Story: "Something About Her Scent"
Apr. 1st, 2023 11:23 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ysabetwordsmithHappy Hobbit birthday to everyone! I decided to write fanfic instead of original work today. :D This was inspired by three squares in my 4-1-23 card for the Gothic Bingo Fest: Wednesday Addams, =Snap Twice= combine exactly two adjacent prompts, and Mummy. It belongs to the Wednesday iteration of the Addams Family mythos.
"Something About Her Scent"
Wednesday lifted her head, watching as Enid bustled around the room. There was something different about her. She was happy, bouncy, but that was typical. Wednesday tapped a single finger against her thigh, trying to sort through the chaotic mess of impressions that Enid trailed around her like a cloud of perfume. Ah. That was it. Something about her scent.
"What are you wearing?" Wednesday said.
"My new sweater from Knifty Knits!" Enid said, twirling. "Do you like it?"
The sweater was monstrously pastel, striped in two different shades of pink along with purple, turquoise, and yellow. It was also fuzzy, at least two sizes too big for Enid, and it clashed violently with the floral shorts and their horrible pompom trim. Just looking at the outfit made Wednesday's eyes water, so she closed them to concentrate better.
"Not the sweater," she said. "Your perfume."
"It's for werewolves? For special occasions? I'm going out to a party with some other girls," Enid said. "I'm sorry about the smell, everyone else hates it."
"I don't hate it," Wednesday said quietly.
"Really?" said Enid. "That's good. That's great. I mean, that you don't hate it. I don't want you to hate ... it."
"I think it's interesting," Wednesday said. She stepped closer, trying to avoid looking at the colors too much, and just breathed in the cloud of scent that wrapped around Enid. It smelled like roadkill, whale vomit, civet excreta, with odd hints of cinnamon and myrrh, all under a lilting riff of jasmine. It reminded Wednesday of her favorite Mummy Spice perfume oil based on cassia, cumin, anise, cedar, myrrh, frankincense, leather, vanilla, and patchouli.
"Did you -- did you just scent me?" Enid said.
"Hmm," Wednesday said. "I needed a better impression of your perfume. It's all over you. What did you do, roll in it?"
Enid giggled. "That is actually how it's applied," she said, holding out a towel covered in ghastly pink-and-yellow flowers.
Wednesday took the towel, trying to ignore the eye-mugging colors, and buried her face in the folds. It smelled rich and wild, thick with the spicy-animal notes of the werewolf perfume, and under that, something warm and musky that was just Enid. Wednesday wasn't about to roll in it, because that would be utterly undignified. Instead she swirled it around her shoulders like a cape so she could cuddle the scent closer, just for a moment.
"If you like it, um, you can have what's left of my old bottle," Enid said, offering a fluted bottle of pink-and-gold glass. "I've got a new one that I haven't even opened yet."
"I do like the scent," Wednesday admitted, hastily returning the towel. She liked it better on Enid than in the bottle, but with a bit of it on her own skin, it would shift to match her personal scent while letting them smell a little alike. That gave her another idea, and she drifted back to her own side of the room.
Enid followed her. "Just, you know, be aware that all the werewolves will notice that you're wearing our perfume and they'll think you're, um, dressing up for a special occasion."
"I will disabuse them of any mistaken ideas," Wednesday promised, unlocking the desk drawer where she kept her valuables. She pulled out a bottle of faceted black glass.
When she turned around, Enid was right behind her. The werewolf yipped in surprise and jumped back a step. "Sorry, didn't mean to crowd you," Enid said. "I was just trying to see what you were doing."
"This," Wednesday said, opening her hand. "What do you think of it?"
Enid sniffed eagerly, nose twitching. "Oh, that smells so good," she said. "You smell like that, sometimes, just a little bit."
Wednesday flicked the black tassel. "I put it on with this, or at most, touch my wrist to the mouth of the bottle," she said. "Just enough to anchor my senses with something familiar, not enough to drown out other smells entirely." She had to do something to keep the scent pile of the school from overwhelming her. It was complete and utter chaos, with so many types of Outcasts mingling together, from the fresh marine smell of the sirens to the stone-dust of the gorgons.
"Yeah, sometimes it's a bit much in here," said Enid. "That's why all the werewolves bring our own perfume and stuff."
"It's called Mummy Spice. I don't have a spare bottle, because I just got this," Wednesday said. She'd restocked before the new semester started, to make sure she wouldn't run out. "But I have something else..."
She'd gone shopping with Enid in mind, just in case there was a birthday or some other gift-giving occasion. They didn't need another disaster like the surprise party in Crackstone's tomb. Wednesday turned her back and quickly decanted some of the potent oil into a new vessel. "Here. For you."
Enid cupped her hand around the pendant. It was a faceted flask carved from pure onyx, above which hung two large river pearls set with jeweled crescent moons, hung on a delicate gold chain. "It's beautiful," she breathed.
"I saw it and the moons reminded me of you," Wednesday said.
"Thank you," said Enid. "Whenever I smell this, I'll think of you."
"That's the idea," Wednesday said, one corner of her mouth curling up.
All the werewolves would notice that, too, the way their scents were starting to mingle, but that was okay. It was fitting for Wednesday and Enid to smell a little alike, as their lives began to intertwine at the edges like two patches of vines growing together. When Enid went to the party, people would wonder what it was about her ...
