I usually don't fuss about birthdays, I just like to enjoy myself on my special day... But this one is different - once can only turn 30 once in a lifetime. And though I was dreading this day a year ago and two years ado, or more accurately - pressured to prove myself that I have accomplished something spectacular by the age of 30 - I was surprised that when the date started approaching I found myself feeling, in fact - excited, content and quite proud of myself for turning 30 and achieving the most important things for me, both in my personal and professional life (you know, blogs have that way of making people think that way about themselves...). Yet, I still have a lot to look forward to, more to dreams to fulfill and more work to do. And it feels good.

I started my day with organizing new ingredients that just arrived yesterday (what could be better for a birthday present?). Orange blossom absolute, orange flower water absolute, pink lotus absolute and lavender absolutes were the highlight of the morning. The beautiful aromas uplifting, soothing and exciting. A true treat for body, mind and soul.
The orange blossom absolute clean and floral; orange flower water absolute tart yet honeyed; pink lotus suave and mellow, softly floral; lavender absolute like an emerald jewel, velvety and fuzzily warm. As with anything that requires order, my obsession soon took over and I officially started a studio make-over, transferring many other oils into clear dropper vials, where their colours shine through, their texture can be sensed and experienced with the rythm and flow of the fragrant drops...

I was working on perfecting a few of my recent perfumes, to fine tune them to the new qualities of the building blocks. But also, I am re-doing some of my old perfumes, which I was not quite happy enough with their performance and thought the new ingredients will improve. There are only two words that will a perfume connoisseur: Discontinued and Re-formulated. But fear not, these changes that are being made to several of my older perfumes are truly going to bring them to a different level; if you loved them before, you will love them even more. The true spirit of the perfume will remain the same, only tweaked and improved thanks to the new ingredients.

Guilt, Sabotage and Schizm are of the few that got a special treatment today.

Guilt - a leathery bitter chocolate with orange blossom heart will be better than ever, with a delicious new amber compound that I have developed. And the orange blossom is simply to die for, especially with the new chocolate absolute, which is caramel-like yet shamelessly cocoa! The key here is to keep the cocoa as a team player with the other notes, rather than focus on it as the only star at the show. The orange blossom, amber and chocolate with the barely there hint of smoke interact beautifully...

Sabotage - a vetiver and tobacco scent with citrus-spicy heart, now with a new, very refreshing type of vetiver. I mus admit I have a personal bias against the marmite-like, dark vetiver note. It is quite challenging to work with. The new vetiver I got - a wild one from Haiti - has the same refreshing qualities of citrus, without being citrusy. It may be a bit more of a heart note than a base note, but I love it. I am waiting to see how it unfolds with the lemon leaf, tobacco leaves and tonka bean. So far it's been delightful!

Schizm - Originally made with narcissus note which I can no longer obtain, and a musky costus-based musk note which due to safety regulations I am forced to ommit, I have now decided to keep it's flamboyant, sassy yet classy attitude with accents of pink lotus and orange blossom to replace the heady yet powdery presence of narcissus, and the musk accord is now based on Cepes (wild mushroom), ambrette and a rough and dry cedar moss.

It will be at least a week until I see if my predictions worked, and than tweaking will be made if necessary. but so far it all seems to be leading to the right direction...