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Over the past two years I’ve worked on several perfume projects
that had shorter turnaround times than I’d like. Some of the rush was because I
was given very little time (by my standards) to work on a project and some was due to the fact
that I tend to juggle multiple tasks and procrastinate on whatever is not
extremely urgent. Of course, the result of procrastination is also a short
deadline. I don’t think the end products of the work that was done quickly are
inferior in any way to those that have taken longer. In fact, one of my
favorite fragrances was produced on a short deadline. What I can say, though,
is that the end products might have been different if I’d had more time to
think about them and tweak them, and I might have savored the creative process
more.
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I don’t like being rushed by externally imposed deadlines. Just
as I enjoy waking up slowly in the morning with my laptop and coffee and just
as I enjoy eating things that would be categorized as belonging to the “slow
food” movement, I’m a believer in “slow perfume”. I like to take my time and savor every stage
of formulation, tweaking subtly as I go, and thinking about it as I sniff over
the course of days, weeks, months, and sometimes even years. It’s happened more
than once that a formula just didn’t quite smell the way I wanted it to, so I
put it aside. Later, I discovered a new material that was exactly what I needed
to finish it up. Working on a strict deadline, I would have settled for
something that was not my original vision.
I’ve thought about the concept of slow perfume as I’ve
worked on Blackbird, going through a 6-month process that mostly involved
thinking about it and testing materials. For me, perfume-making is like writing
– most of the work is done consciously or subconsciously in my head before I
put fingers to keyboard or do any mixing of materials. Perfume materials need
time to blend, so smelling has to be done after they have time to settle in
together. The blending may also be a multi-stage process, with each stage taking
time to mature before it’s combined with other components.
I don’t know how other perfumers work, but I do know that for
most endeavors, having time to think and reflect is important. Good wine, cheese, and some perfume materials are better when aged. Bees painstakingly select the best nectar and collect it to make real honey, not a high-fructose corn syrup imitation. Creative concepts also need time to develop. Products made with love and thought must somehow reflect that slow process.
[Photos all from Wikimedia]
I'm all for slow. I do like some of my quick sketches and watercolors immensely, but most of my paintings have 20 or more layers, and take over a year to finish. Some are never finished! And I am curious about modern perfume design, because in the olden days, it was considered necessary to age a perfume for at least 6 months to really understand what it was saying. Now everything's fast fast fast. Have you noticed a difference with your perfumes, in terms of letting them age before use? I know chypre's I've made seem much smoother after several months. Maybe with modern synthetics, aging isn't necessary. I don't know!
ReplyDeleteMarla, there's something much more satisfying about taking your time and putting on the 20 layers over the course of a year compared to doing a quick sketch, which is probably just the prelude to the painting.
DeleteIt is absolutely correct that perfume needs time to age. I notice a huge difference in my perfumes from the time the concentrate is first mixed until it's had time to age. They seem much smoother and more coherent after a few months. It's more true for naturals, but even with synthetics aging definitely benefits the blend. Time and time again I go back to one of my perfumes and am surprised by how good it is after aging.
I also age some of my natural materials before I use them. Some things are better fresh, others are better aged.
Something I didn't mention in the other reply is that often, after aging I find that adjustments are in order. Some notes tend to recede and others come to the fore, so several iterations of the adjustment process are often necessary. This is during the formulation stage, and is one of the reasons why it takes a lot of time. I can usually guess what's going to happen and compensate for it in the original formula, but not always. Once the final formula is established, the aging doesn't take as long, but I like to be aging a new batch as I use the older one.
DeleteI remember reading that a perfume put out by Frapin got excellent reviews at first, but as the batch aged, it went off completely and had to be trashed. (My sample was from a mod batch that never went on sale; it aged pretty well.) Then the formula was rewritten, and the perfume allowed to age before sale. I think too many niche brands move product out too quickly, I'm sure the Frapin Syndrome happens a lot.
DeleteThat Frapin story is interesting. I think there's a lot of pressure to move new perfumes out quickly, and I don't like it. I also think the quick-release syndrome applies to a lot of things, not just perfumes.
DeleteWriting music and making perfume are often considered parallel endeavors. The big difference is, of course, that music is usually a strictly temporal art while perfume making seems (to me anyway) to be both plastic and temporal. When writing music the composer or improviser may think of the piece, be in training to express it and have it in his hands or on the tip of his tongue for years. The moment when the music finally "appears" can seem almost spontaneous. I imagine this might be the same for a perfumer? For a composer and perfumer that "spontaneous" moment is often followed by long periods of crafting and refining. On the other hand, the musical improviser's offering, especially if the piece is not recorded, has no substance and exists only as long as it is played, then it is no more than a memory. Perhaps not unlike the perception of a fragrance?
ReplyDeleteWhile I usually compose rather than improvise music, I prefer a more improvisatory approach to painting. I use acrylics and lots of water so can splash away to my heart's content and let gravity and viscosity do what they do. When I'm finished with an improvised painting I actually have some sort of concrete (plastic) object to show for my efforts.
Gail, you're absolutely right about the creative process for music and perfume being similar, with each creation existing just at the interface between consciousness and unconsciousness for a time, sometimes a long time, before it "appears". Because perfume evolves as it is worn, and because it's only perceived for a time while it's being worn, it has some of the temporal properties of music.
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