There are countless brands and varieties of fragrances on the market these days; so many in fact that it can be difficult finding the particular one that matches your style and personality perfectly. So why not avoid all the confusion and make your own fragrance?
The basic concept of making fragrance is quite easy. It is simply a combination of essential oils (up to 30%), alcohol (up to 85%) and water (around 5%). To make a fragrance you firstly add the essential oils you've chosen to the alcohol one drop at a time while stirring and making sure that the oil has completely dissolved before adding the next drop.
Once all oils have been added the oil/alcohol blend should be left to stand for 2 days before adding the water and stirring again. At this point the fragrance should be put in a cool, dark place and left to stand for at least 3 weeks, at which time the mixture should be filtered (a coffee filter is good for this) and bottled.
The skill in making your own fragrance comes in to play with the ratio at which you use essential oils in the mix. A single drop too much or too little of any particular oil will change the entire characteristic of the fragrance completely.
The blend of different essential oils is also a definite skill. Each essential oil carries its own notes that play well or poorly with other oils. These can be broken into fresh, green, woody, spicy, exotic, animalistic, aromatic, bloomy and fruity notes. Knowing how much or how little of each to add to a mixture can be the difference between a sensational fragrance or an absolute horror.
How to learn all these skills and make your own fragrance yourself is best achieved with a good quality instructional guide. Good guides explain how to detect certain notes in essential oils, how best to mix them, and even how to make your own oils from scratch.
The best fragrances start with a simple understanding of how notes work. From there it just takes time and experimentation. So get started!
Learn how to make your own fragrance here!
You will also find guides and information for making your own soaps and other Spa beauty products.