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Home / SmellyBlog / Tagged: Chocolate Perfume

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Brewing

I have been too busy to blog in the past few days. The countdown to take-off has started, and the clocks are ticking… Tying loose ends; strategic packing (trying to refine into an art form the virtues of minimalistic luggage); But also lots of brewing: bath oils and massage oils as gifts for family and friends on the front burner, and new scents to be left to marry when I am away. I am hoping to find some great surprises when I am back… Schizm already smells lovely, with the new creamy tuberose and the addition of orange blossom for a vividly sensual white floral heart, and cepes and ambrette to supply the muskiness of the original costus formula. Guilt is starting to grow on me with new crop of chocolate absolute (deliciously smooth and rich, thickly sweet in the best possible way) and infused with luxurious honeyed amber and fruity orange blossom and blood orange. I have been trying to see how it will work without the smoky leathery note that makes Guilt what it is (chocolate and smoking seem to fit the title of the two greatest crimes of pleasure, but they also smell good together) I have been also working on two new soliflores for the summer and am hoping that they will become even better after aging. These are going to be surprises for you, and I will not reveal the singular theme for now.

So back to brewing: I am really enjoying the simplicity of bath and massage oils and have decided to share my pleasures with my immediate family and friends (which I refer to, without their knowledge, as my lab pets). For them I have been concocting luxurious massage and bath oils from almond oils and organic virgin coconut oil, infused with delicious edible scents such as chocolate, licorice, gin & tonic and others. The greatest fun of making one-of-a-kind personal products is the flexibility and room for improvisation. And so I took the liberty to apply some of my underground creativity to the packaging: miniature liquor bottles were freed of their toxic contents and released of their labels and instead were filled with fragrant virgin coconut oil, flavoured with botanical essences. The result is pictured below for your amusement.

Booze Bath: featuring almond oil and essences of white cognac absolute, juniper berry and lime.
Choco Bath: featuring almond oil and essences of chocolate absolute, vanilla absolute and blood orange essential oil.
The lettering, by the way, possesses the unexpected feature of glowing in the dark!


Chocolate Dilemma

Some perfumes start with an abstract concept. Other perfumes are inspired by a building block - a note of distinct character the inspires the perfumer to explore possibilities and express the magnificent beauty of simplicity. So what happens when an unusually stunning building block is discovered in the middle of developing an abstract perfume?

I just received a new cocoa absolute which smells truly of chocolate. Sweetness and all. It’s all I have been looking forward to for reworking my chocolate perfume, Guilt, and perfecting it. Guilt is a leathery chocolate concoction, juxtaposing smoky notes, rich florals and deep brown chocolate and amber with a hint of spice. Rose, orange blossom, frangipani and mimosa create an interesting ethereal contrast to the hedonistic chocolate… Guilt has always been a dark, leathery scent, the concept being using the most guilt-inducing substances such as cigarette smoke and chocolate addiction as the theme for an unusual gourmand.
Now with the new sweet chocolate I am feeling tempted to re-work it into an altogether different concept - a milk chocolate, almost caramel-like, with sweet chocolate and vanilla, maybe also some tonka bean and amber. No flowers. No leather. No spices. Just chocolate.
Of course there is the possibility of starting a new scent, but I have promised myself to not over-expand my collection (one chocolate perfume should be enough).

Which of the two would make you feel most shamelessly guilty?
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