Free Aromatherapy Course

Abdes Salaam of La Via del Profumo (Profumo.it) announced some wonderful news: a free aromatherapy course which is available online at www.profumo.it/aromacourse.doc
The scope is meant for the benefit of people and not for commercial reasons while Abdes describes some of the stunning effects that aromatherapy can have, with reports and pictures from my Timbuktu experiences. You can reach those on the following link. http://www.profumo.it/Blog/index.php (scroll down a few texts)


More info on La Via de Profumo and Abdes Salaam: http://www.profumo.it/
Check our reviews of his scents on the widgets below.

Penhaligon's Olfactory Owl

Now here's something to get all aflutter for. Harry potter fans as well as fumeheads now have something in common, something as unthinkable as an...owl. Penhaligon’s, the fine English fragrance house founded in 1870, is delighted to announce that an Olfactory Owl will be touring London during December.

The Owl, created in homage to their illustrated Christmas Gift Boxes, will be popping up in various locations around London to spread some festive fragrant joy and offer exclusive discount vouchers and perfume samples. Dressed in Victorian finery, the Olfactory Owl will be journeying across London on foot and by tube and bus, taking in some of London’s iconic landmarks and shopping hotspots.
The Owl will be promoted via the Penhaligon’s Facebook and Twitter accounts and customers will be invited to submit pictures of the Olfactory Owl to win Christmas prizes. Customers can keep up to date with the Owl’s progress by checking his schedule on Facebook and Twitter and by following the Owl’s tweets during his journeys.

The schedule for Penhaligon's Olfactory Owl:
Thursday 16th December – Oxford Street, Bond Street, Savile Row, Burlington Arcade, Fortnum & Mason
Saturday 18th December – Regent Street and Trafalgar Square
Sunday 19th December – Knightsbridge, Sloane Square, Green Park, Piccadilly
Tues 21st December – Covent Garden, Somerset House, British Museum

Get more information/updates:
Penhaligons on Twitter: @Penhaligonsltd #OlfactoryOwl
Penhaligons on Facebook

info/pics via press release

Esxence 2011 Niche Perfumery Exhibition

ESXENCE 2011, the exhibition for the appreciation of Artistic Perfumery will take place at Le Palazzo della Permanente, Via F. Turati 34, in Milan, Italy from 31 March to 3 April 2011.
Opening Hours:
Thursday 31 March and Friday 1 April, for professional and press visitors only: 10.00 a.m. – 6.00 p.m.
Saturday 2 and Sunday 3 April, open to the public: 10.00 a.m. – 6.00 p.m.
For further information, please contact: I.C.E. Organising Secretariat: tel. +39.02.34538354 or visit the official Esxence link.

Esxence The Scent of Excellence, now on its third installation, is once again the must-attend benchmark and rendezvous for brand owners, creators, producers, distributors, buyers and retailers from all over the world, an ideal event for developing a constantly growing market that can offer competitive advantages to those who produce fragrances that are not intended to appeal to everybody, but to express olfactory creativity and communication. This is a sector that the statistics show to be maturing coherently, guaranteeing that its dealers achieve results comparable to those of conventional perfumery. After achieving an increase of 54% in brands represented in 2010 compared to the previous year and thousands of visitors from more than 24 different countries, the main aim of the 2011 edition is to pursue its activity of contributing to developing Artistic Perfumery as a creative art that springs from human talent, so as to spread knowledge about it and encourage its diffusion as a unique, fascinating artistic heritage. In Italy alone, this sector has reached a turnover estimated at 120 million Euros and has a total potential of more than 850 million Euros at European level.
The Promoting Committee – which has confirmed I.C.E. International Club Exhibitions, a company specialising in niche events, as organiser of Esxence for the third year running – has already chosen the new International Technical Committee of experts in the sector, whose task is to apply predetermined shared parameters to filter the numerous applications to participate, so as to keep access selective and highly qualified.

Esxence The Scent of Excellence 2011 will feature perfume products that make a distinctive mark for their expressive capacity, quality, authenticity and finesse, created to give olfactory form to metals, to stones, to seas, to oceans and to deserts, adopting combinations previously considered impossible. These refined creations convey a sense of strength and vigour, narrating unique, magical stories, acting out dramas and comedies and telling fables from different eras, always plucking the chords of the emotions with their undeniable power to evoke.

info via press release

Between Work and Play...

The end of the road for 2010 finds me juggling a million things on my admittedly less than perfectly agile hands, trying to reconcile the business side of things of being a fragrance writer and historian with the aesthetic hedonism for which you have come to know me. An intermezzo which will promenade my shadow alongside the Elysian Fields is called for, that might keep me from too much technological access. There are a couple of scheduled posts however, so you might peek for a few surprises and many tasty nuggets as soon as the machine gets re-oiled and back at full swing again. À très bientôt!

"Diorissimo was used to conjure up images of the suffocated American housewife"

"It's a rainy Tuesday night, and I'm in a basement club in London wafting a perfume-impregnated cardboard stick under my nose. It smells good. I can detect a delicate floral note. But then I pick up the distinct aroma of cigarettes. The perfume is Jasmin et Cigarettes, a tobacco-infused scent made by Etat Libre d'Orange". Thus begins the article on The Guardian by Leonie Cooper concerning a decidecated group of fumeheads who assemble to watch movies enhanced by the experience of scent, much like Polyester by John Waters had ventured to do decades before. "This is Scratch and Sniff, a series of events aimed at enhancing our understanding of the arts through smell. Each month, a group of around 40 people gather to sniff perfume while watching film clips, or listen to talks about geography and history. This event is called Scent of the Movies and involves sampling unusual scents like Jasmin et Cigarettes, and then matching them to film clips – the idea being to make us think of what a film might smell like." Retrospectives are also indulged, last February comprising a history of the 20th century in scent and film making, combing two passions into one and including classic and unusual fragrances that would help perception. Much like Far from Heaven reprises the Douglas Sirk melodramas of the 50s, this is a reverse exercise meant as both homage and inquisitive gaze into an unknown parameter of the aesthetic pleasure. "I did enjoy the scent for Brokeback Mountain, though. It was called Lonestar Memories – and it smelt of campfires" concludes the writer. Mr.Tauer, I think you have created a classic reference!

And on to you: What is your favourite film and scent coupling? Or which scents would you like to experience/wear while watching movies?

Top photo still from film Far from Heaven starring Julianne Moore