Natural Perfumery by Salaam

With a press release, the Natural Perfumers Guild (NPG) has defined what is considered a natural isolate by its standards, to which all perfumers endorsed by the guild will have to abide.

In the same go, NPG has defined what Guild perfumers should NOT consider “really natural” although they are “legally natural” according to international standards.

In brief, natural isolates are those single molecules extracted from essential oils and natural raw materials existing in Nature, while single molecules extracted from Bio-Tech made material are NOT natural.

I fully endorse the definitions of the NPG and we shall refer to them as a standard definition of natural isolates in our ECLIP list of perfume ingredients.

This is a more courageous stand than it appears at first sight, because it openly clashes with the interests of the industry for which bio tech molecules are a new gold mine.

The big players of the perfume industry get rich on research that brings to light new aromas, that is, new molecules, for which they have a patent and are the unique authorized manufacturers.

The patent on aromatic molecules have created a state of monopoly for many aromatics. This monopoly gives complete control of the market to a single company and these patents are at the origin of the wealth and power of the majors.

With the advent of  bio technologies a door is opened to new incredible possibilities, because not only new molecules can now be synthesized and patented, but also new processes to obtain existing molecules with existing micro-organisms and also, in some cases, new micro-organisms genetically modified that are at the core of the molecules fabrication, can be patented.

I was stunned during the presentations of such molecules that their smell and olfactory comportment was so typical of the chemical synthetic products but they were presented to perfumers as natural, organic and certified Ecocert.

When I asked the producers, as one of their long time customer, what was the material of origin of the essence, they just replied to me that this information was reserved because it was protected by a patent.
Were I to ask if the micro organisms used in the process were GMO, what do you think would have been their answer?
They are just bound to declare that the molecules have a bio-tech origin. That’s all.
This is what I cannot accept for my customers, even in the name of freedom of creativity and of Art (to me this is just the new ego-trip of the new wave indie perfumers), I cannot accept the secrecy that surrounds these materials, using them on blind trust in the corporations, while our whole recent history from Bhopal to Lehman has proved again and again that one cannot trust the corporations when their interest conflicts with the one of mankind.

Now, the stand of the NPG will not please the industry, and certainly not its “cultural and educational arm”, the Fragrance Foundation, the organization that gives the FIFI awards all around the world.
I believe that the chances of NPG perfumers to win a FIFI are now very slim.  As are the chances of any blogger who will support the stand of NPG (Yes, the FF has made a FIFI also for bloggers to make sure they do not deviate from their “philosophy”).

I do not know what is behind a philosophy that certifies “organic” a molecule that does not exist in nature, and I do not know what big interests are behind this insistence to call the bio-tech molecules “natural”.

Maybe someone who reads this can inform us. Economic strategies of corporations fly far over my head, and I can hardly manage a month by month economy in the rough seas of the crisis.
I am a small fishing boat on the ocean, or rather a frail Kayak, corporations are supertankers. Let us hope that at the command there is not a Captain Schettino.

Enfin traduit en Français ce cours fondamental qui synthétise 25 ans d’expérience avec l’utilisation quotidienne des huiles essentielles que j’utilise en tant que parfumeur naturel.
Je l’ai appelé “cours d’aromathérapie de premier secours” parceque cette pratique de l’aromathérapie que je propose montre ses résultats immédiatement, souvent en quelques minutes.

This aromatherapy course synthesises 25 years of experiences in the daily use of the essential oils I have been using as a perfumer. I call it “first aid aromatherapy” because this is a way of using the oils that shows immediate results.

Le cours est gratuit, il est la version écrite de mon cours d’aromathérapie que je tient en Italie téléchargez le ici

Ce cours est conçu de façon à permettre à quiconque de se soigner et de soigner sa famille grâce à seulement quelques huiles essentielles capables de soigner la plupart des troubles communs, permettant ainsi de se garder à distance des médecins, des médicaments et des hôpitaux. En un mot, de se garder des ennuis.

Il s’adresse aussi aux personnes qui soignent grâce à des techniques thérapeutiques variées, afin de leur donner de plus amples moyens de soulager leurs patients, et aux médecins qui cherchent une alternative aux médicaments de l’industrie pharmaceutique.

Les excellents résultats que peut produire l’aromathérapie sont illustrés, à titre d’exemple, sur ce blog où j’ai décrit quelques unes de mes expériences à Tombouctou.

