Instagram: @ashleyinparis Hi everyone! Thank you so much for stopping by. In this video I talk about why it is so complicated to pick out the notes in your fragrance. Hope you all enjoy!
One, of maybe THE best video I’ve watched about fragrances on RU-vid. And I can say that I have watched a bunch of them. You speak very clearly about these things that I felt inspired. Thank you so much. Please never stop making videos!
Wow. This is the kind of explanation about naturals and synthetics that is insightful and distilled down enough for a collector or enthusiast to remember. Love the explanations for why note interpretations can be so different for different people. Ten minutes that will linger in my memory for a long time to come. Thank you, Ashley!!!
Thanks for this. It annoys me a bit when youtube fragrance reviews treat the note list as if it's a list of all the "ingredients" in a perfume and then say things like "technically there is/isn't rum in this". Or when there's a leather note declared, it could be achieved in all sorts of ways (many of which to me smell a particular way, but not like leather). Also I think there's a lack of understanding of how the choice of musks and fixative molecules change the character of a perfume.
Thats interesting in what you said about if the rose isn’t the kind you know, it doesn’t smell like a rose. I hadn’t thought of that subjective viewpoint and how it would give you a bias. Great info!
Hi, Ashley, I just bumped into your channel today through watching your review videos with The Perfume Guy, both of which I found very helpful (and entertaining). Among the videos you uploaded here, this one strikes me as the most unique and insightful (by far), giving us some of your real "insider" thoughts as a trained perfumer. Thanks for sharing them, I appreciate it. In search for my first signature fragrance, my new hobby in the last couple of days has been to hear what perfume lovers on RU-vid has to say about this or that fragrances, write down the notes from the product websites and test them for myself in the perfumeries nearby. But now, hearing from you about the subtleties of the exact making of the fragrances and the difficulty of judging with certainty about them, it occurs to me that it's somewhat analogous to imagining exactly how a certain dish is cooked with exactly which and how much ingredients just by reading its nutritional facts table and blind-tasting it (which is a quite hopeless if not comical task for the untrained, and extremely challenging even for the well-trained nose, I assume), while there are so many "off-the-recipe" know-hows and hundreds of ways to mix the ingredients. Indeed, most of us non-perfumers do not ever feel the need to 'understand' a cologne with such sophistication in order to come to conclusions such as "I like it" or "I don't like it", to purchase it, to wear it, and to 'enjoy' its scent. However, your words remind me of the fact that also in the world of colognes, there are competent and passionate people, who not only 'enjoy', but also 'understand' or 'decompose', and ultimately 'compose' the fragrance themselves, much like there are casual classical music lovers merely 'enjoying' the beautiful music performed by musicians, while the more educated ones like musicologists go on to 'analyze' the music, and a few people even 'compose' or give birth to the music itself. So, Ashley, the one who 'understands' perfumes, the 'composer' in the future, I hope your training in Paris flourishes and your passion keeps on developing to give birth to some of the finest delicacies for us to enjoy that sing hymns in our brain for a long time. + I will be looking forward to watching more videos like this one from you in this channel:) Au revoir! 😉
Thanks for this video, Ashley! I really enjoy these educational vids. I’d love for you to do a vid on how specifically to distinguish niche from independent. Keep up the great work!
Great and informative video, cheers! It helps to clear up common misconceptions people in the 'community' have about notes and them being viewed as singular ingredients rather than abstract descriptors of what one has the potential to smell in a fragrance. As such, reviews so often tend to be based on re-readings of note pyramids released by the brand rather than their own subjective experiences, as well as not highlighting facets of a particular "note" (i.e. what kind of patchouli is it? Chocolatey, earthy, leafy green, medicinal etc.), in a way bringing down their credibility. After seriously getting into fragrances years ago (in more than a mere "I like to smell nice" kind of way), I initially found it all rather aggravating as I obviously wasn't able to pinpoint every single officially listed note on a given fragrance, leading me to think my nose wasn't "developed" enough. As a matter of fact, I can't say I can single them all out now, either, but I understand the concept much better. Related to that, what are your thoughts on people supposedly being able to pick up on every single listed note, even in abstract compositions of notes blending into each other? Is it even possible, for example, for one person to have such a better capacity to identify notes?
A wonderful discussion Ashley, especially the part about how associations and memories play a role in olfaction. Precisely why naturals are sometimes very difficult to identify. I.e, thinking is a problem. 😂
So interesting theme, thank you for putting light on it! For me it's often hard to pick out notes in a fragrance, but I think I'm better now then a couple of years ago, and still I really love to try to do it, and to hear what other people smell, and feel about a fragrance.