... something about her scent.
* * *
Notes:
See Enid's sweater and pompom shorts. Her beach towel has a tropical print.
Wolves and other canids roll in smelly things for multiple reasons. Some are about communication, but also they just think those scents are "pretty" in the same way that humans like perfume. So of course, werewolves adore stinky perfume. Interestingly, humans are also attracted to raunchy notes in perfume, but prefer theirs to be subtler and covered by more attractive floral or spicy notes. Wednesday's senses have a lot in common with werewolves (trained olfactory sense, ability to sing and thus probably hear at ultrasonic range) so I figured she might be intrigued by their idea of perfume.
Perfume ingredients include some surprisingly bad smells as well as good ones.
The smell of death:
Scientist reveals how 400 compounds mix to create heady mixture of scents as bacteria rips apart rotting flesh
Smell of death can consist of more than 400 volatile organic compounds
Scientists say there may be core smells with concentrations that change
If this is the case, it could help scientists better estimate time of death
Necrophagic - or 'dead-eating' - insects are attracted to the smell and may also help researchers identify new core compounds
Dead bodies give off a distinctive, sickly-sweet odour that's immediately recognisable and hard to forget.
The smell of death can consist of more than 400 volatile organic compounds in a complex mixture, researchers have revealed.
These compounds are produced by the actions of bacteria, which break down the tissues in the body into gases and salts.
The Chemistry of Death and Desire
What do fleshy tuberose, cooked Brussel sprouts, chocolate, the musk of human sex, faeces, and a decomposing body all have in common?
Indole, dirty, sexy, carnal Indole. You have smelled it thousands of times without knowing its name, but if you are smelling something a little bit overripe, heavy, and with a strange sweetness, it is most likely Indole. Even untrained noses can pull out the waft of clammy decay in a magnolia blossom, the crotch-like quality to heady jasmine or the slightest smell of poop in roses. That is Indole.
Indole is the smell of human bodies and human intimacy, but also an earthly connection between those bodies and the world around them. After all, flowers are the reproductive organs of plants, living, reproducing, and dying, so of course, we would be attracted and intrigued by our similarities to the chemical composition of these glorious flowers.
Indole
Group: NATURAL AND SYNTHETIC, POPULAR AND WEIRD
Odor profile: in pure form indole smells like mothballs, camphor green and intense; in white flowers such as jasmine, tuberose and orange blossom it adds a deep animalic, slightly fecal tonality
Ambergris is whale vomit, cured by floating in the ocean for a few years. Rank when raw, the cured form smells surprisingly pleasant.
Ambergris Perfumes
Ambergris
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: A product of the intestines of sperm whales found floating on the ocean and blanched by sea and sun with a skin-like salty and warm effect. Synthetically recreated today.
Civet comes from the anal glands of the civet animal.
Civet Perfumes
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: Naturally the byproduct of the anal glands of exotic civet cats (technically no cats), which smells very pungent and fecal but which gives an amazing radiance and warmth to florals. Now synthetically replicated with civetone for ethical reasons.
In local-Earth, people switched from animal-sourced scents to synthetic chemicals. That doesn't work for werewolves, whose noses are too sensitive. So they had to find more tolerable (or least more discreet) ways of harvesting animal scents, which runs up the price.
Spices play a role in many perfumes.
Cinnamon is one of the smells of Christmas: spicy and enticing, comforting and sweet, all at once. Our love of cinnamon dates back thousands of years: 2000 years ago the Egyptians were weaving it into perfumes (though it probably originates way before that, in China).
Cinnamomum verum is thought to have been an ingredient in the original holy ‘anointing oil’, mentioned in the Bible. The Greeks and Romans used it too, often with its near-relation cassia. It’s long been considered to have aphrodisiac properties, when eaten – though if spicy scents turn you on, maybe when dabbed onto pulse-points, too.
Cinnamon Perfumes
Cinnamon
Cinnamomum verum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: A sweet and warm, powdery tenacious spicy note.
Balms and resins are gummy or crystalline perfume ingredients, mostly from trees.
myrrh
Commiphora myrrha
subtle, warm, buttery, earthy, mushroom, bit black licorice
Note / base
Family / amber
Type / CO2 extract
Origin / Ethiopia
Perfumer's Notes
Myrrh is a classical oriental ingredient. Like frankincense it is used commonly as incense. Smooth and sensual, myrrh can enhance and deepen a fragrance, but use delicately or it can be overwhelming.
Myrrh Perfumes
Myrrh
Group: RESINS AND BALSAMS
Odor profile: One of the oldest known perfume ingredients, it has a warm balsamic, sweet aromatic spicy fragrance.
JASMINE
Jasmine and rose are the two ‘foundation stones’ of perfumery. There’s barely a scent out there which doesn’t feature a type of jasmine somewhere in its construction – but all jasmines aren’t created equal, and (dare we say it) there’s a lot of snobbery about jasmine, with fragrance houses falling over themselves to boast of the priceless quality of their jasmine…
There are actually over 200 species of jasmine – but two members of the beautiful white-flowered jasmine family are most ‘prized’. The first is Jasminun grandiflorum, which translates as ‘big-flowered jasmine’; Chanel have their own fields of this in Grasse, and you can read about the harvest and maceration process here – and this is sometimes just referred to, then, as ‘Grasse jasmine’, because it grows so well there. The other precious member of the family is Sambac Jasmine – sometimes known as Tuscan jasmine, or Arabian jasmine, depending on who you’re speaking to… Nowadays, jasmine is grown for the fragrance industry everywhere from India to France, Morocco, Algeria, Spain and Morocco. (It actually originated in India and China, and – who knew? – is a member of the olive family.)