AbdesSalaam Attar

Perfumer composer

An interview on Suzanne’s perfume journal to explain the Oud Caravan project

Michelyn Camen gave me the occasion to explain the Oud Caravan project and the philosophy behind it in an interview on Cafleurebon.
I invite you to discover the explanation on the “Perfume Evolution” that we are living in the present years.
Unconventional thoughts about perfumery blogs
Bloggers have been increasingly courting the industry for recognition (Fifis awards, seats in committees, invitations to events…) and some of them are losing sight of their original mission of promoting conscious consumerism.

About the perfume industry
The industry cannot anymore impose its own criterions and logic, the consumer is gradually gaining the power to impose his will to shape the products, and the refusal of the industry to compromise is digging a growing abyss between what the people really want and what the industry offers.

About philosophy of perfume
My philosophy as a natural perfumer is to produce “Real perfumes made for real people with real ingredients”.I am wondering what philosophy is behind “synthetic crap made for profits with deceptive marketing”

About Indie perfumers
The new generation of perfumers are friendly, idealistic and passionate, the opposite of what a perfume corporation is.

A draw for a bottle of Oud Caravan and much more… on CAFLEUREBON

I shall be glad to have your comments.

Pandemics a manual for survival

The problem of today’s pandemics is a modern problem.

The disease is easily recognized, its modes of propagation are immediately understood, but  the common antibiotics are without effects.

When suddenly appears a virus resistant to 8 antibiotics, no virologist believes that this monster may have acquired his immunity all by itself. They know that it is impossible.

These are the pandemics that threaten us in the near future, you recognize it when you hear doctors on television, saying: “We have never seen anything like that.”

The problem that makes us vulnerable to the new pandemics is the problem of a medical system that has nothing to propose as an alternative to antibiotics, except new antibiotics. But when there are no more new ones? Or when it is necessary to wait for them to be invented? What can we do? 

Today’s pandemics are a scientific problem: Science produces diseases that it cannot cure.

My own 25 years experience with essential oils and that of Aroma-therapists who for 50 years have cured millions of patients is unequivocal: essential oils work where antibiotics have failed. (see here, here and here)
The most important observation has been that viruses cannot develop immunity against essentialoils. Unlike modern medicines which are single molecules, essences are compounds composed of hundreds of molecules that act synergistically, viruses cannot mutate to become resistant to such a massive bio-chemical attack.

Acquiring resistance from essential oils is even more complicated for viruses because essence also have an effect on the “soil” on which they grow (the sick person’s body), making it “hostile” for them.

Essence also acts indirectly on the patient to render him resistant in different ways, for instance by stimulating his immune system, or by activating his endocrine system. The endocrine system is our personal “pharmaceutical laboratory” that produces our own medicinal substances. 

After this preamble, I shall go to straight to the point by listing the essences that are the most appropriate to save our lives in the event of a pandemic and above all I shall explain how to use them. They are all readily available in pharmacies or in herbal medicine shops or even online.

Who reads this should always keep in mind that in the absence of these oils, one can use the aromatic plants from which they come. An additional final chapter will explain how. 

The essences below are among the most useful ones. By fortune they are also the most common ones and also the less expensive ones.

Tea tree
Lavender
Geranium
(an ideal compound is Tea tree, Lavender, Geranium)
Thyme
Clove buds
Mint
Ginger
Frankincense (very difficult to find authentic)

How to use the essences in the event of a pandemic

Pandemics can spread in three ways:

1.         by physical contact, through the hands, saliva or body fluids
2.         by air, through breathing, coughing
3.         by ingesting, though food or water

Pandemic  by physical contact, through the hands, saliva or body fluids, therefore also by coughing. In this case we use the essences to wash our hands after touching people, we can wear a mask scented with essence to approach and talk to others. The scented mask should be also wore in crowded places.

•          how to disinfect hands. Just wash your hands with plain water, pour a single drop of essence on one hand and then rub both. Tea tree, Lavender, Anti-sharks etc. Practically any essence does well.

•          how to perfume the mask: place 2 or 3 drops of essence on the fingertips, rub the fingertips together to  spread the essence between them, then clean your fingers on the inside of the mask. Tea tree, Thyme, Cloves, Ginger, and Bacetto.

•          anti-infectious essences to use for the mouth, pour 1 or 2 to drops of essence directly in the mouth and swallow. Ginger, Mint, and Bacetto. You can also put a drop on a piece of sugar or in honey. You also can sweeten your tea with the scented honey.

