Raw materials further questions.

Yes those should all dilute successfully in ethanol . . . but not always easily. The benzoin siam at 50% in mpg should be easy enough to dilute further in ethanol as it is a fairly mobile liquid and does not take too long to dissolve. Aim for a 10% solution of benzoin, so if you have 2 grams of your benzoin siam at 50%, you’ll need to add 8 grams of ethanol to it, to get a solution which is 10% benzoin and you’ll have about 12.5ml of solution. Note that if you try to do that by volume you won’t get the same result.

The others are less easy and in all cases I would use an automatic stirrer. Anyway the dilution process is similar for oakmoss and coumarin I would aim for 10% so you need, for example 1 gram of coumarin and 9g of ethanol. You can’t do this without an accurate scale. With menthol and calone I would aim for a 1% solution because these are both strong materials that you don’t want to put too much of into your blend. So 0.1g of calone and 9.9g of ethanol will give you 10g (about 11.3ml in this case) of 1% solution.

Assuming that you don’t have an automatic stirrer you can use, I would make these up in a container that you can seal - a bottle with a polycone cap is ideal - and then shake them until you get a fully dissolved solution. With some of them you’ll need to keep going back to the bottle to shake it again repeatedly: you may find it easier to simply put the bottle in your pocket while you are busy doing other things and let your own movements keep the mixture moving until it is all dissolved.


I don’t think you have a problem here either with your nose or your materials: all three have a faint scent when smelled directly. Cedramber (cedryl methyl ether) is the most obvious of them and you should get a woody scent from it once you have it diluted to about 10%.

Hedione and Lyral are both quite strange with only a very faint floral scent even when diluted (I keep those at 10% too). However what you’ll find is that they both have a dramatic effect when you put them into a blend: the hedione gives a brightness and diffusive, exalting quality when mixed with other florals, especially jasmines. You can use quite a lot of it.

Lyral is more subtle, giving a depth and florality to lots of blends - it adds a subtle Lilly of the Valley note if you use a lot of it or combine it with lilial and hydroxycitronellal but try putting just a little into almost any blend and see how it changes it. You’ll also find it has a fixative effect which is very useful. Note that the IFRA restriction for lyral is quite low - only 0.2% in the finished product - so you can’t put much into any blend you intend to sell.

You’re welcome.

Don’t forget that almost everything you use, from hairspray to your car, will have been scented with aroma-chemicals so it’s to be expected that you will recognise many of them: in fact that’s a good sign that your odour memory is good and developing.

Now to those scents you were asking about:
Tuberose is available as a natural absolute - not an exact match to the flower as these things tend not to be but a lovely material. Unfortunately very expensive. It is possible to put together with a combination of synthetics too - you could buy an accord or make your own.

Mimosa is also available as a natural extract but not often used except in very expensive fine fragrance. ‘Mimosa’ on a scent list is more likely to be a clue that acalea (aka mimosa heptanal) has been used.

Peony cannot be processed and no natural peony essential oil has ever been made so far as I know. The scent is very difficult to imitate accurately but Peomosa (aka peony alcohol) is usually involved (also often part of mimosa scents) along with geraniol and possibly peony acetonitrile (aka peonile) which is also commonly used in laundry fragrances.

Iris usually means that orris root is included - which has more of an earthy violet scent really - it comes from the roots of the flag iris, hence the usage. However there are perfumes about that seek to capture the scent of iris flowers, normally using a combination of the classic transparent floral components like cyclamen aldehyde, heliotropine, hedione and hydroxycitronellal.

Cotton isn’t a scent I’ve tried to re-create so I’m not sure what is used for that - perhaps someone else can enlighten us?

Melon is usually created with a combination of calone and cucumber aldehyde

Watermelon again I’m not sure but it will likely include calone and a combination of aldehydes.

Apricot will be Aldehyde C14 (which is really a lactone) and some other elements to give it extra sharpness (lemon or other citrus perhaps) to distinguish it from peach which is otherwise what that lactone smells like.

Fixateur 505 is essentially an ambergris replacement from Firmenich. It’s a proprietary blend but for a guess probably contains ambroxan, ambrinol, cetalox and probably one or more captives. It’s a good fixative and gives a very nice background to many types of scent.

Apricot will be Aldehyde C16 (which is really a lactone) and some other elements to give it extra sharpness (lemon or other citrus perhaps) to distinguish it from peach which is otherwise what that lactone smells like.

You might mean C14 there Chris.

Indeed I might! I’ve corrected the original post: C16 is of course strawberry and wouldn’t be the best place to start for an apricot scent, while C14 is peach, which is quite similar.