As soon as a smell comes along we are covering it up. Whether it comes from the body, the neighbourhood, we cover it up. We clean the floor with products that smell of granny smiths. We don’t have the chance to discover our own body smell. I think you should find out first, before you decide to cover it up. I think certain smells are there for a purpose, for the information they gave you.
— Sissel Tolaas talks to Tony Marcus; read more at the Aesop Register.
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Wow, fascinating article! Her long list of credential, degrees, etc, is quite intimidating. I wasn’t sure quite what the ‘commercial perfumes’ she was looking down on were though: did she mean any perfume that people pay money for? Or did she mean perfumes created by the big companies?
Its ironic that she is sponsored by exactly the kind of company which she is so fundamentally against! (Although, admittedly, irony does not always have very far reaching implications; often its just the way we are forced to compromise with the world we live in.)
Well, she is in fact funded by one of the big fragrance & flavor companies, yes! And I don’t see who would pay for what she does otherwise, or, perhaps more importantly, give her access to the aromachemicals she needs. But yes, it’s ironic.
I didn’t really mean it as a criticism at all!
Oh, that’s ok! It really is ironic. It’s the same boat many of the “professional” perfume critics are in. Without funding from the fragrance companies, your options are limited.
Oh, my, this is a woman after my own heart! Although, I do love perfumes and scented commercial products, my very favorite pastime is to spend time in the ‘real world’ sniffing and identifying! Something which is becoming more difficult as the natural world is pushed away by development and ‘civilization.’
Her comment about IFF is the best validation of something I have suspected for a while — that our taste buds and noses are being manipulated to motivate us to buy products, and possibly, change our attitudes and manipulate us in other ways. Example — the ‘new car smell’ you can buy to make your used car a more attractive purchase!
Now I am suspecting something truly nefarious about the restrictions on oakmoss!
Off to google her name and find out more!
She’s really interesting, I love to read about her work. If you click on the Sissel Tolaas tag above, you’ll find some of our past posts about her, and absolutely a google search will turn up all kinds of fun as well.