Pandemic  by air, through breathing and coughing. In this case we diffuse the essences in the atmosphere in our living space, and breathe air that is disinfected with essential oils, for instance breathing a  scented handkerchief whenever one has approached and spoken with persons that could be infected, or we also may use a mask scented with essential oils.

•          How to use essential oils to disinfect environments: The essences are Tea tree, Citrus, Pine, Eucalyptus. You can diffuse them regularly at home (specially in bedroom) and office. Use spray bottles or a diffuser or spay the essences on house heaters in winter.

Pandemic  by ingesting water or food. In this case we shall use plain water to wash the fresh food and use the essences to season our food and disinfect our drinking water. We can also ingest some essences after eating something about which we have any doubt. Also use the essences to disinfect all drinking water.

•          How to season the foods with essences: mix a few drops of essence with a spoon or two of olive oil and season your food with it, raw or cooked, just before eating. Thyme, Oregano, Cinnamon, Cloves, Ginger, Mint, Frankincense, and even Bacetto.

•          How to disinfect the water: pour a drop of essence of Peppermint or Bacetto in a liter of water, shake well and drink after a few minutes.

•          How to ingest the essences after eating doubtful food?: pour a drop of essence directly in mouth and swallow. Bacetto(best), Thyme, Oregano, Cinnamon, Cloves, Ginger, Mint, Frankincense

The use of aromatic plants against pandemics.

The cure of Garlic. Garlic is a powerful remedy. It should not be underestimated both as a prevention and as a therapy for viral infections, particularly of streptococci type.

It is used in the following way every day at  lunch: clean 5 or 10 cloves of Garlic of their skin, cut them in half lengthwise so that they can be easily swallowed without chewing them.
After each mouthful of food swallow a piece of Garlic prepared without chewing it. Repeat this with every mouthful until you have eaten all the garlic. This method will avoid you having the breath of a French peasant, but you can anyway use Bacetto after eating garlic (or smoking a cigarette) for a fantastic perfumed breath, or else you couls use essences of Fennel or Anise.

Tisanes.. All the aromatic herbs of your kitchen can protect you if you drink them in tea, strengthening your immune system, killing viruses and making the “soil” infertile for them, particularly Oregano, Thyme, Cinnamon and Cloves. Used and overuse…

They can be used as teas. Pour boiling water over the herbs and drink Some of them can be boiled, cinnamon and clove particularly.

See our Kit for first aid aromatherapy

Luca Turin may very well have started the whole process of recognition for Natural Perfumery when in 2006, in his iconic duffnotes on NZ Folio, he declared to the perfumistas community with an amazing foresight: “There are now officially four kinds of perfumery: normal, niche, vintage and natural.”

His statement was not a recognition of the value of natural perfumes, not yet. It was only the recognition of natural perfumers stubbornness. He understood that they were starting a trend and that they were not going to renounce to their idea of making 100% natural perfumes whatever happens and whatever Luca Turin said.

On smelling samples from the “natural perfumers” most of whom were beginners at that time, he immediately admitted the value of some of their fragrances, the potential of natural perfumery and he openly pointed out the shortcomings in blending and materials quality.

Two years later, by bestowing 4 stars on several 100% natural perfumes in his milestone book “The Guide”, he and Tania Sanchez affirmed that natural perfumes could compete with commercial perfumes on their own aesthetic and technical grounds.

This was the beginning of the evolution in the perfumistas mind. Until then it had been universally admitted that no perfume could be great without a dose of natural, but that a modern perfume required synthetic in its structure.

Natural perfumers had been asking: “if no perfume can be great without a dose of natural, why can’t a fully natural perfume be great”?
Short of greatness (and of Luca having to chew his panama), 4 stars in “The Guide” were good enough for a start and a definite signal to all natural perfumers of the world.
I believe that no one has had such a role in the recognition of natural perfumery as Luca Turin had.

One day I came back from Timbuktu and realized that natural perfumers were all over the most popular blogs and the web perfume magazines. The trend had started on the web.
The Arab revolutions were also started on the web, and we cannot underestimate the potential of effect that the web can have on the “real world”.

Natural perfumery has been answering the need of a radical change in a perfume production system where “change” has been meaning 1500 new frags every year, most of which are remakes and most of which are unanimously recognized as “crap”.
Natural perfumery is now for perfumistas what democracy is for the Arabs who have been raised under dictators; the hope of a new and better life without oppression, injustice and corruption.
Natural perfumers are seen as idealistic persons, they are friendly and incorruptible. The contrary of a dictator.
What has been seen in them as fanaticism and unfit ideologism until lately, becomes now the reason for hoping that they can come with something different and better than the perfume industry.

