What is a Fine Fragrance?

Fine fragrances (or fine perfumes) are used for the sole sake of their scents. In other words, their fragrance serve as the functional purpose of the product.

Hence, the formulation of their fragrance composition is the most refined.

How To Describe Perfumes?

Scents can be classified under six olfactory families.

Floral; Green (cut grass, crushed green leaf-like); Aquatic (fresh smell reminiscent of the ocean); Citrusy; Fruity and Gourmand (sweet and "dessert"-like).

What do Top, Middle and Base Notes Mean?

Top notes are the ones that are perceived immediately after the application of the perfume. Top notes consist of small, light molecules that evaporate quickly. Fresh notes like citrus, bergamot and mint, some floral and spicy notes are some examples.

Middle notes, also referred as heart notes, form the scent of a perfume that emerges just prior to the dissipation of the top note. The middle note compounds the main body of a perfume and act to mask the often unpleasant initial impression of base notes, which are meant to become more pleasant with time. A variety of floral, spicy and watery scents along with some woody scents can be found under middle notes.

Base notes form the scent of a perfume that appears close to the departure of the middle notes. The base and middle notes together are the main theme of a perfume. Base notes bring depth and solidity to a perfume. Base notes are typically rich and "deep" and are usually not perceived until 30 minutes after application. Most common examples of base notes include woods, tobacco, amber and musk.

Is it True that the More a Perfume is Expensive, the More it is Higher Quality?

Not necessarily.

Today, an overwhelming majority of perfumery raw ingredients are produced by a mere five companies: International Flavors and Fragrances (IFF), Givaudan, Firmenich, Symrise and Takasago. Hence, as a direct implication, an overwhelming majority of perfume houses and brands buy most of their raw material from the same companies.

So the huge price differences mostly comes from brand positioning, marketing, advertorial expenses, sophisticated retail expenses and exclusive work with famous perfumers.

What is an Eau De Parfum?

In most of the cases, fine fragrances are found as diluted in alcohol. Based on their concentration in alcohol, they are called Eau De Cologne, Eau De Toilette, Eau de Parfum or Extrait De Parfum.

What is Perfume Oil?

In the case of perfume oil, the fragrance oil is carried in neutral (scentless) high quality oily substances. The LAB Fragrances perfume oils contain highest quality natural vegetable oils of jojoba and safflower. Perfume oils can be applied with a dropper or roll-on. To offset the effect of dilution loss due to the lack of solvents like alcohol and water, The LAB Fragrances uses significantly higher percentage of fragrance oil in it’s perfume oil format (in par with its Extrait De Parfum’s).

With perfume oils, you won’t have the negative effects of alcohol, but miss the positive ones too. For instance, you won’t have alcohol’s scent interference and you will have a much increased longevity, which are all good; but you will have a diminished sillage.

Why Fragrance Needs to Be Diluted? Why Don’t We Use Them in Pure Form?

For three reasons:

1 - Some of the ingredients may need to be diluted in alcohol or water to fully release their scent,

2 - In pure format, the density of essential oils and aroma-chemicals may be harsh to the skin,

3 - The solvent also acts as a carrier which eases the application and creates a sillage.         

What is Inside Fragrance Oil?

Fragrance oil is composed of natural extracts and natural essential oils along with laboratory made aroma-chemicals.

Wouldn’t it Be Better if the Fragrance Contained 100% Natural Ingredients? Why Synthetics are Needed?

Not necessarily.

Aroma-chemicals in particular (and synthetics in general) are needed to enhance and to balance the scent characteristics of naturals. They are also useful in creating very interesting accords which are not found in nature. To achieve all this, perfumers have more than 3,000 synthetic molecules at their disposal (whereas natural fragrance ingredients number in the hundreds). In short, without synthetic molecules, great perfumes as you know them, wouldn’t exist.

To best understand this, it suffices to smell perfumes purely made of essential oils and natural extracts: They would smell nice, but would rarely match the various deep, complex and rich characteristics of the best perfumes.

Moreover, in simple formulations, the pure naturals would also paradoxically fail to mimic nature. For instance, the fabulous smell of rose would be much better captured in the bottle in a hybrid natural-synthetic composition then in a pure natural one.

Also, laboratory work helps in three more ways. One is to isolate natural ingredients’ aromatic molecules from the unwanted rest. Second is to avoid harming forests and harming animals. Indeed, do we want to use the land to grow sandal trees for perfume instead of natural forests or food? And do we want to harm or kill deer and civets to extract musk? Well, studying the chemistry of sandalwood oil and musk to recreate them synthetically is definitely a noble solution here. And third, counter intuitively, some natural ingredients are problematic: the recipe for the iconic Chanel No. 5 for instance is undergoing a revision, not to remove synthetic aldehydes but to replace some of its woodsy notes, which are derived from natural mosses. The European Union deemed them as toxic and proceeded to ban their use.

So the perception of associating synthetic with low quality and natural with high quality in today’s perfumery is not necessarily accurate.

In short, man-made molecules are awesome stuff, they help preserve the planet, foster the art and technology of fragrance making and they have been used in the best fragrances continuously since almost 150 years.

Is Fragrance Bad for Health?

If composed with ultimate care and disclosed with full transparency, the risk of damage can truly be minimized.

The LAB Fragrances doesn’t content with the restrictions of ASEAN regulation’s alone. It is one of the rare houses who complies with both European Union and International Fragrance Association (IFRA) severe restrictions and requirements based on sound and rigourous studies.

Besides, The LAB Fragrances fully discloses it’s fragrance content as opposed to the general industry practice of opaquely bundling most of the ingredients under ‘perfume/fragrance’.

Wouldn’t it Be Better for Health if No Synthetic Chemicals were Used?

Not necessarily.

