AMBRETTE SEEDS, OKRA AND “BOTANICAL MUSK”

The “Mystery of Musk” project seems to have created a lot of interest in natural, plant-based materials that can produce a musky scent. Of course, animal-based products like civet and castoreum are natural, too, but there are some convincing and not so convincing reasons for not using them. I won’t go there today.

A few weeks back I wrote a post on amber, but didn’t include ambrette seeds in that category. Perhaps I should have because the name sounds a bit like amber, and it sometimes seems to be described in terms of amber or included as a component of an “amber” accord. The source of ambrette, also known as “botanical musk”, “vegetable musk” and other, less obvious names, comes from a plant in the hibiscus family, Abelmoschus moschatus, shown in the drawing at the top. It’s related to okra (Abelmoschus esculentus), a vegetable that I love curried, fried in batter, cooked in gumbo, or just about any other way you want to prepare it. I used to grow it back when I lived in a place where we didn’t have slugs as big as small dogs, slimy disgusting creatures that can completely mow down a row of okra plants overnight. Come to think of it, okra has a slimy side to it, so maybe there’s something in it that slugs find especially delightful. I now snap up okra whenever it appears in one of our local produce stands, which is all too seldom.

Fresh okra flowers are beautiful, like a light yellow hibiscus with a dark red center, and the fresh pods and seeds have a light perfumey smell. Abelmoschus moschatus flowers and pods look very similar. Ambrette amps up the okra scent to produce a highly distinctive aroma that makes a wonderful perfume base.

A while back I bought a bottle of ambrette seed CO2 extract and have been learning to love it. It arrived in the winter, as a beige-colored solid that looked like just about any other absolute. In that state it didn’t seem to have very much aroma, just a sort of off-putting waxy smell a little like fake oakmoss. To give it a fair chance, I warmed it up enough so that it became liquid, and rubbed a little bit on my skin. At first there was just the waxy smell, only stronger, but before long it bloomed with one of the most amazing and unique scents that I’ve experienced. Unless you’ve smelled ambrette, it’s hard to describe because I can’t think of anything else like it. It’s a little bit floral, a little bit sweet, and a lot of its own musky character. It has decent sillage and lasts for a very long time once it reaches the “musky” phase of its development. I like to wear it by itself, but I’m not sure that hard-core approach is for everybody. Now that it’s summer, it stays mostly liquid, with some waxy stuff in the bottom.

I was planning on using ambrette in a perfume when I acquired some samples of Strange Invisible Perfumes. The first one that I tried, Musc Botanique, was almost pure ambrette with the waxy notes at the beginning covered up with some geranium. I love it. The next was Prima Ballerina, mostly a mixture of ambrette, rose, and lime. Also very nice. The third one, L’Invisible, seemed weak compared to the others, but there is a slight ambrette note in the drydown along with some oakmoss. I still have two more SIP samples to try, so am curious to see if they have ambrette in the base, too. If so, I’ll have to conclude that the trademark of SIP is ambrette. Not a bad thing to use, but it would be nice to mix things up a little. Once I try all of the samples, I’ll probably post reviews here. In the meantime, I’ve concluded that ambrette is a good scent for hot summer weather, and will go to the produce stand to look for some okra. A big pot of gumbo sounds like a good meal for the coming weekend and an opportunity to think about the musky side of okra.

[All Abelmoschus illustrations are from Wikimedia]

FALSE ATTRIBUTIONS OF SILLAGE

Yesterday I was testing the sample of Strange Invisible Perfumes Musc Botanique that I got from the perfume shop, sitting at my work table and really getting into huffing the geranium and ambrette seed mixture. At some point it seemed to me that the sillage miraculously developed into the most wonderful thing that I had ever smelled, something that was indescribably sweet, powdery, musky, floral, and like nothing I had ever smelled before. I wrote an over-the-top review raving about how wonderful the sillage was, and how strange it was that it wasn’t detectable close to the skin. I was ready to go out and buy a full bottle of the stuff.

