Aroma chemicals!

[rob2982]

Hi everyone I am new here, and new to the world of perfume DIY. I find this subject extremely fascinating and would love to explore aroma chemicals as opposed to EO's. I have read about the inconsistencies in using fragrance oils and eo's but I am struggling to find any reputable suppliers in the UK, so any help would be very welcome! Or failing this a company that provides the highest quality in oils, thanks guys!

[Skelly]

http://www.olfactik.com/ (I order on Sunday and they usually turn up by Thursday via Royal Mail. In a cardboard bocks)

and...

https://www.hermitageoils.com/ (A bit faster than Olfactik, even though they offer free postage. Royal Mail again, but they use a plastic bag)

No problems with either supplier. Hermitage have more oils, and a bigger collection of musks than Olfactik. Olfactik have a larger array of chems.

You need to order at least £20 worth of stuff from Hermitage. They'll probably mail you a discount code at some point.

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Oh, and maybe, just maybe, a friend and I might be setting something up. Though this will depend on a number of factors such as both of us simultaneously finding ourselves out of work. If we do we'll be concentrating on the things that are difficult to get in small amounts in the UK, such as Ambroxan, Ambronax, Cashmeran, Tabanon, Timbersilk, Timberide etc

Though don't hold your breath. I put the chances of it happening at about one in twenty.

Erm... quick market research question... would anyone here be interested in such a service?

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[rob2982]

Thanks for that its just what i was looking for, i tbh i would be really interested and i am learning all the time and having new material to work with would be great!

[gido]

this question has been asked before a couple of times, i suggest searching this forum with google in the following format,
site:basenotes.net search query

also check out the sticky diy suppliers thread.

btw. hekserij (good and trustworthy perfume diy supplier in the netherlands) has moved, and is now found at the following address,
http://www.hexapus.nl/en/main.htm

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i had forgotten about olfactik. how are their goods?

[Chris Bartlett]

In addition I'm now offering a Discovery kit of aroma chemicals - details of exactly what's in it are on my blog - something I've been meaning to do for ages and it finally got done because a fellow Basenoter pmed asking for it, which provided the impetus to get it designed.

[Skelly]

'i had forgotten about olfactik. how are their goods?'

I'm not really good enough to tell the quality of an EO straight off, so I worked out a test:

I dipped a strip into Olfactic's bergamot and compared it to the hippy shop bergamot I already owned. They both smelled pretty similar, but Olfactic's seemed a little fresher. So I had a good long smell of the Olfactic - the idea being to completely flood my nose with it - and tried the hippy shop offering, which I could barely detect. Then I gave my nose a rest and reversed the process. And found that I could still easily smell the Olfactik bergamot. From this I deduced that the Olfactik bergamot was fresher/better.

I don't know if this is a recognised method of comparing EO's, but couldn't think of anything else.

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[Chris Bartlett]

'i had forgotten about olfactik. how are their goods?'

I'm not really good enough to tell the quality of an EO straight off, so I worked out a test:

I dipped a strip into Olfactic's bergamot and compared it to the hippy shop bergamot I already owned. They both smelled pretty similar, but Olfactic's seemed a little fresher. So I had a good long smell of the Olfactic - the idea being to completely flood my nose with it - and tried the hippy shop offering, which I could barely detect. Then I gave my nose a rest and reversed the process. And found that I could still easily smell the Olfactik bergamot. From this I deduced that the Olfactik bergamot was fresher/better.

I don't know if this is a recognised method of comparing EO's, but couldn't think of anything else.

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The method you describe is a recognised method for establishing the olfactory differences between two materials. It does not always follow that the one that has extra elements in it will be better: in some cases you could be detecting an adulterant that way.

In this case however I suspect that your conclusion is correct. I have no experience of Olfactik bergamot but the materials I have bought from them have been of good quality and I doubt very much that the local 'hippy shop' has the best quality to start with, the best storage conditions or the turnover to ensure freshness.

To make the comparison method really work you need a 'known good' material to compare to, which is difficult for small players.

[Skelly]

Thanks for that its just what i was looking for, i tbh i would be really interested and i am learning all the time and having new material to work with would be great!

Hermitage have a rapidly expanding collection of interesting synthetics so it's even more unlikely we'll be doing it now.

Check 'em out. Look under the 'artisan' tab.

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[rob2982]

I have just checked this out, they do in fact have some interesting stuff there but it's not as extensive as olfactiks yet . But I do sincerely wish that I could purchase a perfume alcohol from either hermitage or olfactik, as it is quite annoying that after shopping on there websites that I then have to purchase it from a different source and pay a second round of postage costs, I would just like to be able to source everything I need from one place!

[outline]

perfumersapprentice

[Skelly]

I have just checked this out, they do in fact have some interesting stuff there but it's not as extensive as olfactiks yet . But I do sincerely wish that I could purchase a perfume alcohol from either hermitage or olfactik, as it is quite annoying that after shopping on there websites that I then have to purchase it from a different source and pay a second round of postage costs, I would just like to be able to source everything I need from one place!