It is a little bit as if citizens fed up with mainstream politicians turned their votes to the ecologist and extremist parties. In a context of oppression, injustice and corruption, extremism is seen as incorruptness and ecology as a way for a better quality of living.
There is much parallelism between politics and perfumery, new politicians who are independent of parties, who are ecological and idealistic soon become corrupt when they enter into the political system, and this is the greater threat for consumers, when natural perfumers enter into the perfume industry.

This is inevitably what the future has in store, the absorption of natural independent perfumers into the industrial system of perfumery.
Already, the Fragrance Foundation of the famous FIFI awards has set up a “Indie Committee” on which board is present the most famous of  natural perfumer. The FF is defined as the “non-profit, educational arm of the international fragrance industry”.

From now on, the possibility that a natural perfumer will be awarded with the maximum official recognition is very concrete.
This can certainly be the mean to control natural perfumers, bestowing recognition and awards to those who are least disturbing to the industry., and boycotting other undisciplined ones.

A boycott against perfumers of the Natural perfumers Guild has indeed already been publicly announced by a members of this board on her blog and it is obvious that her political position will heavily influence her decision for the awards.

It was already known that the FIFI were not awarded by merit but by political convenience and with the setting up of  this “Indie Committee”, natural perfumery is drawn by force into the politics of the industry.

Future is always very much predictable to whom studies the past and observes the present, but this is for next time…

Not many years ago there were just 3 official types of perfumery, Vintage, mainstream and Niche perfumery, such as Creed or Lutens .

The last 20 years have witnessed not only the  birth and growth of independent natural perfumers but also the of “New Niche” perfumers,  like Ormonde Jane, Andy Tauer,  Dawn Spencer Hurwitz, ecc… ,  who steadily won recognition and reached a level of success superior to that of natural perfumers by proposing a return to the origins of modern perfumery, where the artistry of fragrance resided into the clash or complementarity of synthetics with naturals.
Their success in the niche market has been due to the fact that they were offering  what had totally disappeared from mainstream perfumery and was disappearing from “Old Niche”, creativity, experimentation, new ideas…

All this was happening while mainstream and Old Niche perfumery were  eliminating naturals not only from their new products but also from their famous classics, reformulating them.

Originally, the public of “New Niche” perfumers was  a small market of demanding consumers who had been already educated to artistic perfumery by the Old Niche products, the perfumistas:  fans of perfume. Their market  is now rapidly extending to usual consumers of mainstream fragrances for 2 reasons, disappointment from mainstream products  and new ethical consumerism.

The relationship of the “New Niche”  perfumers with their customers  became lately very similar to that  of performers with their fans. The physical scene contact that performers have with their public is substituted by the web contact on a web-scene consisting of personal blogs and personal FB pages.
The “New  Niche” perfumers interact personally with the public and unveil their personal life, emotions and even business in a sometimes embarrassing  manner for a non-American person.

The “New Niche”  perfumers have opened the door of recognition to natural perfumers, it is the “New Niche” trend that came first and it carried the Natural Perfumery trend.

- First of all by reintroducing naturals in a much more consistent manner than “Old niche” perfumery did,  therefore educating  the nose of “perfumistas”  to  a higher standard of quality with which they could appreciate perfumes fully Natural and also re-evaluate Old Niche and mainstream products.

-Secondly by demonstrating that a person without any previous experience or link in the perfume industry could pop up , set up a small one man business, succeed into producing real good products and obtain international recognition through the web. This is a revolution in the mind of the public; real perfumes are not necessarily produced by famous brand fragrances.
This was also a strong encouragement for striving natural perfumers who were lagging behind stuck in the very small “alternative ecological” market .

-Thirdly, some of them like DSH and andy Tauer, by participating into fragrance projects with natural perfumers and bloggers promoted natural perfumery in a big way. New Niche perfumers allowed natural perfumers to share their own fame and recognition among perfumistas.

These are the other 3 protagonists that have contributed into the making of the trend of natural perfumes started by mandy Aftel , Anya McCoy and the bloggers: Old niche perfumers, “New Niche” perfumers and the perfumistas.

They participated in making natural perfumers become recognized protagonists of modern perfumery.

However, the birth of the trend has been possible only because of 2 external factor, the particular situation of mainstream perfumery at this point of its evolution and the new consumer trends towards ethical and ecological consumerism.

This is for next time…