At some point during that rapturous experience, I had to go outside. Once I was out of the house, the scent reverted to a fairly simple ambrette, and the wonderful sillage was gone. When I went back in the house again, the rest of the scent came back and I realized that what I was smelling was a combination of the Musc Botanique and the fumes rising up from several batches of newly-made soap that were curing in the sun on a table in the back greenhouse room. I had to laugh and, of course, re-write my review. However, I have to say that the combination of everything at once was heavenly.

Another similar incident happened when I was at the meeting in Saint Louis. I had put on Sel de Vetiver that morning, but when I got to the meeting, I smelled sandalwood, a very nice sandalwood indeed, almost like the one in the original Samsara. At first I thought someone else in the room was wearing a perfume with lots of sandalwood, but at some point I realized that the smell was coming from my wrist. At that point I thought to myself how remarkable it is that Sel de Vetiver smells so different in a warmer, more humid climate. Then I realized that the sandalwood smell was coming from my left wrist, in the vicinity of my plastic watchband. Apparently one of the experimental mixtures that I had applied a couple of days before had gotten under my watchband and been soaked up by the plastic. I think I know which one it was and when it happened. Weeks later the watch still smells vaguely like sandalwood. Amazing.

Have you had an experience where you thought you were smelling your perfume but it turned out to be something else? Write a comment about it, and you will be entered in a drawing to win a 5 ml bottle of Golden Cattleya perfume, the newest addition to the Orchid Scents line. If you’re in the US, I’ll also include a full-size Golden Cattleya soap, one of the ones that was drying yesterday. The drawing will be on Saturday, August 28.

KNOWS PERFUME: A GEM IN WEST SEATTLE

I’m back home again after a week of not posting due to being busy with conference activities, the chronic difficulty of getting on the internet, and just plain inertia. Now that I’m getting back into a normal routine, I have to decide whether to post some more of the travelogue-type things that I started writing about on the road, or switch to something directly perfume related. Perfume wins, hands down.

Before I left I had made an appointment to go show my line of fragrances to Christen Cottam, who has recently opened up a wonderful shop in West Seattle called “Knows Perfume”. West Seattle is like a self-contained little beach town, and Knows Perfume is right on the main drag, California Avenue. The entrance is simple, but attractive. The shop is easy to find, and there’s plenty of street parking, at least on a weekday. The inside looks inviting, with a couch, lots of artwork, tall stools at the counter, and plenty of floor space, with items nicely displayed on shelves and tabletops.

Christen herself is friendly, enthusiastic, knowledgeable, and clearly loves what she’s doing. The lines that she sells are all ones that would be considered niche or indy, ranging from L’Artisan, Montale, and Bois 1920 to Strange Invisible Perfumes, Tallulah Jane, Smell Bent, and Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab. These are the perfumes that you won’t find in the drugstore, department store, or duty-free shop. In addition to the merchandise, Christen keeps her own personal collection of perfumes at the shop for sampling, decanting, and trading. With hard-to-find perfumes to suit every taste and a level of communication and service that’s almost unheard-of these days, I predict that Knows Perfume will be a huge success.

Before opening the shop, Christen studied biology, taught high-school science, worked for a biotech company, and was a roller derby skater. Quite a life! She has obviously been interested in perfume for many years, and the shop is the culmination of that interest. She says that she considers herself more of a “curator” of perfumes than a vendor, and this attitude shows in every aspect of the shop and in her interactions with the people who come in.

We spent a long time talking about perfume and, as I was about to leave, I asked her what she would recommend to a jaded perfumista who has a closet full of samples and bottles at home (to say nothing of a fully loaded perfume organ). She first said that she would just turn them loose in the shop to sniff around, but then she started pulling some things out for me to try. I ended up coming home with generous samples of six different scents from Strange Invisible Perfumes, Costume National Homme, and Montale Attar. I just tried the SIP Musc Botanique and absolutely love it. Thank you, Christen!