Natural ingredients, who also are complex organic molecules just like aromachemicals are, are never meant to always be harmless to humans.

Are The LAB Fragrances Perfumes Vegan?

Yes.

Are The LAB Fragrances Perfumes Animal Testing Free?

We don’t support animal testing at all, and as a brand we did never and will definitely not test on animals.

This said, there is a sad and rarely spoken truth about this:

It might be true that the perfume brand in question has never tested on animals, but the sheer knowledge on ingredients’ harmfulness majorly comes from past animal testings done by raw material companies. So whenever we know for sure that a particular ingredient in our composition is harmless, this may just be because there sadly had been an animal testing somewhere and sometime in the past.

What is the Best Way to Preserve Perfumes?

The ideal condition is around 6°C and zero humidity. But we do not recommend to store your perfumes in refrigerators where you also store food.

Our recommendation is simply to keep them away from bathroom like excessive humidity environments and from direct sunlight. The best you simply can, would be to keep your fragrances in the most frequently air-conditioned room and store them in dark cabinets or drawers. This way, the alcohol based fragrances will be in very good shape for at least 3 years.

How Long Fragrances Last on Skin?

High quallity Eau De Parfum blends are supposed to last at least 6 hours on the skin. But this should be considered as a very rough rule of thumb because many factors affect longevity:

Skin Type (oily skins tend to capture the fragrance for longer); Place of Application (fragrance lasts longer on textile and hair then on skin); Fragrance Formulation (fresh notes like bergamot and citrus last less then woody and musky notes); Layering (Application of a compatible lotion or cream beneath may enhance fragrance longevity); Use (outdoor use diminishes the longevity).

Is it True that Fragrances Smell Different on Different Skins?

Yes, but not as much as people think. It is extremely rare to come across two people on whom same scent will have a completely different character.

There are some other factors which confuse people.

For instance, all fragrances change with time after application. So a perfume you smell on a friend may of course be perceived different on you immediately after you apply it.

Second, the same fragrance will smell different on close-up vs through sillage.

Lastly, at older times when synthetics were not around to stabilize and fix the formulations and raw materials were not reliably and precisely compounded, perfumes tent more to change character from flacon to flacon and even within flacons.

Why Man And Woman Fragrances Differ?

They don’t differ in reality. In nature, there is no such thing as male or female fragrance.

But they differ in cultural constructs and also in perceptions built up by decades old of marketing.

For instance, rose scent is used exclusively by men after prayer in some middle eastern cultures, whereas it is inconceivable for men to wear rose scent in European countries.

This said, we do not exclude the statistical difference in preferences between men (who tend to like more spicy and woody scents on them) and women (who tend to like more floral and fruity scents on them).

But statistics is one thing, and personal choices is another.

We chose to prioritize personal choices.

Hence, The LAB Fragrances prefer to market it’s collection as unisex.

Where and How We Should Apply Fine Fragrances?

There is no rule. But we can suggest some guidelines.

The conventional spots are warm pulse points like wrists and below the ears, or even behind the knees (considering the fragrance will rise while evaporating).

Hairs is a good spot too, because not only they capture the fragrance for long, but also they do an excellent job in diffusing it. Caution: alcohol may have a drying effect on scalp.

Clothes is also a good choice, since they do capture best the fragrance. One downside is that you need to be careful when changing the fragrance. Also, abundant application of a high concentrate perfume on a particular spot might leave a stain on some fabrics. Please also note that perfume oils are much more likely to leave stains especially on silk, wool and satin as compared to alcohol based perfumes.

Does Rubbing Perfumed Wrists Deteriorate the Perfume?

It is more a myth then reality.

The mechanical force of rubbing or the heat released out of it are way too tiny to degrade the molecules of the fragrances.

On the other hand, the stimulation might accelerate the diffusion of top notes, hence altering a bit the experience.

Also, we generally propose our customers to try one scent per wrist while trying to decide which one to pick. Rubbing may take this option away.

I can’t smell my own fragrance after a while. Is it normal?  

Well don’t worry, humans become insensitive after a while to the particular scent it is constantly exposed to. This is a natural defence mechanism.

So how to select a fragrance in a fragrance shop?

Well, the nose does not quickly loses its sensitivity for smells in general. So when you switch the scent, the nose instantly resets itself. Most retailers use coffee beans to help the customers to switch between fragrance testers. Though not useless, this method is not necessary either, since the switch automatically happens when you get a whiff of the next tester. If you really want to give a break between testers or keep smelling the same scent longer, smelling your own scent from the back of your hand for instance will do the job equally well, if not better.

As a side note, using paper stripes at first and then spraying the short listed three or four fragrances on the skin would avoid overwhelming the nose.

Do You Recommend Perfume Layering?

Our collection is not particularly designed for perfume layering, because our perfumes are already complex in themselves. But again, there is no rule, and the priority lies with the wearers’ preferences.

We recommend layering perfume oil with alcohol based versions of the same scent though, to capture benefits of both (i.e. enhanced longevity and enhanced diffusion).

Should One Stick to One Fragrance for Years to Make it Her Signature?

In plain objectivity, sticking to one perfume is not much different then sticking to one model of wristwatch.

But again, this is a personal preference.

Should One Change His Fragrance According to Seasons?

From a technical perspective, this is not a necessity.

It is logical to understand that lighter, airy scents are associated with hot climates and woody, heavier scents with cold. This approach simply comes from the possible feeling of comfort of a light and fresh scent when the climate is already heavy with heat and humidity.

But this doesn’t mean that woody, musky and amberish scents are only for winters! This beautiful scents are intrinsic to nature for all the time.. In most of the cases, it might just suffice to lower the dose! Imagine just a hint of an exquisite woody scent on a very hot day.. Why not?

Please write us your questions through https://www.thelabfragrances.com/contact/