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The title is Perfume: Joy, Scandal, Sin

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I’m a True Blood fan, because I love women who kick butt (and Sookie does quite well!) and also because vampires were not meant to glitter. I don’t mind seeing scruffy Sam running around too much, either. Since I know a few people who would gladly volunteer themselves to Eric, Bill or a host of other characters on this show (and a few on say, Buffy) I designed “vampire groupie” composed of exactly the sort of things an enthusiastic person with an appreciation for Louisianna might wear: it has scents of walnut oil, nutmeg, anise and a magnolia bouquet. As one friend described it, “It sort of slides down your throat.”

Which, if you’re a vampire groupie, is exactly what you’re going for!

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Awhile back I started making these burnable pieces of paper. It was my first sally into the rising art form of trashion, and it gave me something fun to do with all the paper bags and junk mail littering my home. I’ve certainly used it a lot in my own practice – uncrossing rituals, a fast way to clear mosquitoes, even as a quirky little postcard that made it all the way to Canada.

So now I want to know how people who have gotten it from me have used it – if you’ve been around it, what have you done with it? If you haven’t had a chance to try my incense paper, comment here with how you’d like to use it. The most interesting comment will get a free pack!

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by Osbournes life on flickr

I adore vintage perfume bottles, and while I just don’t have the space for them all to come live with me, I do love finding images like this so I can drool and daydream about a big shop window with the sunlight filtering through the hundreds of lovely bottles.

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Since I began making perfume, I’ve ruined a LOT of clothing. It’s my own fault for not making sure I owned a smock from the get-go, but since I learn best by making mistakes, it’s a lesson I learned a few rather nice shirts at a time first. I also learned that if you don’t act fast when you do spill oil of any kind on yourself, you may just have to give up your garment.

However, once in awhile I emerge from a spill triumphant. The basics to cleaning up oil products can be found here, although my own methods differ just a bit. When I get an oil spill, as soon as I can I dab it with vinegar and then follow this with rubbing alcohol. Then for good measure, I use one of those rub-and-leave it stain sticks you can get at Target for around $4. It’s actually saved me some nice stuff.

In the event that that fails me, I toss the item onto my “T-shirt surgery” pile and experiment on it with scissors, ribbons, safety pins and grommets – and that’s another story for another day.

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I have an odd burden of synthetic materials picked up from purchasing various lots from people destashing. Most of the time the purchase was made with other raw materials in with the deal, some of which were legit or were believed to be the real thing by the person selling to me. I don’t think anyone willfully misrepresented what they sold, they just didn’t know that there’s no such thing as orchid essential oil, or that frangipani comes in absolute but not essential oil. Assuming that most of the material in these fragrance oils is some form of petroleum, I have to consider the petroleum guidelines: you can’t throw them down a sink, or bury them, or do much of anything else with them – so I have to find a way to use them up to get rid of them properly. In small amounts they are diluted enough to return to the environment safely, leaving me in a position where I have to figure out what I can do with them.

The end result is that you’re going to see some serious trashion-line work from me this year, up to and including reed diffusers, some more trashion perfumes and possibly even some candle-making. This summer I hope to bring interesting things – including more space in my studio!

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I’ve given you the can’ts and won’ts, and now I’m sharing my want-to-makes:

1. I want to make a fragrance that captures the Mississippi river in June. It’s an odd smell, certainly not one you’d want to wear directly, but a fragrant interpretation rich with chocolate and tobacco with green and watery top notes that pulses like the dam by the energy park in Minneapolis would smell awesome.

2. I want to make a light facial moisturizer. This is also out of self-interest: I try to take great care of my skin, and a moisturizer that is suitable for summer is my holy grail. I have high hopes based on jojoba, vegetable glycerin and an as-yet undetermined third ingredient.

3. I want to use up my synthetic stores as soon as possible.

4. I want to make scented gloves, Queen of England style. My mother sent me some prototypes to practice on so now it’s between me and a bunch of wax to work it all out. These won’t be cheap. But they will be interesting.

5. I want to grow catnip, valerian and catmint. Although I can’t own cats (severe allergies) I’ll happily be their dealer.

6. I want to grow and offer my own facial steam tea. I feel weird just repackaging it, so over time I’m going to see what I use and offer what I grow myself – yes, on my apartment balcony.

7. I want to make corn-syrup free caramels. Now that I know I’m allergic to corn syrup (there are other, undetermined things, too) it’s become the whole grail of my candy and baking arts.

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Artist’s Statement

Burn, Bite and Backstab explores the safe-but-dangerous, oddly addictive nature of gossip. A little gossip can make life more interesting, but too much can really hurt anyone who touches the gossip. So, just as people who play the eternal game of Chinese telephone gradually dilute the message, so this scent is diluted just enough that it’s still spicy and entertaining – and yet the fragrant ingredients are dilute, and have a lime neutralizer on top of them so that that cinnamon should never sink its teeth into your skin. Use like gossip: sparingly, and for the occassions that need some zest.

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You may have noticed that the product churn at Magickal Realism has slowed down in the past year. It’s not because I’m tired of perfumery – anything but! It’s because I’ve been taking time out to explore my own creative horizons, and to become a better perfume artisan, with yet more unique fragrances and approaches to fragrance. This has caused a conscious separation from the perfume grind as you know it: I’m not easy to find in my usual places, and thanks to a family crisis, a move, and my upcoming wedding I’m maintaining my slow pace even if drives you all mad. :)

Along with brushing up on my writing and perfuming skills, I’ve been gardening and discovering a love for decoupage. I’ll leave scrabble pendants to the scrabble makers, but now that I’m covering every glass surface that wanders into my home, I’m looking at possibly releasing them as reed diffusers as an extension of my trashion line – assuming I can find something trashion-like to use as a diffuser (I feel not-good buying reeds for this purpose.)

For instance, I mentioned this chair before:

It’s now happily ensconsed on my balcony – I’ll be showing you the plants I’m growing on it soon. I’m hoping to train moon flower and morning glory up the chair, to make it a complete organic/trashion art piece. While it took a long time and did involve an incident with Mod Podge and poor ventilation, it was really a lot of fun to do.

I’m also grinding incense and including it in some trashion packaging:

Some of these are old spice jars. Some of these are other stuff – and I’m using herbs that I didn’t need for infusions, cooking or whatever. The intention is that you can use the jar to spice up your space and use the incense either as a spell powder (sprinkle where you need it most) or to burn on incense charcoal.

There will be other things coming this summer – artist’s statements for my established perfume line, and some insight into the perfume line I’m developing for my sister based on her love of the show Supernatural. Also, as part of that process, what I do to avoid trademark infringement and why it may not always work. Fortunately, you can’t trademark inspiration. Unfortunately, network television isn’t great with fan collaboration and brand hijacking, although some shows are more tolerant than others.

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