What is Natural Perfumery

If you no longer can wear, or even enjoy, department store fragrances because of allergies or sensitivities to synthetic chemicals, dyes or preservatives, you’re part of a growing population seeking an alternative; perfumes made with nature-derived ingredients.

Natural Perfumery composed of botanical essences and essential oils is not a new phenomenon, however.  Until the later 19th Century, when scientists began to manipulate, isolate and imitate odors from nature, botanical and animal essences were the only components found in perfumes.  We’ve come a long way from the time when Mother Nature’s gifts were used for perfume and healing to today when synthetic chemicals are in everything from processed foods to laundry detergents and are implicated in a growing number of health problems.

For the last 150 years, fragrance companies have increasingly relied on synthetic chemicals made with petrochemicals as the starting product and only a very small percentage have been extensively tested for safety and fewer still have been tested for their effects in combination.  Commercial fragrances can use hundreds of synthetics chemicals in a single perfume.  These artificial molecules do their best to imitate and may smell remarkably like the real material, but they never come close to having the complexity, mystery, and therapeutic value of plant-derived materials.

To me, the choice between using synthetic chemicals or natural chemicals in perfume is the difference between seeing a reprint of a famous painting or going to the Louvre to see the true Mona Lisa.  Happily, many are reclaiming the fine artisan craft of Natural Perfumery!  The wise consumer is now acknowledging the impact of excessive use of synthetic chemicals on the environment and choosing natural alternatives.