Orange Flower

The experience of walking through the white floral wafts in an orange orchard is an olfactory delight, with a lighter, crisper citrus scent in the air. This, while the flower up-close smells deeper, more pollen-rich and comparatively… more herbaceous.

What if you could take a blossom of bitter orange and capture both that smell you feast on when holding the petal to your nose and the scent that starts to tickle your senses as you walk through an orchard in bloom?

You can actually capture different scents from the blossoms of the bitter orange tree—through distillation (an essential oil), or as a solvent extract (an absolute). The result is that you get to smell the same blossom from different angles that reveal unique nuances dormant in the same flower. That’s how you get two unique scents from the same tree (orange blossom and neroli.)

Orange blossom is truer to the scent of the flower smelled up close. But people forget the flower itself is only one dimension in the floral landscape.

I composed this unique fusion of orange blossoms to capture both its floral beauty as well as its delectable sweetness. Naturally, the fusion includes both absolutes and essential oils.

Absolutes are more viscous, with umami that’s absent in the essential oil, which generally means it’ll last longer on your skin and boasts a longer drydown. (This is also why, as a stronger fixative, it’s preferred as a perfume ingredient.)

You’ll smell a more indolic tone in orange blossoms that’s more sultry and, dare I say it… edible… than in neroli, where you indulge in a scent that’s pristine, fresh, and crisper on the citrus scale.

Like with other precious florals, it takes a truckload of flowers to extract only a tiny amount of absolute. Despite the cost and rarity, perfumers fall over themselves to obtain orange blossom. It’s the cornerstone of many legendary perfumes, as the zesty aroma gives it undeniable appeal.

Many essential oils have all sorts of aromatherapeutic benefits, but few are so pleasant to use as bitter orange. Add a drop or two in a warm bath, on a cotton ball, wet towel, cream lotion, or to a diffuser, and expect to be dazzled by the bitter-citrus fusion with that floral freshness that lets you forget you had a headache to begin with.

While you usually have to choose between citrus and floral, Orange Flower s lets you smell a scent where citrus meets floral in a fragrance that’s at once delicious and beautiful; energizing and pristine.

In fact, it’s so citrus-floral you might be startled to smell a subtle note of jasmine underneath a blanket of green akin to petitgrain, all awash under a blooming orange flower chord. But science has got your back…… that jasmine note is actually there, just like some typical citrus notes are not, which is what allows for the stunning fresh/pretty dance to take the stage.

The drydown is delectably raw cane sugar sweet. Like a fusion of the delicate white floral tones of neroli to the wholesome, almost earthy tenacity of clementine peel…… relish it all with a fat swipe on the top of your hand.

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