Jasmine gives a richness and intensity to fragrances: a sweet floral note, but with a dead-sexy muskiness to it. If you smell different concentrated ‘absolutes’ (the oily liquids created through macerating the jasmine flowers), they have their own characters: some smell medicinal, some sweet, some musky, some green. It’s extraordinary that a single plant can smell so different, depending on where it’s grown. The genius of perfumers is knowing just what they have to do, to blend those into perfectly constructed scents for us to wear.
Jasmine Perfumes
Jasmine
Jasminum Grandiflorum (Oleaceae);
Group: WHITE FLOWERS
Odor profile: Sweet, white floral, opulent, can be more indolic or greener and fresher when synthesized in the lab.
Enid's perfume bottle is pink and gold Murano glass.
Egyptian mummies incorporate numerous spices, resins, and other fragrant substances in their creation. Wednesday's perfume oil uses those along with leather, vanilla, and patchouli to convey the sense of age and death.
CINNAMOMUM CASSIA
It smells like cinnamon. (Actually, it tastes like cinnamon too.) It looks like cinnamon. Cinnamomum cassia even has cinnamon in its botanical name, and is known sometimes as ‘Chinese cinnamon’, or even ‘false cinnamon’. Both were among the most popular perfume ingredients of ancient times, referred to as far back as ancient Egyptian unguent recipes. (Although some scholars – and we’re really not qualified to argue – think that the cassia plant of old is inferior to the one still used today in teas, ointments and perfumery.) The twigs, buds and foliage of this 3-metre tree can be steam-distilled – but cassia is sometimes recreated synthetically, giving a potent and seriously spicy, almost earthy note that when handled with care lends itself especially well to Ambrées.
Cassia Perfumes
Cassia
Cinnamomum cassia; Other names: Chinese cinnamon, False Cinnamon
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: cinnamon-like, spicy, earthy, aromatic facets, coming from Cinnamomum aromaticum. Very concentrated, intense spice note.
Cumin: Reinventing Sensuality
The spicy olfactory family comprises a wide variety of spices, including warm spices like cinnamon and cloves, and cool spices such as cardamom and coriander. Cumin, however, is a unique spice due to its animal-like note, which imparts a sensual, strong, and persistent aroma to fragrance compositions. While the odor can sometimes resemble sweat, animal notes in perfumery are highly useful for their capacity to fix other components and enhance their scents. When used precisely and sparingly, cumin lends strength and character to fragrances, as evidenced in Le Mâle by Jean-Paul Gaultier. In this perfume, cumin features as a middle note, accompanied by cinnamon and enhanced by orange blossom, culminating in a very oriental and sensual fragrance.
Cumin Perfumes
Cumin
Cuminum cyminum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: a spice with an especially pungent, bitter-sour note that can resemble sweat. Polarizing, it can highlight a fragrance creation like no other and is nowadays often used to render an intimate, animalic note in abscence of animalics. Famously overdosed in Kingdom by Alexander McQueen.
anise
Pimpinella anisum
black licorice, anised, sweet, spicy, fresh, green
Note / top
Family / aromatic/herbal
Type / essential oil
Origin / Italy
Perfumer's Notes
Anise essential oil is produced from anise seeds, the same seed that gives licorice its distinctive scent. Anethole, the main component in the essential oil, is also found in fennel and star anise. Anise is a polarizing ingredient due to it's unique impact in a fragrance — most people love it or hate it. Use it to add an aromatic, spicy note to your fragrance.
Anise Perfumes
Anise
Pimpinella anisum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: the scent of aniseed, rich in anethol, reminiscent of licorice. Belongs in the same family of scents as tarragon and fennel (also rich in anethol). Very popular in fragrances, notably L'Heure Bleu.
Cedar in perfumery
Cedar is an important wood in perfumery. It is considered as a tutor by perfumers, as it is a note that gives vibration to the fragrance. It supports the whole olfactory pyramid, it can cross the perfume from the top notes to the base notes. It is a wood that is increasingly used in fragrances for women, along with vetiver, sandalwood and patchouli.
Cedar Perfumes
Cedar
Cedrus, family Pinaceae;
Group: WOODS AND MOSSES
Odor profile: An soft woody note coming from either the Atlas Mountains (Morocco) or the Virginia (US) cedarwood. There are also many cedar-smelling synthetics in use.
frankincense
Boswellia serrata
peppery, citrus, woody, balsamic, sweet-licorice tones
Note / base
Family / amber
Type / CO2 extract
Origin / India
Perfumer's Notes
Frankincense is a resinous material obtained from a Boswellia tree species. The most common use of frankincense (also called olibanum) is as an incense. In perfumery, frankincense is very versatile thanks to its peppery citrus top and woody balsamic base. Frankincense lends a lift to citrus and green fragrances, and brings softness to oriental blends.
