ON THE NOSE Natasha Koifman created her own fragrance, Twentysix (left), named after the scent’s 26 components. Zoologist’s Macaque (right) combines notes of cedar, rosewood and jasmine tea.
Despite the fact that it's invisible, a fragrance is probably more personal than anything else in your wardrobe. Every body's chemistry reacts in its own way to a perfume's various oils and compounds, and the scents you choose take on a dimension that's unique to you. Since each individual fragrance smells slightly different on each wearer, it can be difficult to find that Goldilocks scent, one that's just right. As a result, your perfect fragrance might actually be not one, but a layered combination of several.
"I couldn't ever find the fragrance I actually wanted," says Natasha Koifman, founder of Toronto PR agency NKPR. "I like the combination of musk and floral and struggled to find a scent that encompassed both with the right balance." Koifman experimented with her existing collection of perfumes, but it was only after receiving a gift set of Tom Ford Private Blend oils, and layering different combinations in varying amounts, that she was able to develop her elusive perfect scent.
Keen to create your own signature bouquet? Victor Wong, creator of Toronto-based Zoologist perfumes, recommends using less complex scents at the start. This helps to avoid creating the olfactory equivalent of muddy paint. Zoologist's scents range from Macaque, with notes of cedar, rosewood and jasmine tea, to Rhinoceros, which has a heady hit of top notes including rum, bergamot and sage. Wong advises at-home perfumers to "choose two scents that belong to the same genre such as rosy orientals, or simple 'freshies' like citrus and light florals." Because the nose quickly becomes accustomed to new aromas, Wong suggests testing combinations on a T-shirt or towel, leaving the room for 15 minutes, then returning to whiff the results.
While Koifman's adventures in layering led her to bottle her signature scent, Twentysix (so-called for its 26 components including peony, patchouli, grapefruit and Bulgarian rose), and donate its proceeds to Artists for Peace and Justice, novice layerers need remember only one simple rule: "You don't want to overdo it!" she says. "No one will want to stand beside you if the scent is too strong." Indeed, layered or not, when it comes to fragrance, less is always more.