Allergy Issues - Looking for low-synthetic scents

Ayala Moriel (http://www.quinta-essentia.ca/) uses only natural ingredients. But you may be allergic to natural as well as synthetic scents, only way to know is to try

I would suggest gathering up a bunch of samples and sniffing.

From what is said, I hear that Creed uses a lot of natural products. I can't say for sure about that but that is what most say.

Most use sythetic now. It is hard to find hardly any natural components of a scent because it is so expensive and difficult.

Good luck on your hunt.

A synthetic won't trigger an allergy per se any more or less than a natural scent will. It's important to find out which notes trigger a bad response. If you've had allergy testing, you might know which flowers, trees, or grasses give you trouble. If certain synthetics give you headaches, you can at least stay away from scents with aldehydes, and from cheaper frags. I believe L'Occitane deals mostly with natural forms of scent and they have some simple ones, one or two notes, that might work well. You can check their web site. Some small houses specialize in all-natural, try googling all-natural perfumes. L'Erbolario in Italy uses natural whenever possible, if you're in Europe.

agree with l'occitane, they use mostly natural ingredients in their products.

I think E. Coudray works with natural ingredients too, but I am not sure.

You may want to try Laila by Geir Ness also. No chemicals or additives in that.

I think it's important to reiterate the point about allergens in both organic and synthetic compounds. I would imagine that the houses that focus on organics would try their best to make the product hypoallergenic. But I think the same is true for any reputable fragrance house. You seem unsure of the nature or general class of the substances you are allergic to, ie. pollens, saps, solvents etc. and, unfortunately it can remain a mystery in many cases. Have you spoken with a perfume chemist or designer? If you could find one such an expert, they may be able to enlighten you as to which elements in fragrances tend to produce the most alleric reactions (which I hope you'll pass on to the rest of us). I'm sure they could direct you to more perfume houses as well.

You could try sniffing a bunch 'o' essential oils and see to which of those you have a reaction.

There are many allergens in both synthetics and natural elements/compounds in fragrances. What makes you think you won't get allergies from a non-synthetic scent?

I have to deal with allergies and for me, it's very much a trial and error thing.

My sympathies, since I have similar issues.

I react badly to a pretty wide range of common fragrance ingredients. Neroli, which many perfumers consider hypoallergenic, is one of the banes of my existence. There's a laundry list of other notes which give me problems. I've pinned each one down (carefully!) by making a list of notes which I *know* are safe. Then I made a list of common notes that were not known to be safe, and started testing each one. I don't consider a note confirmed to be a problem until I've found perfume with that note to be problematic *and* the plant in question is problematic.

I don't treat essential oils as enough to verify because it's very difficult to be certain the essential oil is unadulterated. Further, even if the oil is in fact the real thing, it is quite concentrated. Many things are fine in a small dose and not at all fine in a large dose. If I had some skill as a perfumer, perhaps they'd be ok. Until then, I'll verify on the real plants.

If you react to nearly everything scented, you likely have trouble with one or more flower derived scents. Since the synthetic versions are chemically identical to the majority component of the natural essential oil (sometimes they're much more sophisticated than this and the synthetic will come close to being identical to the composition of the EO), you will almost always react to both the synthetic and natural versions. Depending on what you react to, there may or may not be any mass market fragrances you can wear safely. Also, most mass market fragrances (sadly) do not list every single note they contain. So even if one of your particular problem notes isn't listed, the scent might *still* contain it and thus be unsafe for you.

Many of the small perfume houses that sell online are much more responsive to allergy issues. Often, the owner will be willing to help you pin down problems.

You very likely *can* find perfumes to love. It will take some work and careful note keeping. But if I can do it, you can too. If you're not sure where to start on building a known safe list, try your spice cabinet. A large number of perfumes contain herbs and spices as notes. And well, if you eat a particular spice regularly, it's not likely to give you trouble in a perfume.

Emily

I just thought of this site if you haven't already searched there. I would guess you've already tied it but maybe not.

www.allergybuyersclub.com

i concur on the creed lines