Frankincense Perfumes
Olibanum (Frankincense)
Boswellia carterii (Burseraceae);
Group: RESINS AND BALSAMS
Odor profile: A fresh balsamic, somewhat green, woody and spicy fragrance with a fruity top note.
Leather
Fragrances can be ‘leathery’ – but it’s not really essence-of-leather in that bottle, as Andy Tauer explains below. It might be from birch tar (which has a leathery smokiness), or juniper, aldehydes or other synthetics, designed to give a skin-like scent. Patchouli, black tea and tobacco can also conjure up that old library/leather-jacket sensuality. Women’s chypres, and men’s fragrances, are most likely to have a leathery sensuality, but perfumers can take leather on all sorts of fragrant journeys: woody, aromatic, floral, even gourmand.
Leather Perfumes
Leather
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: Synthetic or naturally derived note of pungent characteristics, reminiscent of cured hides and leather goods. Usually rendered by birch tar or by synth isoquinolines.
Vanilla and vanillin in perfumery
The Aztecs used vanilla to flavour chocolate-based nectar. It is said to contain benefits for fighting fears and anxieties, it provides health and strength.
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Vanilla is one of the essential raw materials of the amber or oriental facet.
Vanilla Perfumes
Vanilla
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: An ever popular fragrance note, known mostly through its synthetic variant vanillin, which is sweet, cozy, comforting, with a pleasing cookie-baking feeling to it. Alongside amber, the reference note for the Oriental family of scents (The most famous classic being Shalimar). The real vanilla pod has darker facets that recall treacle and booze with off notes. Simple vanillas (Victoria's Secret Love to Dream, Charlie Touch, TBS Vanilla, Coty Vanilla Musk) have become increasingly popular with the adolescent market, giving rise to the umbiquity of the gourmand category of scents, while complex, earthier vanillas are appearing steadily in the niche sector (Spirituese Double Vanille by Guerlain, Tihota Indult, Montale Vanille Absolue).
Patchouli, the magic leaf
Origin of patchouli
The patchouli leaf or patchouly.
Botanical family: Pogostemon of the Lamiaceae family.
The name patchouli appeared at the beginning of the 19th century and is probably a combination of the terms patch (green) and ilai (leaves), or leaf (in English). It is also said to come from the Tamil paccilai meaning green leaf.
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Patchouli is the most widely used raw material in perfumery except for citrus. Patchouli is a plant that looks very much like a large shrub about one metre tall with leaves resembling those of the mint.
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Olfactory description of patchouli
There is only one botanical variety of patchouli but depending on the terroir the scent can be different.
Patchouli has a woody, earthy, humid, dark smell and evokes a colour between brown and black. A camphor note molecule is identified in it, it also has almost a dusty scent. Patchouli can be reminiscent of a cork or an overripe apple, some find it smells like mushrooms, cellars and mould.
Many perfumers have told me that they can detect a hint of cocoa in good quality patchouli.
Use of patchouli
Patchouli is the most important raw material in perfumery and is used in both men's and women's fragrances.
Patchouli has a woody note that combines beautifully with other woody notes, such as vetiver, sandalwood or cedar.
It brings depth and sensuality and is considered by some to be an aphrodisiac, especially when combined with sweet oriental notes such as incense, vanilla and cistus.
Patchouli can be refreshed by citrus fruits such as bergamot. It is often associated with rose, sometimes with jasmine, a little less with ylang-ylang. Patchouli is also a perfect match for gourmand notes.
Patchouli is a rather dark aromatic note that brings a lot of character, depth, but also brings out the freshness. It is a sublimator, rich, sensual and charismatic, often replacing mosses in chypre constructions and is essential in oriental compositions. It is always present in woody fragrances.
Patchouli Perfumes
Patchouli
Pogostemon Cablin;
Group: WOODS AND MOSSES
Odor profile: An exotic bush that grows mainly in India, the leaves of which produce the essential oil of patchouli. Sweet, dark, with an earthy, woody edge, it is very popular in many blends, especially the contemporary woody floral musks. There are also synthetics and fractal extractions.
Wednesday's perfume bottle of Mummy Spice is faceted black glass with a matching tassel.
Enid's perfume necklace from Wednesday is faceted onyx with moon-pearl beads on a gold chain.
Wolves communicate a lot with scent, and werewolves likely do the same, so wearing each other's perfume is pretty significant.
"Something About Her Scent"
Wednesday lifted her head, watching as Enid bustled around the room. There was something different about her. She was happy, bouncy, but that was typical. Wednesday tapped a single finger against her thigh, trying to sort through the chaotic mess of impressions that Enid trailed around her like a cloud of perfume. Ah. That was it. Something about her scent.
"What are you wearing?" Wednesday said.
"My new sweater from Knifty Knits!" Enid said, twirling. "Do you like it?"
The sweater was monstrously pastel, striped in two different shades of pink along with purple, turquoise, and yellow. It was also fuzzy, at least two sizes too big for Enid, and it clashed violently with the floral shorts and their horrible pompom trim. Just looking at the outfit made Wednesday's eyes water, so she closed them to concentrate better.
"Not the sweater," she said. "Your perfume."
"It's for werewolves? For special occasions? I'm going out to a party with some other girls," Enid said. "I'm sorry about the smell, everyone else hates it."
"I don't hate it," Wednesday said quietly.
