when I was in my 20’s . . . with my boyfriend . . . on his motorcycle . . . riding through
Germany . . . smelling the sweet aroma of Linden blossoms at night!”
The Linden Blossom CO2 has all the aromatic facets of a light and sunlit floral honey, with
none of the rich denseness of the darker honeys. I also detect a sweet floral backnote to the
linden that is very sheer. When I read your characterization of this Linden essence that we’ve
chosen to work with, I almost wanted to title my letter: “Me Too Honey.”
The linden is a fugitive and mercurial top note in extremis. The real challenge with creating a
perfume with this very delicate linden blossom is to not lose it, so that the sheer lightness and
honey don’t get buried by the middle and base notes. At first, I tried working in 190 proof grape
alcohol. I wanted to explore its fruity aromatic quality and thought it might marry well with the
linden, but alas, they were not happy together and I realized that I needed the clean white
canvas of my neutral 200 proof corn alcohol.
Feeling my way along in the dark, one point of illumination is the gorgeous top note Mimosa,
with its waxy floral sweetness marries beautifully with the evanescent linden.
*Note from Nathan: Robertet lists Mimosa Olessence as “Low temperature extraction on
natural nerolidol in order to obtain the most genuine floral odour. Odour: delicate fresh, floral,
anisic note, less herbal than the traditional mimosa absolute.”
The base and middle notes are another (and much trickier) story. I’m considering using
angelica root essential oil in the base. It is a light, musky aroma with some overlap with the
linden, and it could carry an aspect of the linden down into the base without burying it;
hopefully, its potential tartness will stay muted enough.
As with you Andy, I like the rosy, bloomy aspect of Phenyl Ethyl Alcohol and will be
experimenting with it in the middle. I’m also exploring kewda (from the pandanas plant), a
beautiful, light floral that smells like a mixture of horseradish and gardenia — rich and spicy,
yet light and transparent. The kewda could lock with the angelica root, since they both have
that light, green transparency.
I have made two complete trial perfumes so far, just as sketches of some of these preliminary
concepts. There are still many more versions up ahead — I have not yet found the key to the
door that unlocks the mysteries of this perfume, but it is refreshing to have a partner in the
search. Creating perfume is such a joyful yet usually solitary endeavor, but now as I follow my
nose, it fundamentally changes my process to search for the words to describe and share with
you Andy, and Nathan, and our readers.
With my creative process under scrutiny, I reach back into my oblivion and pull up a fresh
consciousness. I enjoy working with this raised awareness, and treasure as well the
opportunity to be in Andy’s head as he works –- I find his mind most compelling.
Thank you so very much for this meeting of the minds, hearts, and noses over this wonderful
delicate linden essence.
Warmly,
Mandy
Zurich, October 14, 2010
Dear Mandy:
Thank you so much for sharing your experience with me and the readers of Nathan’s blog. I
will be in France tomorrow, for a day trip, but hopefully, I can blog and FB comment on it over
the weekend.
I loved, loved, loved your words and I find it so interesting to follow you and your way to tackle
this essence and the creative process. For me, creation is a very, very erratic process. I can
go troubled for days, worrying about chords, going to bed with them, not finding an answer to
my question, and suddenly, while boxing perfume, riding the tramway or eating dinner, I come
to a point where I feel closer to the answer. Sometimes, my inspiration comes in bed at night.
Sometimes in supermarkets. It’s weird.
I have so far not figured out how this creative world inside me functions, and I did not find the
easy and quick access to it yet. But I am happy that there is this inspirational energy that
(sometimes) helps. Reading your words I can see that you tap this reservoir, too. I am looking
so much forward to the next letter and learning more how you approach this challenge.
I constructed a trial version — it sits there in the dark and matures now. I look forward to
sharing, as soon as it’s matured a bit more.
And now: Time (soon) for bed.
By the way: the fire tree shipment got delayed due to production issues, but I will get it mid
next week.
With fragrant hugs and rosy whiffs,
Yours,
Andy
Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer: Letters to a Fellow
Perfumer (ep. 4)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on O C T O B E R 2 6 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
Berkeley, October 21, 2010
Dear Andy,
I decided there was something I needed to think through, from the base on up, which is: “What
is every possible note that I could include with the linden CO2?”
