Making scents

When I was a little girl, my friend and I would collect fallen rose petals from the garden (or, if I’m honest, rip my mum’s roses to shreds) to make “scent”. We would steep the petals overnight in water and the next day, we would fish them out again and proudly dab the result behind our ears. It always, always looked and smelt like viscous dishwater but to us it was our very own Chanel N°5.




My tastes are a little more sophisticated now and there’s nothing I like better than going to the perfume counter at the Galeries Lafayette and dousing myself from the testers. French perfume has always had a whiff of wicked frivolity about it and here in France, nine out of ten women wear it as do one out of two men – and even babies have their own eau de toilette. It wasn’t always so. Before Julius Caesar arrived, the Gauls were a pretty malodorous bunch but the Romans soon had them smelling of roses. And with Christianity came incense and scented candles in the churches although later, Christianity would be responsible for a decline in the use of perfume and cosmetics.

In the twelfth century, the Crusaders brought back exotic scents from the East and from Spain, pots of fragrances used in the making of gloves. At this time, Grasse, in the south of France, was already known for its tanneries and the first French perfumers were known as the maîtres gantiers or Master Glovers. They were the only people authorized to sell perfume for gloves. By the end of the seventeenth century, they had become known as Master Perfumers and Grasse had become the largest production centre of the raw materials for perfumery: roses, jasmine and citrus trees that thrived in the Mediterranean climate.

The Renaissance was an era of frivolity and excess. Charles VIII and François I both had personal Master Perfumers and although François’s son, Henri II, did not share this passion his mistress, the beautiful Diane de Poitiers, did and she attributed her youthful appearance to a secret, fragrant beauty water. However, it was during the reign of Henri III that the nation’s love for perfume became an obsession bordering on madness. Henri was very effeminate and surrounded himself with like-minded courtiers who wore outlandish frilly clothes, make-up and jewellery and drenched themselves – and the dogs and parrots they brought to court – with heavy perfume.

By the time Louis XIV came to the throne, the air was more breathable. Louis did not dislike perfume but he preferred it to be discreet. Natural scents became popular and it was during his reign that eau de Cologne was created…by an Italian barber living in Germany. He mixed grape spirits, oil of neroli, bergamot, lavender and rosemary to “capture the essence of an Italian spring morning after the rain”. It was not only used as a fragrance - it was diluted in bath water, mixed with wine, used as a mouthwash, an enema and even injected directly into the body. The original cologne is now known as 4711, after the number of the house where it was being produced in the nineteenth century.

According to legend, when the French royal family tried to escape during the Revolution disguised as commoners, they were betrayed by Marie-Antoinette's distinctive perfume which revealed her true identity. Those brave Revolutionaries may have despised luxury and privilege but their love of perfume was not diminished and they eased their guilty consciences by creating perfumes such as parfum à la nation and parfum à la guillotine - a heady scent to be sure. Not surprisingly, they did not really catch on.

The Emperor Napoleon was a man obsessed with personal hygiene and it is said that he ruined many a uniform because he insisted on dousing them in his favourite eau de Cologne to get rid of the manly smell of his sweaty soldiers. While in exile, he was horrified to find he had run out of cologne. He could not do without his daily rub-down so he ordered his servant to rustle up something from the local flora. A French company claims to sell this authentic Napoleon eau de Cologne today…and according to their web site, they also sell the intriguing “Swimming-pool water fragrance”. Eau de swimming pool? On closer inspection it turns out to be a product that scents your pool water and not something to make you smell like the local baths on a Saturday afternoon. Phew.

Grasse is still the perfume capital of France today although the industry now relies more on chemicals than flowers and there are many products other than soap and perfume that require a scent. There are still a few fields of flowers but much of the raw material is imported and processed in the factories located in the countryside surrounding the town. Every factory employs one or two perfumers – or “noses” as they are known. They work at a perfume organ – a mini-laboratory that does indeed look a bit like an organ - surrounded by the raw materials which they mix and smell until they are satisfied, which can take months or even years.

Meanwhile, I’m still waiting to be offered a huge bottle of my favourite perfume for my birthday tomorrow but I suppose I’ll have to settle for a dog-eared card and an I O U as usual. Anyway, I could always nip round to the Galeries Lafayette for a really special occasion…