By now most of you have read what I won’t make – and I thought it fair to also go into what I can’t make for you.
Just to clear up a common assumption, I actually will make a perfume for you with a smell I don’t like. I consider it a mark of skill to make something I personally hate that you love – it means I’m mature enough to recognize quality and structure even in something that doesn’t necessarily suit my tastes. When it comes down to what I can’t make, it changes over time, but the basics are pretty simple:
1. I can’t make a pure essential oil for you. I work from my apartment, with a scrubbed studio and kitchen at my disposal. I like having a home. My landlord likes me staying in a home that is not destroyed. So distilling oils is right out. I also really don’t feel good about selling you cuts and decants of my essential oil stock – there are plenty of suppliers where you can get it direct, so please don’t come to me. If I’m in a position to offer raw material, I’ll be sure to let EVERYONE know.
2. A lot of floral scents. There are many, many florals that just don’t hold up in any kind of distillation. Since I am a natural perfumer, this means that there are scents that just aren’t available to me. While some syntheticists see this as an argument for using synthetics, I consider many natural approaches either unexplored or forgotten so this doesn’t bother me in the least. It’s been an age of floral scents, but savory scents on men and women are still new and interesting territory to me.
3. An approximation of any obscure perfume. Even in person, it’s much too expensive an undertaking for a small perfumer like myself, especially for something I’ve never smelled. All those failed options are raw material – I can’t afford to waste that. Yes, I have an interest in perfume – but because I dislike department store perfumes, I don’t have an encyclopedic knowledge of what’s on the market because I don’t usually enjoy what’s on the mainstream market.