My creative process usually starts with a pretty wide palette, but in this case, there are such
limited choices for essences that can play well with linden. I decided to just pick out all the
essences from my perfume organ that were candidates and look at them as a set, like trying to
choose playmates at the schoolyard for your child – some kids would do fine with almost
anyone, but our delicate linden is a “sensitive” child.
You have to screen out more than just the real bullies, you need to protect the linden from the
kids who would give even a sideways glance, or else linden will go away. So I decided to
make this short list of potential playmates. The picture below shows the base notes on the
right, then middles, then (very few!) tops.
Approved friends of our sensitive child, Linden
From this reduced range, I started in the base, focusing on Clary Sage concrete. This very
gentle, herbal-ambery note is much softer than the clary sage essential oil. I wanted to see
how ambergris would play as well, enhancing the ambery notes and lending a shimmering
effect to the background of the base without calling attention to itself.
In the middle, I tried the very beautiful, soft, flat smell of poplar bud absolute; slightly raisin-like
and flatly floral. Since I had to edit out the angelica root from the base in the last version
because it was too sharp, I thought to replace its role with pink pepper absolute (schinus
molle), a more floral and rounded pepper than traditional black pepper.
For the top, it seemed a no-brainer that I could extend the honey aspect of the linden blossom
with honey absolute –- the odor profiles are so similar. Wrong again! The honey (and the
poplar buds) just flatten out the linden, even though they are “light”.
I then realized that the essences desperately need to have a sheer texture to their aroma.
Linden is not just a sweet honey smell; it also has a buoyant, sparkling quality that must be
preserved, so I’ll need to pare down and move toward a simpler construction.
Less really is more in this formula.
Warmly,
Mandy
Zurich, October 23, 2010
Dearest Mandy,
Thank you so much for your latest letter and for sharing your picture with me/us. I love, love
the idea of using the pink pepper. That is clever and might indeed work. I got to know pink
pepper a few years ago, but so far have never used it in a composition; it is so much gentler
than its black variant and embraces other notes instead of punching and getting above them.
And I am deeply in love with clary sage, although I’ve found a lot of perfume lovers have a
hard time dealing with it in fragrances.
But then, we have the privilege to play and compose without having to worry about focus
groups, target groups or prices, right? And in a sense, I feel it is my mission (or rather my
“duty”) to challenge my perfume loving friends and point to new directions.
And thus, I start every fragrance with a “white piece of paper”, or rather an empty excel file,
and try to invent my chords and compositions anew. Without using pre-made bases that can
be purchased from the industry, like the Linden blossom base from Givaudan, which I have not
smelled yet, but which I’ve heard is really good, but I don’t want to use it because I love the
challenge of building compositions.
Actually, the idea of writing to you about us being privileged and about using bases came to
me during my weekend jogging. During these two hours, I always try to think about perfumes
and notes and the wide wild world of perfumery. Taking up a mental note I made, after
watching a movie the other night, I came to the this conclusion: it is the WHAT AND the WHY
we create that sets us apart — the “WHAT” in the sense that we may dare to use raw
materials that are tricky to get, like the Linden blossom extract that’s made in small quantities
by a family owned company (for our composing readers, the linden extract is from Ecomaat).
Some of these raw materials are hard to produce and are, in a sense, pieces of art in
themselves, for sure a piece of handicraft; unfortunately, and too often, the workers harvesting
these flower buds, leaves and twigs are not paid well, an aspect of using raw materials that
sometimes troubles me. I don’t know too much about the production process of Linden
blossom extracts, but I know that Ecomaat takes care of the folks doing the hard work. They
also care about organic farming, which is important to me, too.
And then I feel we are privileged because of the reasons WHY we create perfumes. My “WHY”
is answered every day by myself, as nobody else is telling me what to do. I feel very free, and
when it comes to perfumery, this is a rare good. For me, creating perfumes is fun. It can be an
addiction, a quest for beauty, a search for an expression using the words of scent, a challenge
to create a scent that captures or at least comes close to an idea that I have in my mind.
