Help with paring down/understanding an idea for a formula..

[Anti]

Hello my fellow BNers..I hope your noses are well and I want to give a thank you to this forum for all of its resources...words cannot express my gratitude. I have been dabbling and getting a lot better with perfumery in recent months. I wanted to make a fragrance for someone special and I asked them which aromas are most pleasing within the normal scent categories (citrus, wood, floral etc) They responded with " Sage and clary sage, eucalyptus, juniper, fresh woods, fresh pine, juicy pear, fresh lavender " Is this a fougere? I am not looking for formulas or a quick fix. I just want to narrow down what kind of skeleton I am looking at. I also realize that there are many angles and nuances to what this could "be"...I suppose I am just looking for ideas where this could go. I am making this for a feminine person in there late 20s . Thank you for your consideration.

Caveat- I have about 150 aroma chemicals (noob but VERY excited and persistent to this for life) so I know I can make up something-ish but I suppose I just need some brainstorming. Thank you.

 

[pkiler]

The notes are all top and middle. You'll need some basenotes.

Could be a fougere, could be something else. Don't define it by a category.

 

[dwsel]

The notes you've posted sound like a thing that you could turn into the fougere:

https://basenotes.com/threads/what-are-the-de-facto-chypre-and-fougere-ingredients.325638/

Do you have a list of your materials compiled somewhere? If you posted it here we might be able to help you with some suggestions on what combines best.

Sage and clary sage, eucalyptus, juniper, fresh woods, fresh pine, juicy pear, fresh lavender

Do you have any of these already (except for the pear)?

 

[Anti]

The notes are all top and middle. You'll need some basenotes.

Could be a fougere, could be something else. Don't define it by a category.

Thank you for the reply. I definitely need to suss out something in the base realm for sure. I only stated a category because it helps me to study up and ease of access for looking up things. I am a musician and artist and I try to use certain categories to learn where some lines are so that I can then "color outside " them or not. Again thank you

 

[Anti]

The notes you've posted sound like a thing that you could turn into the fougere:

https://basenotes.com/threads/what-are-the-de-facto-chypre-and-fougere-ingredients.325638/

Do you have a list of your materials compiled somewhere? If you posted it here we might be able to help you with some suggestions on what combines best.


Do you have any of these already (except for the pear)?

Thanks for replying...I will certainly post my ACs once I get to my organ. I truly appreciate any help so thank you.

 

[Anti]

--Sage and clary sage, eucalyptus, juniper, fresh woods, fresh pine, juicy pear, fresh lavender--

Looking through organ I am aghast at how unbalanced it is but I bought a lot of stuff in the beginning out of fun. I am always down to break out the wallet in my future endeavors. I do have Clary, juniper, lavender 42/40, lavender aldehyde...as far as "fresh" woods I have Cypress and Cypriol ouch. I do have balsam fir on order. I notice most of my woods are sandalwood, agar types. I'm not a huge fan of cedarwood (so far) but I have only smelled PA tx cedar so obv I am unlearned in that. I don't care for the pencil shaving note.

 

[dwsel]

So we have:
Clary Sage EO (or Absolute? which is a base note - you didn't define)
Juniper EO,
Lavender 42/40 EO,
Lavender aldehyde (I don't know this one)
for "fresh" you've added Cypress EO

And that set is fine to build a nice fresh accord.

Now for the base:

Accord with Cypriol EO, Sandalwood and things like Patchouli EO can be always built but there's a chance it won't be "fresh" anymore. Really depends on what Sandalwood, what patchouli and how you go about the Cypriol (heavy or just a hint of).

Is sandalwood natural or some synthetics or some pre-made accord? You can definitely try to build something with sandalwood and Fir balsam and keep it fresh.

How about some basenotes like musks, things like ISO E super, Vertofix, woody ambers that could extend the base? Maybe you have something Vetiver to add? Clove ACs can make it more aromatic if that's your direction https://www.google.com/search?q=clove ac diy site:basenotes.com

Or things like Veramoss (or Oakmoss Absolute), Tonka/Coumarin or some coumarin-type ACs if you wanted to go full fougere?

 

[Pinkster]

While you're still at the conceptual stage, you might want to consider the amount of nose training (or lack thereof) your subject has. If they aren't very familiar with what all these materials actually smell like, it's possible that they're listing notes from some of their favorite perfumes and that the final scent they have in mind might be very different from the list of notes they've given you. This has happened to me more than once with my own family, who are very much not perfume people--wishing you better luck!

If you two live nearby, you could consider meeting up to go over your materials and smell the ones that sound intriguing on their own. I know when I first started with perfumery, there were also a bunch of materials that I never expected to love but totally blew me away! Alternatively, it might be helpful to know what other perfumes they've smelled and loved, to give you a little more context. In my experience, there are a number of common perfumery materials--"clean" musks, super ambers, etc--that untrained noses often don't pick up on as individual notes, but are vital to the final perfumes they love.

Anyway, just my two cents. Sounds like a fun project!

 

[Anti]

dwsel-thanks for your reply. In my haste while writing I often forget to specify important details. I was referring to Clary EO..although I looked up the absolute and it sounds like something I really want.

I do have PA patchouli and Clearwood. All of my sandalwoods are synthetics (javanol, santaliff,sanjinol and dreamwood base) I'm not totally sure if I want to go in that direction though. I need to procure more woods other that sandalwood me thinks. I would really like to try cedars again but I just can't get past that pencil edge.

I do have Haitian vetiver, which I adore. I also have PA oakmoss and veramoss.I do think now a sweet/fresh herbal, slightly leather with nice oakmoss base is what could work.

Thank you so much for your reply and I definitely need to go shopping for more herbal, green and woodsy ACs..

 

[Anti]

While you're still at the conceptual stage, you might want to consider the amount of nose training (or lack thereof) your subject has. If they aren't very familiar with what all these materials actually smell like, it's possible that they're listing notes from some of their favorite perfumes and that the final scent they have in mind might be very different from the list of notes they've given you. This has happened to me more than once with my own family, who are very much not perfume people--wishing you better luck!

If you two live nearby, you could consider meeting up to go over your materials and smell the ones that sound intriguing on their own. I know when I first started with perfumery, there were also a bunch of materials that I never expected to love but totally blew me away! Alternatively, it might be helpful to know what other perfumes they've smelled and loved, to give you a little more context. In my experience, there are a number of common perfumery materials--"clean" musks, super ambers, etc--that untrained noses often don't pick up on as individual notes, but are vital to the final perfumes they love.

Anyway, just my two cents. Sounds like a fun project!

Thank you for your reply Pinkster...this is so so true. I have noticed over the past several years getting into this art form the exact thing you mention. I have been approached many times by people asking for "something"...when I try to narrow down what they are looking for I get a lot of ambiguous terms.. "make me something pretty" is far too cloudy for this novice 🤣🤣