The man from Hermitage mailed me today to tell me that they should be stocking 'organic grain alcohol' within a couple of weeks. I put in a request and they'll also be stocking norlimbanol at around the same time. It looks as if they're not competing with olfactik on the chems front, but that's life. He also asked if there was anything else I was looking for, but I don't understand how all the chems I already have work together, so that'll do me for now.

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[rob2982]

Thank you, I will be looking into that right now. Thanks skelly

[pickledtink]

Erm... quick market research question... would anyone here be interested in such a service?

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Quick market research reply. Yes. :-)

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I have just checked this out, they do in fact have some interesting stuff there but it's not as extensive as olfactiks yet . But I do sincerely wish that I could purchase a perfume alcohol from either hermitage or olfactik, as it is quite annoying that after shopping on there websites that I then have to purchase it from a different source and pay a second round of postage costs, I would just like to be able to source everything I need from one place!

Maybe we should all email them and ask?
I just bought 5 litres PA @£5.00 per litre delivery inc' from Mistral as 1 litre with the postage would have cost £18.40.
Mad price difference.

[Skelly]

'Quick market research reply. Yes. :-)'


I'm afraid this is even more unlikely to happen 'cos my prospective technical director/partner in crime is currently in Dubai* pouring over GC/MS analyses of things I can't mention in order to make them more suitable for that market - usually a lot 'sweeter' in case you're interested.

*Unless there are problems with the 'Cherry Vanilla Ester' or whatever they've written in big letters across the top of the piperonal paperwork.

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[Chris Bartlett]

http://www.olfactik.com/ (I order on Sunday and they usually turn up by Thursday via Royal Mail. In a cardboard bocks)

and...

https://www.hermitageoils.com/ (A bit faster than Olfactik, even though they offer free postage. Royal Mail again, but they use a plastic bag)

No problems with either supplier. Hermitage have more oils, and a bigger collection of musks than Olfactik. Olfactik have a larger array of chems.

You need to order at least £20 worth of stuff from Hermitage. They'll probably mail you a discount code at some point.

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This accords largely with my experience too, except that my orders from Hermitage have always come in a box - I guess it depends how much you order - I've had samples in a jiffy-bag but that's all.

Olfactik stock a wider array of the basic chemicals - everyday things that are widely used and generally fairly inexpensive - they tend to stock them in their 'native' form, so Tonalid for example, comes as the crystaline solid rather than pre-dissolved in something else.

Hermitage have only a few of the basic things but, in keeping with Adam's policy of stocking the more unusual natural materials, they have a couple of selections of really interesting synthetic materials, some of which are very hard to find, such as hydrocinnamaldehyde. As a rule they are, where necessary, diluted such that they are mobile liquids that can safely be posted - flammable materials can't be sent internationally (or nationally in larger amounts).

Flammability is also the reason Perfumer's Alcohol costs so much in postage - Mistral send it via HazMat courier because anything more than a (I think) 150ml counts as a hazardous material that other couriers and RM can't carry - hence the higher cost - and hence it makes sense to buy more at a time.

[Spoombung]

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[outline]

Ambreine vs Ambrox any difference between them?

Plenty of ambrox, not so much with ambreine availability...
http://www.aftelier.com/ambreine.html

[pkiler]

Pretty sure that Ambrain and Ambreine are the same thing...

I have Ambrain, that smells so much like Labdanum...
Entirely different from Ambrox then...

[Chris Bartlett]

Ambreine vs Ambrox any difference between them?

Plenty of ambrox, not so much with ambreine availability...
http://www.aftelier.com/ambreine.html

I'm sure I've answered this before somewhere but anyway - the ambreine produced from labdanum that Aftelier sell is a proprietary product of Firmenich ('one company in the world' is a very romantic way of saying that one of the three dominant players in the perfumery ingredients market makes it and has kept the process a secret). I'm not quite sure whether that's the same as the Ambrain you have Paul but it seems very likely that it is.

Another similar product is Ambrarome which was originally made as a replacement for natural ambergris and is also made from extracts of cistus.

Both have been used in the industry for many years.

Ambrox is a term usually used to mean Ambrox DL or one of it's synonyms: quite different because it's a brand name for a single synthetic molecule (though a mixture of isomers) which replicates one of the components of natural ambergris. The term ambrox is sometimes used to mean any of a range of similar products, in particular Ambroxan / Ambrofix / Orcanox which are brand names for chiral isomers, which though similar, are not quite the same.

Just to confuse matters further there is also Ambrein which is the waxy substance that is the majority component of natural ambergris, the breakdown products of which give the precious scented molecules of ambroxide and others that have been replicated by the various brand-named products above. When pure, ambrein is odourless. Bo Jensen provides a good description of what's going on (scroll down to the text just below the whale pictures).

Since this seems to come up quite often I think I'll incorporate it into my blog post on Ambergris or perhaps I'll create a new one covering the synthetics - I decided to create a new post covering ambergris substitutes and while I was at it I've sought to clarify the relationship with amber in perfumery.