I feel your motivation to create is nourished by the same energy sources. I can sense it when I
see your flacons in the picture that you attached to your last letter, and I can feel it when you
write about your visions for the Linden blossom.
I have from my latest trial (omitting the cedar wood from Morocco) learned: 1.) that I cannot
use the Sandalwood from India in the base (at least in larger amounts), but should stick to the
S. spicatum from Australia with 1:1 Sandalore (a molecule that has a woody sandalwood
aspect, and is less creamy than real sandalwood); 2.) that I cannot use too much citrus in the
head (I am using lemon, bergamot, litsea cubea, neroli), but that hints of these are good; and
3.) that rose absolute goes very well with linden blossom, but rose oil needs a very careful
hand.
Finally, I built (for my second last trial) a base, all synthetic, that puts together the main
synthetics that I figured I might need to support the light honey aspect of the natural linden
blossom. In a sense, this complicates the thinking about a composition, introducing a formula
within a formula, but in another sense, it helps me.
Following the rule, “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time!”, I isolate individual tasks,
like building a synthetic base to support the linden blossom, and these tasks result in a base.
In my October 11th base version, I use seven compounds, among them Lilial, ionones and
geraniol. It is a gentle base, very discreet. I use about 1 part of this base to about 2.5 parts of
the natural Linden blossom.
The mixture of October 11th looks like my best approach so far. I’ve diluted an aliquot over the
weekend. It looks fine, but it needs another week or so of maturation, and I haven’t figured out
in which dilution it might be studied for further optimizations. But this might be a topic for
another letter!
I send you my greetings and a picture, taken this moment. My cluttered, chaotic desk, where I
think and write about perfumes and other issues.
Andy’s picture of his cluttered, chaotic desk
Actually, every formula sees the world first from here, on my computer, in an excel table. The
paper on the lamp guides me through my perfumery work, on which I wrote down Edmond
Roudnitska’s definition of “les qualités fondamentales du grand parfum”.
With warmest regards and a fragrant hug.
Yours,
Andy
Berkeley, October 25, 2010
Dear Andy,
Thank you for your last letter. I feel a real kinship in the way we think about making perfume,
and wanted to respond to some of your thoughts.
For me, I never even think about the price of ingredients at all. I love using whatever I want,
without anyone controlling what I make in any way. Some of those extremely expensive
materials that I like are just like fine leather or precious stones. Ambergris, orange blossom,
boronia – they have such a depth and complexity, their tangled histories of where they’ve been
and what they’ve done in the history of perfumery. They have a real sense of quality that
transforms my work.
I can’t start with anything premade, and I wouldn’t want to either. There’s just nothing out there
that could possibly fit into my process. I’ve heard, for instance, of perfumers having top-note
chords prepared to fit on various bases. To me that would be like designing a custom-built
house and then bolting on a pre-fab top floor. The idea of taking a shortcut is a nightmare to
me.
I, too, start with a blank page in my mind. My process follows a ritual pattern, practically to the
point of superstition. I need to have nothing in the way — no scales, no computer, no
machines. It’s a very simple yet aesthetic process: a good pen, and my workbook with blank
paper (my favorite Amalfi). I begin with a conversation in my head between two essences,
then I listen to what they say to me and watch what they’re trying to do together. At this
earliest stage, there’s a very wide playing field, but each subsequent choice narrows the
remaining options.
As I go along developing the formula, the perfume itself begins to take shape, both in my head
and in the beaker. I’m often cutting away the extraneous, like sculpting to get it to its proper
shape. The difference from actually chiseling away at a piece of rock is that making a mistake
won’t cost me the whole piece of marble, though I do wind up throwing out a small fortune, one
mistaken mixture at a time.
Creatively, the process is easy enough to reset to a point just before the mistake, almost like
getting stuck while climbing a tree, then backing down a little lower to take a different branch.