It’s definitely something you only get better and better at, and there’s no wrong answer even if it’s on on the official notes list. So glad you enjoyed the video and thank you for watching!
Just discovered your channel yesterday. Seems like you will be putting out a lot of interesting videos in the future. I just wanna follow along to see what I can learn.
Great vid Ashley. You mentioned that you could do a whole video on synthetics. I’d be really keen to learn more about them. Especially since the fragrance you got me hooked on (Kenzo Homme Intense) has two of your employers synthetics, in Calypsone and Akigalawood. I’d love to have a greater understanding on how they’re made and then licensed to perfumers.
Hi Ashley, I love these in-depth videos! What does it mean when a fragrance is "well blended"? I get confused when i hear people list off individual notes they smell (whether or not the official ones are listed) in a fragrance, then they follow up with "the fragrance is well blended." Like to me if something is blended well that means it's hard to pin point different notes as if they can be separated. I dont get it. Please explain. Thanks
Nice topic Ashley! I believe the notes list we consumers see in pages and press are more a mkt and creative director brand 'thing' rather a perfumer's decision. Am I wrong?
Ashley, this video could have been a hour and I would be here for it. You mentioned not one fragrance but I was still captured. More this please. I’m into darker fragrances ( Death by Cold Cave X Blackbird is amazing ) has an oud note but I’m wondering how can I smell real oud? I have many fragrances with oud as a not but want to smell actual oud.
This made me realize that the fragrances that I enjoy the most are ones that evoke reveries. MM’s UTLT, Versace Eau Fraiche, DS&D Amber Kiso, DS&D I don’t know what, D&G The One, Chanel’s BDC, TF Noir Extreme. I imagine that if I was a perfumer, my goal would be to create Reveries in a bottle. Must be hard to recreate chemicals and natural materials into what I described, something quite personal on a large scale.
Great video Ashley! Please provide us with more of this really valuable information. Maybe you can do a class on a patreon channel? I don't know if you would have enough people join to make it worthwhile - just a thought. Take care, Ginny 😘😘😘
Hi Ashley! I have a question. If I've put on perfume for years, every single day, are there diseases in the body related to the chemicals contained in the perfumes? Greetings from Mexico!
You mentioned "headspace", and I THINK I read somewhere about it being a technique of isolating aromatic molecules out of a real object. Very nice treatment of identifying notes in compositions, and it would have been nice to get a more in depth explanation of headspace. Gas chromatography?
thank you for the video and the great info! i myself am obsessed with jasmine notes, because a neighbor has a jasmine tree and 1) the breeze smells of jasmine 2) as kids we loved to bruise the flowers and let that smell spread. i know the natural smell of jasmine, but i've been tricked by synthetics for sooo long!
For someone who is not trained like me, when i watch reviews i will compare it with fragrance that i have and see his interpretation, does it correlate with what i smell or like.. thats how i find my reviewers on RU-vid.. you wont find an exact person with exactly similar taste as you, cause every person has differences, so i just pick the closes and learn from there..
I've noticed that synthetics used in fragrance often times seem to smell like plastic or like cleaners or just don't smell natural. I get that synthetics have better longevity often & are cheaper so I'm not totally against them but I usually can tell the difference
I think this animatic notes : musk , ambergris, labdanum , castoréum… are not nice in à parfum and I think who creates parfumés are exaggerating with using them, even in summer fragrances MUSK is in base, that’s mean , when thé parfum dries down, I smell all day musk 😭 Almost all parfumés (from 100$ to 600$)…have this animalic base , they smell so nice in the beginning and then the dry down….not so nice. I love natural extracts in my parfumés, I love citrusy, berries, flowers , woods and synthetic ONLY if is needed to avoid allergies. I wish parfumés to keep the same smell from the beginning to the end .ex. If is citrusy, I really don’t like to change in some animalistic smell. I really like your video and thank you for making time for us! 🤗
Thanks for the video, when you have kids, you become a master at smelling animal smells and are puzzled by anything that smells good. I NEED TO RETRAIN MY NOSE. Peace!
Blue + Yellow = Green - Sometimes the same rule is what exactly the perfumer do with perfume accords. - An example: Material by Amouage the reason why the perfumer added Oud notes? to support other notes … here is the creativity.
Ashley, your videos are great! I want to put this out there for you : if you want to grow you channel, do more mainstream stuff (titles like "lady-killer" "compliment getters" etc) Videos like this one appeal more to people who are very passionate about fragrances. Now, if you want to keep your channel more niche, that's fine.. Cheers!
While it's nice to understand how the professionals do it, this video contained nothing that would actually increase any lay person's ability to "pick out the notes" in their fragrances. That ability comes only with time and exposure to the various notes and the fragrances that contain them.
