Animalic notes in perfumery (Civet, Beeswax, Indole, Ambrinol, Ambarome) 

When I got Beeswax for the first time I expected it to be a lot more honey like but the smell reminds me more of hay

Ambergris is not whale vomit. Sperm whales do expel squid beaks from their mouth from time to time, but ambergris is formed when, for whatever reason, the squid beaks get into the gut. Then, like an oyster turning a grain of sand into a pearl, the whale coats the sharp beaks with a black and stinking substance that is waxy and floats. It is thought that if the accretion gets too big the whale may die from the obstruction to its gut, but that most times the bolus is eventually excreted. As the blob of muck floats around the oceans , some of the molecules break down in UV light, and the colour becomes lighter--from black to greys to almost white. As this happens the smell improves and the price goes up. Christopher Kemp tells an interesting story in his book, _Floating Gold: A Natural (and Unnatural) History of Ambergris_ . In the 19th century, an aborigine in Tasmania found a floating dead whale, and at great risk to his life, cut a hole in it and climbed inside. He found a huge boulder of ambergris. Since no one in Tasmania knew what it was worth, it was sent to London and placed temporarily in a bank vault. When the expert buyer went into the vault to examine it, the smell was so bad he could hardly breathe. This was because the outside of the mass was fresh, and not quite ambergris yet. But when the lump was cut open they found a very large chunk of older grey ambergris in the center (the oldest part), and the fellow who found it became rich. Thanks for another interesting video!

I love the smell of beeswax. Used to use the candles in my meditations so it's an incredibly relaxing scent. Great info Sam. Thank you!

Don’t ever be shy about advertising your products Sam. Just say it without apologising!

This is actually a really interesting channel even for those just interested in understanding perfumes and not necessarily making them.

Thank you for this, Sam, the timing couldn't be better! I just ordered around USD $200 worth of new raw materials to experiment with and, while I held back on the urge to get my nose on the more overtly civet- types, I did lean slightly animalic on 3 or 4 of the musks I selected. I can't wait to get my nose on them, but I will DEFINITELY be needing some direction as to their utility!

Great to see you get your nose on these! Thanks for all the information

Very intresting, looking forward to leathery notes!

Particularly interesting comments on beeswax absolute, I learned a lot from. Great to see you sniff these out, cheers.

Subbed - this was fascinating! Thank you Sam

You rock!! I just created my own strawberry accord thanks to you and I love it. I have a couple of other fruit accords I'm trying to make and was wondering if you had any advice. Thank you again you are the man.

It was worth watching this just for your comments on civet 🤣

I ordered Sam’s Labdanum and it is absolutely awesome. And thank you for replying to my question, i felt quite honoured. I love all of Sam’s videos as they spurred me on in my interest in aroma chemistry and essential oils. Id love to have BEESWAX as a singular scent.

Synthetic civet DOES smell bad even for trained noses, the one from Synarome is way better than the one from Firmenich, though, but still bad. Funnily the natural civet absolute I had from Charabot/Robertet undiluted had more facets from vomit than poo. To my knowledge it's not illegal (unlike deer musk, which is due to the deer being endangered), but fell out of favour due to the methods used to harvest the crude paste being painful for the animals (which are also held captive in not the best conditions often). Of course it was possible to harvest less painful and keep the civet 'cats' in better conditions but the only ones that might have had an influence on it were the big producers. But as the awareness of animals as feeling creatures arose and perfume became more and more a cheap industrial product where such high priced materials are unwanted anyway the big raw material producers dropped that field completely (Charabot/Robertet discontinued production afaik as one of the last big companies). But that does not mean these animals are unharmed now, as the East still has demand, not only for perfumery but also for traditional medical use. And then we have the coffee.... a product that involves even more cruelty that the production of the paste, since they are force fed with coffee beans which they can't (fully) digest and wouldn't eat voluntarily, but with hardly anything else as this would mean the coffee beans would come out again with with too much poo. So they are kept starving, causing a high mortalit rate. Originally this coffee was produced (ab)using a related species from the genus Paradoxurus, but since the result is similar, and a lot of civet cats were held for perfumery production (with the West mostly withdrew, so no money can be made here any longer), now animals from both genera produce such animalic coffees. I love besswax absolute, but while it used to be pricy the price nowadays got really out of hand (due to American foulbrood causing the death of so many hives outside America, I suppose? On the other hand, I still can buy a kilo of beeswax for not much more than a decade ago.. hm... 🤔), so I began to use much less of it, as restocking would become a pain in the a**... Chris from Pell Wall wrote that a bit of Ambrinol would turn labdanum into an ambergris note. I thought adding a tiny bit might still make an amber perfume more interesting but apparently you should not use both unless you want a dirty ambergris note. Today, unfortunately ambroxan is used synonymously for ambergris, but in case one would want a more accurate ambergris note I would use Ambrox Super, Ambrarome Absolu and Ambrinol 95 for a basic accord (that can be modified with materials like Ambrocenide, Grisalava, et cetera).

Civet segment, hilarious!🤣

Looking forward to leathery notes

I hope you also cover Suederal LT in your leather video. It's my favorite leather note I've smelled so far

I'm working on an ambergris base, which is supposed to smell like real ambergris tincture. Currently my formula contains ambrinol S at whopping 7%!

Ain't got a problem with genuine anamalics if they are sourced responsibly. Deer Musk can be harvested ethically as well as Ambergris.

animalics are used for contrast and depth, i quite enjoy them when done properly, i love muscs koublai khan by serge lutens a lot.

It would be perfect if you could prepare leather accord 👌

Hi Sam. Thanks for the video. Are you smelling these materials neat or diluted? If so, what dilution percentage are you using please?

Don't they excrete Ambergris?

Water in Perfume : what? why? how much?

oot 😭 you know what, for me... you with that mustache just look damn hot! just like you acting like "a daddy wanting it" 😭 your voice also sounds heavier than it used to be. I like you without that mustache when explaining perfume because I can listen and keep my focus on the content, not on this hot daddy. mmm, thank you for the knowledge by the way. ❤️

There are farms for Civets

Ahhh yes I do love the smell of poo, fart gas, and wet animals in the morning 😌🤣

Shaved pls, suit you better bro 😵‍💫

quit sniffing on film please

Chypre Fragrances, hoping they would come back in trend 📉 someday 🥲