Getting up into the higher branches, however, the choices are fewer and the top eventually
comes into view. The reduction in options doesn’t make everything easier, though; it’s actually
the most difficult at the end, when fitting in the top notes. That makes this linden perfume
especially hard, since it starts at the top, but I enjoy every last difficult bit of this process, every
twist and turn.
Even though this searching part of the process — the finding a way through the maze — is a
valuable and entertaining odyssey in itself, it’s a journey never to be repeated. Once I get to
the finished perfume — the complete, whole work — there is a real satisfaction and true sense
of coming to the best possible destination. There’s no more reason to back up to a previous
branch or passageway to find a different solution, no reason to explore what else could have
happened from that original point of departure. It would be like taking the first half of a book
and writing a different ending, or carving the Venus de Milo’s head onto the shoulders of
Michelangelo’s David.
The properly finished perfume (hopefully) has all the ingredients perfectly locked together.
Everything fits. Nothing is extra. There are no paths not taken. On to the next project!
I like very much that each new perfume is a whole new set of problems to be solved.
Warmly,
Mandy
Zurich, October 26th, 2010
Oh Mandy,
This is utterly fascinating!
I will –- in my next letter in a week or so — add a few more details on how I approach my
empty excel. This *is* really thrilling to exchange so intimately on how we think and work.
All the best now, and with much love,
Andy
Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer: Letters to a Fellow
Perfumer (ep. 5)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on N O V E M B E R 3 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
Zurich, November 01, 2010
Dearest Mandy,
Your last letter was such a treat. Thank you!
It was a great pleasure following your layout — how you tackle a challenge and solve it. I wish
I could write the same, but quite often my perfume challenges remain for a while unsolved.
In a sense, I have a hard time finishing my scented projects. Defining them as “finished” is
difficult for me, and I often ask outsiders what they think, and whether it’s time for me to stop.
And sometimes when I feel I might be close to a solution, I’m still not there where I feel it
should be. It bothers me, and can be painful — the feeling of not being good enough, of not
reaching that full potential.
It’s part of every creative process, I guess, to experience some sort of an angst, but then, on
the other side, I sometimes feel the positive energy coming out of the pain. Thus, looking back
those years, I feel that for me, failing is an important part of my perfumery work.
A lot of experiments fail. Sometimes because the basic idea is not right, yet while other times
the underlying idea may be correct, the experiment fails because of one detail, like a bit too
much of any one ingredient. This failing leads to frustration, intensifies the thinking process
and the pain going with it is part of the learning curve.
You could say it’s a strong motivator.
When I was evaluating where I am with the Linden blossom during a few hours fiddling forth
and back on Excel and with paper strips during the last weekend, I ended up with a conclusion
that I wanted a bit of salicylate powder power. Luca Turin once said something like “Salicylate
makes every perfume BIG” or something along this line. Actually, I remember it that way and
it’s true — salicylates are great at upgrading weak scented soups into big theater.
But then, with the Linden blossom, even a little bit (of salicylate) was too much. Thus, another
lesson learnt — forget salicylates there, at least in reasonable amount. And I guess with this
lesson goes another lesson: quite often, I look for a twist using yet another raw material.
Adding more ingredients into the mixture is quite often a first line of thought, yet at the state
where I now find myself, with a composition that is already quite complex, very often the
solution is in *not* adding more ingredients, reducing its complexity and adjusting proportions,
instead. As our minds work like a palimpsest over time, this simple rule often slips my
attention.
I like to add new layers, it seems.
And I feel, when using naturals like we do, being present in all their complexity, that keeping
complexity under control is THE way to go. The complexity of naturals by themselves is
always stunning, and sometimes I wished they would come a bit more standardized;
unfortunately, they don’t.
Sometimes, there are variations in color, and there are small variations in the scent, for
instance, due to the weather during a harvest season, or because the producer could not
blend separate batches to compensate for individual differences.
Actually, on a side note, even when working with synthetics, you sometimes face these same
challenges. The scent quality of complex chemicals like ambroxan is prone to slight variations.
When I wrote the last paragraph, I started wondering how our Linden blossom extract gets
produced, so I asked Atanas from Ecomaat in Bulgaria:
“Dear Atanas, Ecomaat is producing the Linden blossom CO2 extract in Bulgaria. It’s of a
wonderful quality and needs a very careful hand when blending. Thank you for producing it.
