One of the real challenges facing newbie perfumistas (and even some of us seasoned perfumistas) is learning to pick out fragrance notes. As I’ve said before (see Perfumista tip: on getting to know fragrance notes), I don’t think you need to be an expert either to enjoy perfume or to approach it as an art form, but a certain level of familiarity is certainly helpful — if everyone is talking about sandalwood and you have no idea what sandalwood smells like, you’re left in the dark.

One alternative is to just keep on doggedly smelling different perfumes until you start to recognize and “pick out” fragrance notes, another is to smell the materials separately. The new Les coulisses du parfum kits from Osmoz, the consumer website of the fragrance & flavor company Firmenich, are designed to help you with the latter approach.

There are 3 kits in the series. Volume III, the one I’m reviewing today, is “Legendary woods & resins”, and of necessity is the only one of the 3 made up entirely of natural raw materials.¹ Volume III includes cedar, myrrh, sandalwood, benzoin, vetiver, patchouli, balsam fir, oak, galbanum resinoid, rockrose labdanum, oliban or incense and guaiac wood…

Read the rest of this article »