Perfume

FRAGments: A New Perfume Event

Maggie Mahboubian is on a mission.  A mission to make the world a more fragrant place.  A mission to introduce the world to the independent, artisan perfumers working in this country and Canada.  A mission to create a place where perfume lovers, and those just curious about this growing indie perfume movement, can go to chat up the perfumers and have time to experience the scents.  A mission to “feed the senses.”  To that end, she’s created FRAGments, a one day fragrance salon in Los Angeles, which will take place on June 22, 2013. An architect by training, Maggie launched her own boutique scent line Parfums Lalun at the Artisan Fragrance Salon in Los Angeles in September 2012.  I met Maggie there, and tried her lovely natural perfumes, including Blanche de Bois, made with gardenia from her own garden, Qajar Rose and La Lune de Miel. After participating more…

New! The Essence of Wine and Perfume – A Pairing Workshop in LA

Please join me and master perfumer Sarah Horowitz for a super fun wine and perfume pairing workshop in Los Angeles!  We’ll be pairing wine with fragrant essences curated by Sarah at her perfume studio.  You’ll get to sniff and sip.  The best part of all is we’ll be creating a custom, one-of-a-kind fragrance on the spot, with your input, inspired by one of the wines!  You’ll be able to take a home a sample vial of this bespoke scent.  This is a  great way to learn about both wine and perfume, and how the two are more similar than you ever imagined. Our guest vintner is Sonja Magdevski of Casa Dumetz Wines and we’ll be pouring and pairing her wines with Sarah’s perfumes! Tell all your perfume loving friends, especially those in the Los Angeles area.  Sign up early! Space is extremely limited. Detailed information on ScentTrails.com, a new perfume boutique finder and…

Original Scent Opening Draws Stars and Fragrance Fanatics

Blue and green glass bottles fill shelves against a stark white backdrop.  Mixologists hold bottle stoppers out for people seated at the bar to smell.  They wear white lab coats that say “Be Original Be Fabulous.”  They seem to be conspiring with the guest brewing a concoction.  Clear glass bottles are filled with amber colored liquids. You’d think that a special Cognac or Bourbon is being blended for a cocktail at a hipster bar. Instead, the people behind the bar are perfume gods and goddesses, waiting to help you find your own Original Scent. Then you notice Kelly Bensimon (Real Housewives of New York) sniffing and smelling at the bar.  She’s consulting with artisan perfumer Sarah Horowitz to create a custom blended perfume. There’s Jeff Goldblum trying out different scents. These sessions are taking place at Original Scent, a new upscale custom fragrance boutique in Pasadena, CA. Original Scent is…

Learning To Blend Perfume – A Class With An Artisan Pefumer

When you’re really passionate about wine, there’s nothing better than getting an opportunity to visit one of your favorite wineries, meet the winemaker, and then have a blending session led by that winemaker.  By learning the basics of blending, you can taste how just a few drops here or a few milliliters there of Cabernet Franc added to a Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot blend can make all the difference, one creating a blend that you don’t like at all to one that is sublime, one that you can’t wait to drink. The same principle applies in perfume blending, as I learned one recent Saturday in Los Angeles.  I had met perfumer Sarah Horowitz through the Artisan Frangrance Salons held in San Francisco and LA, and I liked her perfumes very much.  I’m obsessed with Perfect Coconut Milk and Beauty Comes from Within.  When I heard that she also teaches a beginner’s…

Gardenia In Full Bloom At CREED

Ah gardenia.  This white flower’s creamy, milky fragrance is a heady scent.  There have been many interpretations of gardenia as a perfume.  The venerable fragrance House of Creed has created Fleurs de Gardenia, the latest scent in the repertoire of Creed’s perfumes.  With Valentines Day coming up, should you need a gift, this beautiful fragrance is a fitting romantic gift.

Fleurs de Gardenia - CREED Boutique

To launch this fragrance, Erwin Creed traveled from Paris to the United States, making personal appearances at six Neiman Marcus stores in November, where Fleurs de Gardenia is sold exclusively, including the San Francisco store (where I met him).  It’s rare that Erwin gets to do an in-store appearance, so it is a big deal that he is in town. There are violins playing.

Erwin CREED 2013 photo

Scent as Pure Art

Photos by Rich Kallaher, Courtesy of the Museum of Arts and Design

Fragrance is having its moment.  You expect to find perfume on display in drug stores, in department stores, in high end boutiques.  You even find it airports at duty free shops.  In a museum?  That’s probably the last place you’d expect to find perfume.  By the way, don’t call it perfume. I’ll explain later. Chandler Burr is the mastermind of the new Department of Olfactory Art at the Museum of Arts and Design (MAD) in New York City.  His position as curator is one he created, successfully pitched to MAD in 2010.  At that time, Chandler was the one and only scent critic for the New York Times, where he wrote about fragrance the same way as art, dance and book critic would write about the art they cover.  Chandler’s point of view then as now, is that scents are works of art and the people creating them are artists in their own right.

6 Indie Perfumes You Need To Sniff Now

Twice a year fragrance lovers descend upon New York City for the tour de force that is Sniffapalooza.  One of the fragrance event group’s signature perfume odysseys is the annual “Spring Fling,” a weekend event that explores scents all over the city.  While many large perfume houses introduce new scents to our group, Sniffapalooza is also known for the debuts of small boutique labels. I love discovering new fragrances and sharing the stories.  While we tried over 100 scents, I fell in love with six of them, all different, but complex and interesting.  Some are just launching, others have been around for a few years, but all are making a big splash in the perfume world. 

4 Late Summer Reading Picks on Wine and Perfume

Margrit Mondavi_s Sketchbook_ Reflections on Wine, Food, Art, Family, Romance and Life_ Thomas Keller_ 9780615604947_ Amazon.com_ Books

Remember those days when you had a required summer reading list from school?  Yeah, those lists made reading a chore.  Now as adults, we lament that we have no time to read.  But we get to choose what we read.  There’s still time before the summer ends to pick up a book or two, especially when the subjects are wine or perfume.

In The Juice by Jay McInerney,  the Wall Street Journal wine columnist takes you on a journey through the world of wine.

LA’s Scent Bar Now at a Target Near You

If you are what Scent Bar co-owner Adam Eastwood calls a “perfume head” then most likely you know the fragrance boutique Scent Bar in Los Angeles and its companion website LuckyScent.  “Our core business is helping people find very hard to find and rare types of fragrances that are not readily available in the marketplace,” says Adam.  I’ve ordered countless samples on LuckyScent, a great service that’s offered so you can try these exotic perfumes in your own home.

You won’t find celebrity fragrances here.  “Our market is a much smaller segment of perfume users, people who are really serious about it.”  He describes his clients as willing to experiment with perfumes to find new and unusual scents.  The fragrances they stock are from very small brands made in very small amounts.  They are not scents for the masses.

Then Target came calling.

A Fragrant Affair: The First Artisan Fragrance Salon

I am a wine lover, unabashedly passionate about wine.  That I’m also a perfumer lover should come as no surprise, because I find them so similar in the way that perfumes have a top, middle and base note, and how wine has a bouquet, mid palate and finish, with both perfume and wine changing in similar ways over time.

So I was excited to learn that on July 8, 2012 a scentsational event will be taking place in San Francisco.  The first annual Artisan Fragrance Salon celebrates independent perfume brands from across the country and Canada.

“The growth of the artisan chocolate market has really taken off in the last few years,” says A.K. Crump.  He’s been producing events across the country called Chocolate Salons since 2007.   “I think that we are poised to start seeing a similar growth in artisan fragrances.” 

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