I’m wondering if you’ll let us know a technical detail — when you extract the Linden flowers
with CO2, what is the yield? How much linden blossom do you need for a kilogram of extract,
and do you extract the dried flowers or the fresh flowers?”
Atanas replied (Atanas Krachmarov, Ecomaat Ltd., Bulgaria):
“The production of 1 kilogram Linden blossoms CO2 extract requires about 25-30 kg raw
material of highest grade. The linden flowers that we use for extraction are dry and there is a
very specific detail about drying the linden blossoms: in the aim to preserve the aroma with all
its nuances, flowers must be dried very tenderly. The process allowing such care is drying
under shadow during hot summertime, because if processed by electrical heating, the linden
blossoms lose their fragrance and the raw material turns into hay. The production of 1 kg dry
linden flowers requires 9 kg of fresh blossoms, so finally 1 kg of linden CO2 is made from 220
– 270 kgs of linden . . . “
Well, dearest Mandy, when I read his answer, I realized how precious this material is! It is a
pleasure working on this flower with you. I send you my fragrant greetings and look forward to
soon sending you a trial version.
Yours,
Andy
Berkeley, November 2, 2010
Dear Andy,
I am so swamped getting ready to go to New York City and making companion products for all
the chefs participating in the Alchemy of Taste and Smell dinner at the Astor Center. I’ve
created numerous sprays based around the aromas of seaweed, coffee, hay with flowers, and
smoked cinnamon!! So while I love your beautiful letter, I have to regretfully sit this round out
— but I’ll be writing more in the next round after my two events in NYC.
But I do want to add that I agree that the linden blossom calls out for a reduction in complexity.
Much as I, too, wanted to embellish it, I found all I was doing was making it lose its luster. It is
this conversation with the essences, where they barely whisper what they need in my ear, that
feels like the intimate communication of falling in love.
Wish me luck in New York.
Love,
Mandy
Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer: Letters to a Fellow
Perfumer (ep. 6)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on N O V E M B E R 1 5 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
Zurich, November 14, 2010
Dearest Mandy,
I hope these lines find you well, and that you soon receive the sample I sent last week. I write
this letter as I’m sitting in the train, leaving for a hike as far away from town as possible,
moving forward to silence and the fragrances of nature on a brilliant November day — in
search of a few hours of peace and meditation while walking across a rustling sea of colored
leaves.
I did a night shift yesterday, finishing orders and urgent e-mails so that I might have enough
time today. I always anticipate these moments of silence, freed from the loud world of perfume
business and the communications within. There is definitely too much going on these days
before the holiday season . . . it is during these precious moments, when I’m alone, secluded
from the urgencies and pressures that I think “perfumes”.
Sometimes, by the way, these moments take place when I’m lying in bed, reflecting on a note
or a construction. Do you dream about perfumes, too? I do. Upon first waking up, I try to hold
onto these pictures of the subconscious, but they are hard to capture and twist away as
consciousness reappears.
Andy’s picture of the sea of leaves he rustled across
I was going through my linden blossom trial in my mind quite often over the last weeks. The
sample that I sent to you is dated October 11th. It is matured and is, in my totally biased and
non neutral opinion, “nice”. I showed it to my friend and partner, known on my blog as Wfactor, and I went to bed wearing the scent of this linden blossom for a couple of nights. I often
try my creations during the night as I do not have a lot of opportunities to wear perfume during
the day.
“Nice,” he said. “The word that comes to my mind is peace.” I replied, “You know, peace is
protected as a brand name in perfumery, I think” — and so our pillow talk moved towards the
strange, wild world of trademark protection in perfumery and beyond. But for him, it is a calm
and peaceful scent.
Anyhow, when I ask myself whether a composition of mine is good and well constructed, I
usually refer to the criteria by Edmond Roudnitska. In his booklet, “Le Parfum” (Que sais –je,
page74, 75), Roudnitska addresses the question of what is a beautiful perfume (le beau
parfum): ” . . . Le beau parfum est celui qui nous procure un ‘choc’”, which can be literally
translated as “a beautiful perfume is one that leads to a shock.”
