Perfume vocabulary is diverse and often confusing. Therefore we have compiled an extensive reference on Perfume Shrine, analysing the various perfume terms applied by perfumers with examples of actual perfumes. Today's terms comprise some of the more "acquired taste" definitions on fragrant materials &finished compositions. More perfume jargon than marketing copy, the sheer force and almost visceral effect they have leaves no one indifferent.
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| copal with trapped insects (wikimedia commons) |
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Terpenic, Phenolic and Camphorous are not terms you'd see brandished in a general discussion about fragrance or in the promotional material handed out by perfume companies. More smell-specific and objective definitions than subjective terms ~relating to appreciation rather than factual knowledge, such as sharp, soft, ambrosial, tart, pungent or zesty~ they form a cluster of nuances within a more general smell group, namely citrus, leather and green respectively. Let's see them one by one.
Terpenic: Perversely Fresh, Rosy Citrus with Hints of Turpentine
Terpenic comes from terpenes, a large and diverse class of organic compounds (ten carbon alcohols), produced by conifers (and a few insects) for protective reasons, as they are strong-smelling, reminiscent of turpentine. You're more familiar with terpenes than you think: The aroma and flavor of hops, a prime constituent in select beers, comes from terpenes. Vitamin A and squalene are also terpenes and so are their derivative.
In fragrances, however, the term is associated with conifer-deriving essences, particularly pine (which contains a-pinene and b-pinene alonside the combined molecule terpineol) and fir. Copal, a tree resin that is particularly identified with the aromatic resins used by the cultures of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica as ceremonially burned incense and other purposes, is also rather more acrid than most other resins (though resins can have terpenic facets, especially frankincense/olibanum) and therefore requires its own little footnote.
Various terpenes are present in a variety of plants emitting fresh scent: farnesol is present in many essential oils such as citronella, neroli, lemon grass, tuberose, rose, and tolu balsam; geraniol (which smells rosy in isolation) is the primary part of rose oil, palmarosa oil, and Javanese citronella oil; limonene is the dominant terpene in lemon peel. Citing these examples it's easy to see how terpenic stands for fresh & dry, bitter citrusy with a background of a petrol and winery note.
Serge Lutens Fille en Aiguilles is a beautiful exaple that combines the terpenic facets of pine into a smooth base with sweeter elements.
Caron's Alpona is a "dry as a bone", clean, refreshing and bitter rendition of the citrus peel note.
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| pine resin (wikimedia commons) |
Phenolic: Tar-Like and Acrid
Phenolic comes from phenol (carbolic acid and phenic acid), an organic compound in white crystal form which possesses a very pungent, acrid, smoky scent that is very dry and can veer into tarry-smelling, even like bitumen and hot tarmac. Fitting considering that -like many perfumery ingredients- phenol was first isolated from coal tar. Tar came from the pyrolysation of pine trees and from peat. The latter is often used as a term to describe certain whiskeys (peaty tasting) and it's incomphrehensible to most who wouldn't dream how peat tastes like. But think of it as tarry and you're there!
Natural sources include tea, coffee and chocolate and yerba maté, but even fruits such as pomegranates and blackcurrant can be refered to as having phenolic facets (in the case of the fruits behind the tangy top notes); phenol is leaning into acidic rather than alcaline. In perfumery castoreum, birch tar and narcissus all exhibit their barnyard and smoky black tea tar-like facets in various fragrances.
Usually phenolic is a term we use to describe leathery fragrances, such as
Chanel Cuir de Russie,
Etro Gomma,
Knize Ten,
Bvlgari Black. The Chanel fragrance is an interesting example as it combines a
de iuro resinous note (birch tar) with phenolic facets. Birch tar is poised to me between resinous and phenolic: rather think of phenolic as a sub-dividion of a more generalised resin group, much like terpenic is a more nuanced division under the citrus & resin groups.
A beautiful, truly "phenolic fragrance" that sets the example for this kind of thing is the scarce & super exclusive
Eau de Fier by Annick Goutal. Another interpretation comes in leathery fragrances, especially hard-core ones, such as
Lonestar Memories by Tauer Perfumes.
Gaucho by Ayala Moriel takes the more yerba maté like note as its departure point in
a fougère fragrance composition full of
coumarin.
L'Artisan Parfumeur explores the leathery, phenolic facets of narcissus in their harvest fragrance
Fleur de Narcisse.
Camphorous/Camphoraceous: Cool, Sharp Green
Seen with both spellings, the scent of camphor is familiar to us from common "moth balls" which utilize the white crystalls for moth repelling. However the cooling, sharp and pungent scent of camphor which triggers the trigeminal nerve in the nose (hence the intense repulsion it can produce to sensitive individuals) is also a constituent, small but very significant of certain fragrant plants: Eycalyptus and the camphor laurel (from which camphor is often derived, though not exclusively as it can be made synthetically as well) are the obvious suspects, but camphoraceous smells also include one end of the lavender essence spectrum (that medicinal top note, the other end is caramelic), patchouli and the top note of tuberose and gardenia.
This is why often such perfumes are curedly described as "smelling like moth-balls". They can also have positive connotations, memory associations with the smell of Vicks vaporub (or not, depending on how often and how much your parents used to use on you as a kid!).
The beautiful vibrancy that camphor brings to a composition can be seen in intense patchouli fragrances, as
Clinique Aromatics Elixir or
Voleur de Roses by L'Artisan Parfumeur, as well as some "modern classic" tuberose fragrances, such as
Frederic Malle Carnal Flower and
Gardenia Passion by Annick Goutal.
Ylang ylang flower (cananga odorata) apart from
the salicylates facet it has can also take camphorous nuances, as evidenced by another
Goutal fragrance, Passion.
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This is a perfume to wear sparingly (it can be big), but it won't change much during the day and after the initial impression it dries down to an erotic and skin-friendly, skin-compatible nuzzling buzz. 
