My Adventure into the World Fragrance - Part One

As the title of this post hints at, this is about my journey in understanding perfumery. I'm not really sure where to start, but I will try the beginning because that is generally the best place to start.

My first real experience with perfumes/fragrances was at Bath and Body Works. This was a couple of years ago and somewhat later in life compared to the average girl, since my mom has always had sensitivity to chemicals, synthetic perfumes, and the likes, which left me using toiletries labeled "fragrance free" most of my life. Anyway,  I went into the store, and browsing through all the beautifully packaged and named fragrances made me exited! I bought a few of the travel sized mists knowing that the only time I would get to wear them would be out of the house with my then boyfriend.

Fast forward a bit to this last month, I had been wearing some of the lighter scents somewhat regularly, once or twice every two weeks or so (don't laugh! As far as perfumes go, still living at home, that was regularly for me!). I noticed that I would experience headaches after I wore the mists, which, since I have chronic migraines meant one thing, the perfume had to go!

So, remember I told you my mom has had chemical sensitivity all through my growing up? Well that means I have been a bit more aware of those aspects of health for most of my life, and yes, it was out of wanting to smell like pretty things, that I ignored most of what I already knew were likely to be bad things for my body.

Cue giving synthetics the axe, and looking for naturals that wouldn't break the bank. First place I thought I had found was a brand called "Pacifica". Pacifica says that their fragrances are made with "...Pacifica's signature perfume blends with essential and natural oils.". Right off the bat I noticed the word "with" having somewhat of an "eye" for BS, that struck me right away, but really wanting this to work I read further into the website for reassurance and found just that, with comforting words like, "...And, they [the perfumes] are free of phthalates, nitro-musks, benzene, and other things you don't want.".

Well I'm sad to say that is a bit of a lie, you see I  don't want synthetic fragrance, and I know many people out there believe Pacifica to be a natural fragrance line with words floating around like "with essential and natural oils" and "free off... other things you don't want." it makes it sound like you are getting the real deal! But sadly that just isn't the truth...

Brooke Harvey Taylor the co-founder of Pacifica did an interview with Kimberly Jordan Allen at Eco-Chick 
where she clearly states " For Pacifica, I never claim that we are 100% natural.". The interview as a whole sounded a bit to me as though she wanted to make it sound like she had the moral high ground in choosing to use synthetics (also know as chemicals!) in her fragrances, which irks me greatly, as synthetic fragrances have been linked to major health issues, and as someone with allergies, allergies which often times can trigger debilitating migraines that can last for days... Ugh! I find the marketing techniques Pacifica employs to be reprehensible at the least, and unethical at worst. 

But, this isn't a post to put down Pacifica (I do think the charity they are involved in is wonderful). But rather, try to shine a bit of a light on what seems to be a murky area of the cosmetics industry and hopefully offer a alternative.

Oh boy... Looking around a bit further I stumbled on an article that featured LAVANILA Laboratories perfumes, well I got excited, once again. This company makes the claim "100% Healthy", well I wasn't fooled by that, but was intrigued to look further. What I found was free and loose claims that are just flat out false. "100% Free of Harsh Chemicals: Our products are free from harsh chemicals that can dry, damage and irritate the skin. NO: Parabens, Petrochemicals, Phthalates, Propylene Glycol, Mineral Oils, Silicone, Synthetic Dyes, Synthetic Fragrances, Chemical Sunscreens, Sulfates or Aluminum." 

Umm, no synthetic fragrances? That is just a lie. A look into the ingredients list yields the term "Botanical fragrance blend". That's quite vague, so over to their ingredients glossary I went and it states "Botanical fragrance blend (100% natural) - LAVANILA’s own blend of pure essential oils, nature identical oils, and botanically derived aromas." 

 First up "pure  essential oils", that one gets a pass, there is any hidden meaning to it ((most of the time)and I'll be covering what that means in a natural context in the next post). 

 Second  "nature identical oils" which basically means the oil has the same build up as essential oil (which are made of raw plant materials) but, was made by man in a lab. So not necessarily harmful, but certainly not natural by most peoples standards.

And the Third one which is a real dousy... "botanically derived aromas", or as many other companies call it "naturally derived aromas". This one is that big fat lie, you know, the one about them not having synthetic fragrances. You see every chemical on this earth could be considered "naturally (or botanically if you prefer) derived" because man is incapable of making something out of nothing. So if you aren't using nothing, you are left with the only option of using a material that came from the earth. The point is, everything came from nature at one point, and man has a knack for processing nature into some pretty nasty stuff (that doesn't end up even remotely resembling nature), so naturally derived means absolutely nothing, it's just jargon.

I really didn't want to put this into part two (and was hesitant to include it here), because I'd like this to be positive (which is why I'm not touching on the fact that LAVANILA lists "Natural Aroma" in their baby products! Eeep!), but I don't think companies should get away with essentially lying to their customers, it just isn't right.





Part Two of the journey to come shortly...
Sneak preview:

1. Fragrances that just can't be captured naturally. "Which means if a perfume claims to be "natural" and lists that as a fragrance note, it ain't natural."
2. Delving into the world of natural fragrance and what I've learned about it so far. "What is steam distilled, CO2, and Absolutes??"
3. And some links so super-cool blogs run by super-cool people about making you own perfume! "Woo! The fun part!!" (Note, this one may end up being part three...)