"Really?" said Enid. "That's good. That's great. I mean, that you don't hate it. I don't want you to hate ... it."
"I think it's interesting," Wednesday said. She stepped closer, trying to avoid looking at the colors too much, and just breathed in the cloud of scent that wrapped around Enid. It smelled like roadkill, whale vomit, civet excreta, with odd hints of cinnamon and myrrh, all under a lilting riff of jasmine. It reminded Wednesday of her favorite Mummy Spice perfume oil based on cassia, cumin, anise, cedar, myrrh, frankincense, leather, vanilla, and patchouli.
"Did you -- did you just scent me?" Enid said.
"Hmm," Wednesday said. "I needed a better impression of your perfume. It's all over you. What did you do, roll in it?"
Enid giggled. "That is actually how it's applied," she said, holding out a towel covered in ghastly pink-and-yellow flowers.
Wednesday took the towel, trying to ignore the eye-mugging colors, and buried her face in the folds. It smelled rich and wild, thick with the spicy-animal notes of the werewolf perfume, and under that, something warm and musky that was just Enid. Wednesday wasn't about to roll in it, because that would be utterly undignified. Instead she swirled it around her shoulders like a cape so she could cuddle the scent closer, just for a moment.
"If you like it, um, you can have what's left of my old bottle," Enid said, offering a fluted bottle of pink-and-gold glass. "I've got a new one that I haven't even opened yet."
"I do like the scent," Wednesday admitted, hastily returning the towel. She liked it better on Enid than in the bottle, but with a bit of it on her own skin, it would shift to match her personal scent while letting them smell a little alike. That gave her another idea, and she drifted back to her own side of the room.
Enid followed her. "Just, you know, be aware that all the werewolves will notice that you're wearing our perfume and they'll think you're, um, dressing up for a special occasion."
"I will disabuse them of any mistaken ideas," Wednesday promised, unlocking the desk drawer where she kept her valuables. She pulled out a bottle of faceted black glass.
When she turned around, Enid was right behind her. The werewolf yipped in surprise and jumped back a step. "Sorry, didn't mean to crowd you," Enid said. "I was just trying to see what you were doing."
"This," Wednesday said, opening her hand. "What do you think of it?"
Enid sniffed eagerly, nose twitching. "Oh, that smells so good," she said. "You smell like that, sometimes, just a little bit."
Wednesday flicked the black tassel. "I put it on with this, or at most, touch my wrist to the mouth of the bottle," she said. "Just enough to anchor my senses with something familiar, not enough to drown out other smells entirely." She had to do something to keep the scent pile of the school from overwhelming her. It was complete and utter chaos, with so many types of Outcasts mingling together, from the fresh marine smell of the sirens to the stone-dust of the gorgons.
"Yeah, sometimes it's a bit much in here," said Enid. "That's why all the werewolves bring our own perfume and stuff."
"It's called Mummy Spice. I don't have a spare bottle, because I just got this," Wednesday said. She'd restocked before the new semester started, to make sure she wouldn't run out. "But I have something else..."
She'd gone shopping with Enid in mind, just in case there was a birthday or some other gift-giving occasion. They didn't need another disaster like the surprise party in Crackstone's tomb. Wednesday turned her back and quickly decanted some of the potent oil into a new vessel. "Here. For you."
Enid cupped her hand around the pendant. It was a faceted flask carved from pure onyx, above which hung two large river pearls set with jeweled crescent moons, hung on a delicate gold chain. "It's beautiful," she breathed.
"I saw it and the moons reminded me of you," Wednesday said.
"Thank you," said Enid. "Whenever I smell this, I'll think of you."
"That's the idea," Wednesday said, one corner of her mouth curling up.
All the werewolves would notice that, too, the way their scents were starting to mingle, but that was okay. It was fitting for Wednesday and Enid to smell a little alike, as their lives began to intertwine at the edges like two patches of vines growing together. When Enid went to the party, people would wonder what it was about her ...
... something about her scent.
* * *
Notes:
See Enid's sweater and pompom shorts. Her beach towel has a tropical print.
Wolves and other canids roll in smelly things for multiple reasons. Some are about communication, but also they just think those scents are "pretty" in the same way that humans like perfume. So of course, werewolves adore stinky perfume. Interestingly, humans are also attracted to raunchy notes in perfume, but prefer theirs to be subtler and covered by more attractive floral or spicy notes. Wednesday's senses have a lot in common with werewolves (trained olfactory sense, ability to sing and thus probably hear at ultrasonic range) so I figured she might be intrigued by their idea of perfume.
Perfume ingredients include some surprisingly bad smells as well as good ones.
The smell of death:
Scientist reveals how 400 compounds mix to create heady mixture of scents as bacteria rips apart rotting flesh
Smell of death can consist of more than 400 volatile organic compounds
Scientists say there may be core smells with concentrations that change
If this is the case, it could help scientists better estimate time of death
Necrophagic - or 'dead-eating' - insects are attracted to the smell and may also help researchers identify new core compounds
Dead bodies give off a distinctive, sickly-sweet odour that's immediately recognisable and hard to forget.
The smell of death can consist of more than 400 volatile organic compounds in a complex mixture, researchers have revealed.
These compounds are produced by the actions of bacteria, which break down the tissues in the body into gases and salts.