Roudnitska explains the “choc sensoriel” (the shock of the senses) and later he describes the
quality criteria of a grand parfum: “caractère, vigueur, pouvoir diffusant, delicatesse, claret,
volume and persistance”, or character, strength, diffusive power, delicacy, clarity, volume and
staying power. I find these criteria very helpful, especially as they are somewhat contradictory.
The challenge here is, as everywhere in the arts, a challenge of finding a balance.
I identified a few weak points in the October 11th version that I wanted to fix, or, in other
words, that I wanted to polish away without changing the core structure of the perfume —
getting rid of the little dusty and dirty spots and bringing in a bit more light. Thus, I figured that I
want to change the citrus chord that stands out especially at the opening of the perfume. It’s
based on lemon and bergamot, but I changed it by adding sweet orange oil (Messina quality)
and reduced the lemon part.
I also felt like I needed to try a different batch of rose absolute. I used in my newest version a
rose absolute from Bulgaria that is richer, more animalic and more on the thick honey side, as
I figured that the linden blossom might stand comfortably next to it. And I felt like my mixture
needed a bit — maybe just a hint — more depth going with the Neroli and supporting the
Neroli line, so I added a little bit of orange blossom absolute from Egypt to complement the
Neroli oil.
Balance in nature, the Tauer Photography way
Finally, I added the finest hint of Ylang, hoping that the linden blossom shines a bit longer and
a little bit brighter this way. It really is only the finest of hints, and though you don’t smell it
outright, it’s there and has an effect.
That’s the idea, at least.
The main chords with my own “homemade” linden blossom base — the linden blossom
extract, the body of sandalwood, the iris root (Irone alpha) and vanilla CO2 extract — remains
untouched and exactly in place. We will see what happens next.
Optimist that I am, I’m looking forward to testing the newest version later, after it’s had time to
mature. Let us hope!
I remain now with my kindest regards, congratulating you again on your New York City venture
and all the good reports that came out of it.
Yours with great admiration,
Andy
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New York City, November 14, 2010
Dear Andy,
Fragrant greetings from New York City, where my linden blossom perfume has been aging for
a couple of weeks. I wasn’t sure at first when I brought it with me to New York, but now that it
has sat for a while, I definitely think it’s complete.
I came to NYC to work with some very gifted chefs, exploring the interaction of aroma and
taste in food & drinks. I gave a talk on creating flavor with aroma, comparing the process to
designing a good perfume. I find collaboration with other artists (like with chefs, or with you) to
be very stimulating –- generating copious ideas and energy. I’ve worked a lot with chefs, and
am always struck by how similar creating beautiful food is to creating beautiful aromas.
David Chang, George Mendes, Daniel Paterson and Dave Arnold at Astor Place, NYC
The most exciting part for me was the 7-course dinner –- each chef created a dish using some
of my essences, and I created a fragrance to pair with it, served alongside as a spray or solid
or liquid perfume. For a seafood dish, a seaweed & tarragon spray; for a pasta dish, I scented
the chopsticks with black pepper, coffee, and nutmeg. My favorite was a dish that included hay
with a flower garnish, for which I made a solid perfume with a base of hay and flowers
“popping out” of it.
I am mailing you a sample of my linden perfume. Yes, like you say, creative insights are often
very evasive. At times, a solution crystallizes when my mind is occupied elsewhere; coming
unbidden, from an unknown place. I usually know what *not* to do, but the real solution that
pulls a whole perfume together visits me like a guest, whom I’m always grateful to have return.
I mentioned before that every perfume I’ve made has a key that unlocks the wholeness of the
formula. Like with a poem, when complete, there is nothing extraneous — everything carries
its weight, contributing to the whole vision. In my creative process, I often encounter a moment
where I feel a quickening of my step; some momentum leads me where to go to find the
beauty I seek in the final formula.
