Hello, Fragrant Friend 👋,

Amsterdam, here we come! We’ve already received a dozen sign-ups for our first Community Meetup on July 25, 2025. Want to drop by casually? Registration is open until June 15. Chester, the community, and I are excited to connect, smell and judge our #1 scent! RSVP here.

Sometimes plans change—for the better. We’re thrilled to welcome Cansu Dagbagli Ferreira, a designer whose work has been recognised internationally, from Paris to lead our visual journey. Attendees in Amsterdam will get a first look at her work 👀 —and help shape it.

Artistic freedom comes first. For our debut scent, Reflection, Chester had full creative liberty, drawing from personal inspiration. The same goes for our friend and artist Ivana Rubelj, who will interpret the fragrance through a painting that becomes part of the final product.

More soon!

🗓️ Contents of this Issue

1. Note Worthy: Perfume Oscars, Space Smells, and Basenote trouble

2. Niche Newcomers: YLEM, D.S. & Durga, and PIGMENTARIUM

3. QUIZ: Why is CO₂ extraction especially popular among niche perfumers?

4. Scent MythBusters: Perfumers always know when a fragrance is finished.

Note-Worthy 🔎🌸

#OSCAROFPERFUMERY: And the Oscar of perfumery goes to... multiple winners at the 11th Art and Olfaction Awards! Thailand's MEKHA ARANYA by SIAM1928 and Taiwan's MINT ROSE by OrDioLab claimed artisan category honours, while Michael Nordstrand's BAD LILY for TALE Parfum secured independent recognition alongside China's NORTHERN by Soulvent. The awards continue spotlighting independent perfumery's most outstanding creators across four continents.

#SPACESMELLS: From cosmic aromas to stink birds, the rarest scents span galaxies and species. British astronaut Helen Sharman describes space as having "just one smell"—a metallic odour later replicated as "Eau De Space" perfume. Meanwhile, the hoatzin bird of South America earns its "stink bird" nickname through a unique fermentation process producing an aroma likened to fresh cow manure.

#FRAGRANCEDINOSAURINPERIL: An online fragrant dinosaur is in trouble, and the perfume community should take notice. Basenotes, the internet's oldest independent fragrance community at 25 years, faces extinction after Google algorithm changes slashed their traffic by 60% overnight. If you rely on their services, why not consider help at the cost of a Starbucks cup of coffee through their Patreon support.

Niche Newcomers 🎨 🌟 

The fragrance landscape is evolving with bold new voices pushing creative boundaries. YLEM emerges as the visionary project of Moritz Sülz, collaborating with perfumer Andreas Wilhelm to create otherworldly compositions inspired by cosmic phenomena. D.S. & Durga's David Seth Moltz resurrects a 2008 archive gem, proving that sometimes the best innovations come from rediscovering forgotten treasures. Meanwhile, PIGMENTARIUM captures the essence of architectural brutalism in olfactory form, transforming concrete and steel into surprisingly sensual fragrance experiences.

QUIZ 🎲 

Scent MythBusters 🎭️ 

TL;DR

The notion that master perfumers possess an innate ability to definitively declare "this fragrance is complete" is one of perfumery's most persistent myths. In a recent interview, renowned master perfumer Christophe Laudamiel compared designing a fragrance to painting a picture—there's no standard rule to say it's finished, why not add a dot here or more color there? Through conversations with three master perfumers, we discover that the creative process is far more uncertain and open-ended than the public imagines.

The Misconception 🕵️‍♀️

Picture the master perfumer in their pristine laboratory, methodically blending precious essences with Swiss precision. After months of careful formulation, they lift the final blend to their nose and with the confidence of a conductor ending a symphony, declare: "It is finished." We've been conditioned to believe that these olfactory masters possess an almost mystical ability to know exactly when their creation has reached its ideal state—that there's a definitive moment when adding even one more drop would tip the balance from perfection to excess.

The Reality Check 🛑

The truth is far more uncertain and beautifully chaotic. When we examine the actual words of master perfumers, a completely different picture emerges—one of creative uncertainty, endless possibilities, and decisions driven as much by external constraints as by artistic satisfaction.

Christophe Laudamiel, the master behind fragrances in his Zoo collection and works for major houses, doesn't speak of definitive endpoints but rather of precarious balance: "It's like constructing a house of cards. You change one thing and your whole fragrance collapses." This metaphor reveals the fundamental instability at the heart of perfume creation. Each ingredient doesn't merely add to the composition—it transforms everything that came before.

Jean-Claude Ellena, legendary perfumer behind Hermès classics like Un Jardin Sur Le Toit and Terre d'Hermès, offers another perspective that challenges the completion myth. Rather than speaking of definitive endpoints, Ellena describes a philosophy of perpetual reduction: "When I started creating perfume, I was working with 1,200 ingredients. After two years, I reduced my palette to four hundred. Today I work with one hundred and ten! The further I go in time, the simpler it becomes."

Dominique Ropion, the genius behind Portrait of a Lady and La Vie Est Belle, brings yet another dimension: "When I start building something, I don't know what the final result will be. From the initial idea, we could have gone in an entirely different direction; perfumery is a world of infinite possibilities."

Some examples:

• Portrait of a Lady's Evolution: Dominique Ropion reveals that his masterpieces for Frédéric Malle, including Portrait of a Lady and Superstitious, went through countless iterations. The final compositions could have taken "an entirely different direction"—the decision to stop wasn't about reaching perfection but about finding one satisfying path among infinite possibilities.

• Hermès' Minimalist Journey: Jean-Claude Ellena's Terre d'Hermès demonstrates his reduction philosophy in action. What started as complex explorations with hundreds of potential ingredients was distilled down to a precise formula using his limited palette. The fragrance wasn't "finished" in an absolute sense—it was completed within Ellena's self-imposed constraints.

• The House of Cards Reality: Laudamiel's work on fragrances like those in his Zoo collection illustrates the delicate balance he describes. Each adjustment—a touch more bergamot, a reduction in patchouli—can fundamentally alter the entire composition. The fragrance is "finished" when external factors demand it, not when some perfect state is achieved.

Commercial Completion: In reality, most fragrances are declared "finished" when they meet commercial deadlines, regulatory requirements, and budget constraints rather than when the perfumer feels artistically satisfied. The collaborative nature of modern perfumery means completion is often negotiated among marketing teams, brand managers, and focus groups.

So, is the myth busted?

Absolutely. The notion that perfumers "always know when a fragrance is finished" crumbles under examination. Like Laudamiel's house of cards, the myth collapses when we understand how these artists actually work. Perfumers don't possess mystical knowledge about completion—they navigate uncertainty with skill, embrace constraints with creativity, and find beauty in the arbitrary stopping points that commercial realities impose.