The Chemistry of Death and Desire
What do fleshy tuberose, cooked Brussel sprouts, chocolate, the musk of human sex, faeces, and a decomposing body all have in common?
Indole, dirty, sexy, carnal Indole. You have smelled it thousands of times without knowing its name, but if you are smelling something a little bit overripe, heavy, and with a strange sweetness, it is most likely Indole. Even untrained noses can pull out the waft of clammy decay in a magnolia blossom, the crotch-like quality to heady jasmine or the slightest smell of poop in roses. That is Indole.
Indole is the smell of human bodies and human intimacy, but also an earthly connection between those bodies and the world around them. After all, flowers are the reproductive organs of plants, living, reproducing, and dying, so of course, we would be attracted and intrigued by our similarities to the chemical composition of these glorious flowers.
Indole
Group: NATURAL AND SYNTHETIC, POPULAR AND WEIRD
Odor profile: in pure form indole smells like mothballs, camphor green and intense; in white flowers such as jasmine, tuberose and orange blossom it adds a deep animalic, slightly fecal tonality
Ambergris is whale vomit, cured by floating in the ocean for a few years. Rank when raw, the cured form smells surprisingly pleasant.
Ambergris Perfumes
Ambergris
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: A product of the intestines of sperm whales found floating on the ocean and blanched by sea and sun with a skin-like salty and warm effect. Synthetically recreated today.
Civet comes from the anal glands of the civet animal.
Civet Perfumes
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: Naturally the byproduct of the anal glands of exotic civet cats (technically no cats), which smells very pungent and fecal but which gives an amazing radiance and warmth to florals. Now synthetically replicated with civetone for ethical reasons.
In local-Earth, people switched from animal-sourced scents to synthetic chemicals. That doesn't work for werewolves, whose noses are too sensitive. So they had to find more tolerable (or least more discreet) ways of harvesting animal scents, which runs up the price.
Spices play a role in many perfumes.
Cinnamon is one of the smells of Christmas: spicy and enticing, comforting and sweet, all at once. Our love of cinnamon dates back thousands of years: 2000 years ago the Egyptians were weaving it into perfumes (though it probably originates way before that, in China).
Cinnamomum verum is thought to have been an ingredient in the original holy ‘anointing oil’, mentioned in the Bible. The Greeks and Romans used it too, often with its near-relation cassia. It’s long been considered to have aphrodisiac properties, when eaten – though if spicy scents turn you on, maybe when dabbed onto pulse-points, too.
Cinnamon Perfumes
Cinnamon
Cinnamomum verum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: A sweet and warm, powdery tenacious spicy note.
Balms and resins are gummy or crystalline perfume ingredients, mostly from trees.
myrrh
Commiphora myrrha
subtle, warm, buttery, earthy, mushroom, bit black licorice
Note / base
Family / amber
Type / CO2 extract
Origin / Ethiopia
Perfumer's Notes
Myrrh is a classical oriental ingredient. Like frankincense it is used commonly as incense. Smooth and sensual, myrrh can enhance and deepen a fragrance, but use delicately or it can be overwhelming.
Myrrh Perfumes
Myrrh
Group: RESINS AND BALSAMS
Odor profile: One of the oldest known perfume ingredients, it has a warm balsamic, sweet aromatic spicy fragrance.
JASMINE
Jasmine and rose are the two ‘foundation stones’ of perfumery. There’s barely a scent out there which doesn’t feature a type of jasmine somewhere in its construction – but all jasmines aren’t created equal, and (dare we say it) there’s a lot of snobbery about jasmine, with fragrance houses falling over themselves to boast of the priceless quality of their jasmine…
There are actually over 200 species of jasmine – but two members of the beautiful white-flowered jasmine family are most ‘prized’. The first is Jasminun grandiflorum, which translates as ‘big-flowered jasmine’; Chanel have their own fields of this in Grasse, and you can read about the harvest and maceration process here – and this is sometimes just referred to, then, as ‘Grasse jasmine’, because it grows so well there. The other precious member of the family is Sambac Jasmine – sometimes known as Tuscan jasmine, or Arabian jasmine, depending on who you’re speaking to… Nowadays, jasmine is grown for the fragrance industry everywhere from India to France, Morocco, Algeria, Spain and Morocco. (It actually originated in India and China, and – who knew? – is a member of the olive family.)
Jasmine gives a richness and intensity to fragrances: a sweet floral note, but with a dead-sexy muskiness to it. If you smell different concentrated ‘absolutes’ (the oily liquids created through macerating the jasmine flowers), they have their own characters: some smell medicinal, some sweet, some musky, some green. It’s extraordinary that a single plant can smell so different, depending on where it’s grown. The genius of perfumers is knowing just what they have to do, to blend those into perfectly constructed scents for us to wear.
Jasmine Perfumes
Jasmine
Jasminum Grandiflorum (Oleaceae);
Group: WHITE FLOWERS
Odor profile: Sweet, white floral, opulent, can be more indolic or greener and fresher when synthesized in the lab.
Enid's perfume bottle is pink and gold Murano glass.
Egyptian mummies incorporate numerous spices, resins, and other fragrant substances in their creation. Wednesday's perfume oil uses those along with leather, vanilla, and patchouli to convey the sense of age and death.
