- image by Diana Rajchel of Magickal Realism Perfume Arts.I'm a very DIY kind of girl. This is partly because my own perfumery is a bootstrap effort - no debts, no loans, no credit cards used ever. And this means that fancy things like tuberose and ottos come by way of gifts, and are sparse. Nope, my perfumes have a garden feel to them because often, major components of them come from someone's garden.
So, even as I advance my art form from the familiar safety of oil based mixtures to complex things like tinctures, I have to resort to a sort of guerilla harvesting from time to time and I am a girl who relies on the kindness of trusted friends.
This year's treats have been generous indeed: scores of lilac flowers, moving me into year three of the seven year tincture I'm working on. Tomato leaves, thanks to a dear friend's garden going completely bonkers. And, to my delight...roses.
Unfortunately, I had no idea roses were so uncooperative in tincture. I'm sure someone could have told me if I'd asked, but I do like to learn things the hard way. That said their stems and leaves behave very nicely, and I've got some lovely herbal greens to play with this winter as a result. As for the petals...well, the alcohol is very strangely pink/brown now. I might be able to do something with that...
1 comment:
There is a great sense of accomplishment in creating essences which are used in your creations, plus the assurance of knowing what you have is the real thing. Tincturing is as much an adventure as the creation of perfume itself, don't you think?
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