Jeffrey Steingarten (Vogue) and Harold McGee (Curious Cook) enjoy their fan dance
This case of working with the linden essence really called for erring on the side of simplicity,
and I had included too much. I looked for everything that was extraneous and removed it.
Once I took honey absolute out of the top, the linden & mimosa formed a beautiful new aroma,
scarcely need anything else. This pairing was the key to the top. Linden could potentially bury
the mimosa, but in the right proportion they come together to give the illusion of a much more
robust linden, maintaining a honey aroma, even with the honey itself now absent.
Since the beginning, I had considered the phenyl ethyl acetate to complete the top; this natural
isolate lends a sheer, rosey note, very congenial, forming a more complete floral without any
rough edges. It fits very well, and even affects the drydown note in an interesting way,
extending its life a bit longer.
In the middle, taking out the poplar buds and the pink pepper absolute helped clear the
horizon, and what I saw was orange blossom absolute. I had liked your early idea about neroli,
and this essence is even more intense, seemingly too heavy for linden but still a gorgeous,
warm note whose incredible power I had used previously in my Parfum Prive and Orchid
fragrances. It’s tricky and incredibly expensive to use — there are so many bad versions of it. I
found in smelling twenty different types that price is not the key to finding the best, and that the
best is truly extraordinary.
Perfume minis and frankincense resin fans at Alcheny of Taste and Smell event
It struck me that, in the right dose, orange blossom’s suave, sophisticated floral quality could
hook up with the linden blossom in just the right way, lending even more support to the honey
theme. This dose is very light to avoid the overpowering effects (because we must not bury the
linden!). Indeed, it locked so well together that it not only holds onto the linden, but makes it
moreso.
I’m including phenyl ethyl alcohol –- it’s very beautiful and has the right sheer texture, with a
“zelig” quality that lets it move around and fit in everywhere. You’d be hard-pressed to find a
blend that wouldn’t welcome it, and with this linden formula it completes the middle.
Likewise in the base, taking things out was the key –- things that “should have” worked just
didn’t, and here one needs to do two things: 1) be honest about when things aren’t working ,
and 2) not try to fix things by adding more. So in the base, I took out the poplar buds and
limited it to only the benzoin and ambergris. This leaves a sweet, ambery, vanilla base that’s
transparent and shimmering; it’s as light as can be, and carries the sweetness down from the
top and middle layers.
My final formula has no honey in it, but since it maintains or even amplifies the honey aspects
of the linden, I have named it Honey Blossom. There is a bottle on its way to you now.
Warmly,
Mandy
******************************************************************************************
Zurich, November 15, 2010
Dear Mandy,
Welcome back from NY City and thank you for sharing your visions, and for sending me a
sample. I cannot wait for it.
I am thrilled and look so much forward.
Having to run, I remain with kindest regards and a big fragrant hug.
Andy
PS: I cannot wait to start “playing with the Fire Tree” . . .
Mandy Aftel & Andy Tauer: Letters to a Fellow
Perfumer (ep. 7)
by N A T H A N B R A N C H on N O V E M B E R 2 3 , 2 0 1 0 | C O M M E N T S
Berkeley, November 19th, 2010
Dear Andy,
Thank you so much for sending me your Linden Blossom trial from October 11th. Since
we’d been sharing our thoughts as we worked on the same theme of a linden perfume, I
opened the box with great anticipation and more than a little fear that, following some of
the same threads from thousands of miles apart, we had woven them into the same
perfume!
Not to worry –- in pursuit of our oft-repeated goal of holding onto the elusive linden
essence, we found different interpretations and you have indeed done a beautiful job of
holding onto the delicious sheer facet of the linden blossom. Bravo! It’s gorgeous.
It’s like looking at something from a slightly different angle, yet recognizing a family
resemblance to mine. Your direction feels grassier, and lighter as well –- the more
diluted Eau De Parfum (EDP) strength and spray bottle give a different veil of sensuality
than my more intense perfume. I hope you soon get to try the sample of mine that I sent
to you.
A photo of Andy’s Linden perfume trial that he sent to Mandy Aftel
Mandy’s samples of her own Linden perfume, titled “Honey Blossom”
Warmly,
Mandy
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