CINNAMOMUM CASSIA
It smells like cinnamon. (Actually, it tastes like cinnamon too.) It looks like cinnamon. Cinnamomum cassia even has cinnamon in its botanical name, and is known sometimes as ‘Chinese cinnamon’, or even ‘false cinnamon’. Both were among the most popular perfume ingredients of ancient times, referred to as far back as ancient Egyptian unguent recipes. (Although some scholars – and we’re really not qualified to argue – think that the cassia plant of old is inferior to the one still used today in teas, ointments and perfumery.) The twigs, buds and foliage of this 3-metre tree can be steam-distilled – but cassia is sometimes recreated synthetically, giving a potent and seriously spicy, almost earthy note that when handled with care lends itself especially well to Ambrées.
Cassia Perfumes
Cassia
Cinnamomum cassia; Other names: Chinese cinnamon, False Cinnamon
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: cinnamon-like, spicy, earthy, aromatic facets, coming from Cinnamomum aromaticum. Very concentrated, intense spice note.
Cumin: Reinventing Sensuality
The spicy olfactory family comprises a wide variety of spices, including warm spices like cinnamon and cloves, and cool spices such as cardamom and coriander. Cumin, however, is a unique spice due to its animal-like note, which imparts a sensual, strong, and persistent aroma to fragrance compositions. While the odor can sometimes resemble sweat, animal notes in perfumery are highly useful for their capacity to fix other components and enhance their scents. When used precisely and sparingly, cumin lends strength and character to fragrances, as evidenced in Le Mâle by Jean-Paul Gaultier. In this perfume, cumin features as a middle note, accompanied by cinnamon and enhanced by orange blossom, culminating in a very oriental and sensual fragrance.
Cumin Perfumes
Cumin
Cuminum cyminum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: a spice with an especially pungent, bitter-sour note that can resemble sweat. Polarizing, it can highlight a fragrance creation like no other and is nowadays often used to render an intimate, animalic note in abscence of animalics. Famously overdosed in Kingdom by Alexander McQueen.
anise
Pimpinella anisum
black licorice, anised, sweet, spicy, fresh, green
Note / top
Family / aromatic/herbal
Type / essential oil
Origin / Italy
Perfumer's Notes
Anise essential oil is produced from anise seeds, the same seed that gives licorice its distinctive scent. Anethole, the main component in the essential oil, is also found in fennel and star anise. Anise is a polarizing ingredient due to it's unique impact in a fragrance — most people love it or hate it. Use it to add an aromatic, spicy note to your fragrance.
Anise Perfumes
Anise
Pimpinella anisum;
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: the scent of aniseed, rich in anethol, reminiscent of licorice. Belongs in the same family of scents as tarragon and fennel (also rich in anethol). Very popular in fragrances, notably L'Heure Bleu.
Cedar in perfumery
Cedar is an important wood in perfumery. It is considered as a tutor by perfumers, as it is a note that gives vibration to the fragrance. It supports the whole olfactory pyramid, it can cross the perfume from the top notes to the base notes. It is a wood that is increasingly used in fragrances for women, along with vetiver, sandalwood and patchouli.
Cedar Perfumes
Cedar
Cedrus, family Pinaceae;
Group: WOODS AND MOSSES
Odor profile: An soft woody note coming from either the Atlas Mountains (Morocco) or the Virginia (US) cedarwood. There are also many cedar-smelling synthetics in use.
frankincense
Boswellia serrata
peppery, citrus, woody, balsamic, sweet-licorice tones
Note / base
Family / amber
Type / CO2 extract
Origin / India
Perfumer's Notes
Frankincense is a resinous material obtained from a Boswellia tree species. The most common use of frankincense (also called olibanum) is as an incense. In perfumery, frankincense is very versatile thanks to its peppery citrus top and woody balsamic base. Frankincense lends a lift to citrus and green fragrances, and brings softness to oriental blends.
Frankincense Perfumes
Olibanum (Frankincense)
Boswellia carterii (Burseraceae);
Group: RESINS AND BALSAMS
Odor profile: A fresh balsamic, somewhat green, woody and spicy fragrance with a fruity top note.
Leather
Fragrances can be ‘leathery’ – but it’s not really essence-of-leather in that bottle, as Andy Tauer explains below. It might be from birch tar (which has a leathery smokiness), or juniper, aldehydes or other synthetics, designed to give a skin-like scent. Patchouli, black tea and tobacco can also conjure up that old library/leather-jacket sensuality. Women’s chypres, and men’s fragrances, are most likely to have a leathery sensuality, but perfumers can take leather on all sorts of fragrant journeys: woody, aromatic, floral, even gourmand.
Leather Perfumes
Leather
Group: MUSK, AMBER, ANIMALIC SMELLS
Odor profile: Synthetic or naturally derived note of pungent characteristics, reminiscent of cured hides and leather goods. Usually rendered by birch tar or by synth isoquinolines.
Vanilla and vanillin in perfumery
The Aztecs used vanilla to flavour chocolate-based nectar. It is said to contain benefits for fighting fears and anxieties, it provides health and strength.
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Vanilla is one of the essential raw materials of the amber or oriental facet.
Vanilla Perfumes
Vanilla
Group: SPICES
Odor profile: An ever popular fragrance note, known mostly through its synthetic variant vanillin, which is sweet, cozy, comforting, with a pleasing cookie-baking feeling to it. Alongside amber, the reference note for the Oriental family of scents (The most famous classic being Shalimar). The real vanilla pod has darker facets that recall treacle and booze with off notes. Simple vanillas (Victoria's Secret Love to Dream, Charlie Touch, TBS Vanilla, Coty Vanilla Musk) have become increasingly popular with the adolescent market, giving rise to the umbiquity of the gourmand category of scents, while complex, earthier vanillas are appearing steadily in the niche sector (Spirituese Double Vanille by Guerlain, Tihota Indult, Montale Vanille Absolue).
Patchouli, the magic leaf
Origin of patchouli
The patchouli leaf or patchouly.
Botanical family: Pogostemon of the Lamiaceae family.
The name patchouli appeared at the beginning of the 19th century and is probably a combination of the terms patch (green) and ilai (leaves), or leaf (in English). It is also said to come from the Tamil paccilai meaning green leaf.
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Patchouli is the most widely used raw material in perfumery except for citrus. Patchouli is a plant that looks very much like a large shrub about one metre tall with leaves resembling those of the mint.
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Olfactory description of patchouli
There is only one botanical variety of patchouli but depending on the terroir the scent can be different.
Patchouli has a woody, earthy, humid, dark smell and evokes a colour between brown and black. A camphor note molecule is identified in it, it also has almost a dusty scent. Patchouli can be reminiscent of a cork or an overripe apple, some find it smells like mushrooms, cellars and mould.
Many perfumers have told me that they can detect a hint of cocoa in good quality patchouli.
Use of patchouli
Patchouli is the most important raw material in perfumery and is used in both men's and women's fragrances.
Patchouli has a woody note that combines beautifully with other woody notes, such as vetiver, sandalwood or cedar.
It brings depth and sensuality and is considered by some to be an aphrodisiac, especially when combined with sweet oriental notes such as incense, vanilla and cistus.
Patchouli can be refreshed by citrus fruits such as bergamot. It is often associated with rose, sometimes with jasmine, a little less with ylang-ylang. Patchouli is also a perfect match for gourmand notes.
Patchouli is a rather dark aromatic note that brings a lot of character, depth, but also brings out the freshness. It is a sublimator, rich, sensual and charismatic, often replacing mosses in chypre constructions and is essential in oriental compositions. It is always present in woody fragrances.
Patchouli Perfumes
Patchouli
Pogostemon Cablin;
Group: WOODS AND MOSSES
Odor profile: An exotic bush that grows mainly in India, the leaves of which produce the essential oil of patchouli. Sweet, dark, with an earthy, woody edge, it is very popular in many blends, especially the contemporary woody floral musks. There are also synthetics and fractal extractions.
Wednesday's perfume bottle of Mummy Spice is faceted black glass with a matching tassel.
Enid's perfume necklace from Wednesday is faceted onyx with moon-pearl beads on a gold chain.
Wolves communicate a lot with scent, and werewolves likely do the same, so wearing each other's perfume is pretty significant.
(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 06:51 am (UTC)COmmon honeysuckle, a climbing vine that can destroy trees and buildings, is technically a member of the jasmine family. I have always found the scent of honeysuckle, as one rides one's motorcyle down a road through the woods, both aphrodisiac and a bit euphoriant. It makes up for how miserable the end of summer gets :-(
Thoughts
Date: 2023-04-02 07:28 am (UTC)Yeah, it's natural tendency is earthy and damp. If you mix it with hot spices, though, it smells more dry and dusty.
>>COmmon honeysuckle, a climbing vine that can destroy trees and buildings, is technically a member of the jasmine family. I have always found the scent of honeysuckle, as one rides one's motorcyle down a road through the woods, both aphrodisiac and a bit euphoriant. It makes up for how miserable the end of summer gets :-(
Yeah, I like honeysuckle too. Gardenia is another example of a sweet, heavy smell.
(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 07:01 am (UTC)Yes ...
Date: 2023-04-02 07:26 am (UTC)Re: Yes ...
Date: 2023-04-02 10:53 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 04:34 pm (UTC)Jasmine is one of my favorite scents. I also have some frankincense somewhere. Or was it myrrh?
Also I like dragon's blood, the scent.
Thoughts
Date: 2023-04-02 05:56 pm (UTC)Yay! :D It's by far the leading ship in this fandom. I wrote this story so it can be read as slash, pre-slash, or platonic -- what matters is that they're getting attached to each other.
>> Jasmine is one of my favorite scents. <<
I like it, and other sweet heavy flowers like gardenia and plumeria.
>> I also have some frankincense somewhere. Or was it myrrh?<<
I have those singly and together in several different formats. Especially together, they have a very carrying fragrance, all the more so with resin on charcoal. That's convenient for outdoor events.
>> Also I like dragon's blood, the scent.<<
Got that one too. \o/
Re: Thoughts
Date: 2023-04-02 09:13 pm (UTC)Re: Thoughts
Date: 2023-04-03 12:50 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 08:43 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 09:11 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 09:14 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2023-04-02 08:42 pm (UTC)I love the smell of patchouli, I used to work in a doctors' office and I was using patchouli soap at the time and since I always took a shower in the morning right before I went to work, I smelled very intensely of patchouli and it drove my boss nuts.