Click to enlarge image Contents of PerfumersWorld Foundation Course kit.

When you order the PerfumersWorld Foundation Course you receive a password and link to your online lessons. By mail you receive the Perfumery Training Kit K26, which gives you all the materials you need to begin your study of the art and science of perfume creation, including all of the materials required to create your first perfumes.

The PerfumersWorld Perfumery Training Kit K26 includes all of the following:

• 25 concentrated perfume bases, each in its individual, dropper-type bottle with 10 grams of the base. Each of these "Fleuressence^®" bases was developed by perfumer Stephen V. Dowthwaite to illustrate one of the 25 odor groups, "A" through "Y," taught in his "ABC's of Perfumery" perfumery training method.

• One 100 cc aluminum can of "Zolvent," a non-alcoholic, cosmetic grade carrier oil. Zolvent represents the "Z" in The ABC's of Perfumery.

• Two packages of professional perfume smelling strips (50 in each pack.) These are what you will use to sample your fragrances as you create them, adjust them, and demonstrate them to others.

• Five perfume mixing pots with covers. These small mixing pots are the perfect size for creating fragrances from dropper bottles, as taught in the ABC's of Perfumery.

• Two perfume bottles, for your finished creations.

• Additional mixing supplies and accessories, including one package of mini smelling strips (that work perfectly with the mixing pots supplied with the kit!), one package of toothpicks (you'll need them right away), extra dropper tops for the bottles holding your bases (you may never need them but, if one of your tops gets contaminated, this gives you a way to recover from a potential disaster!)

• A short introduction to the ABC's of Perfumery, the 56 page book that comes with the kit and gets you started creating perfume immediately, using The ABC's of Perfumery training method.

• The Perfumers Workbook, perfume creation software on a CD that works on any (windows) personal computer. With a database of over 500 perfumery materials (most of them affordable and available from PerfumersWorld), The Perfumers Workbook also comes with simple formulas installed to help you understand the structure of various perfume types.

"The ABC's of Perfumery"

The ABC's of Perfumery is a perfumery training system, developed by PerfumersWorld, in which each letter of the alphabet represents one of 25 odor groups. "A" stands for "Ali-fat-ic" (think of perfumes such as Chanel No.5), "C" stands for "Citrus" (perfumes such as Davidoff's Cool Water), "F" stands for "Fruit" (like Dior's Poison), "J" for "Jasmine" (like Lanvin's Arpege or Patou's Joy), "Q" for "Queen of the Orient" ("Orientals", such as Guerlain's Shalimar, YSL's Opium or Calvin Klein's Obsession) ... and so on, A through Z. ("Z" stands for "Zolvent", a non-alcoholic, cosmetic grade, carrier oil that can be used in place of alcohol.)

To illustrate both the typical aroma of each group and its use in perfume composition, Stephen V. Dowthwaite, perfumer-educator, created a concentrated perfume base for each of these 26 odor groups, A through Z. The student can learn to identify and classify odors by comparing their aroma to that of each of these 26 bases, seeking the closest match. By this matching process, the student also learns that many scented materials, be they flowers from a garden or candles from the mall, have aromas that match more than one of the 26 odor groups! The student is then challenged to mentally determine the percentages of each of these odor groups that make up the material being smelled, i.e., "Green, 80 percent; citrus, 10 percent; rose, 10 percent".

But the PerfumersWorld bases — marketed under the trademark Fleuressence^® — are also used directly in perfume creation. By mixing different combinations of these bases, a wide range of fragrances can be created.

Using the methods and sample formulas of The ABC's of Perfumery, the student perfumer can, in a relatively short time, learn to translate his or her verbal or visual conception of a perfume and its imagined aroma into a physical creation — the fragrance compound (called "juice" in the trade) — to which alcohol (or Zolvent) can be added to make a fine perfume or cologne. Your new fragrance compound can also be used to scent products such as candles, air fresheners or soap.

The creation power of just 26 Fleuressence^® bases

In no way does The ABC'S of Perfumery training method suggest that you limit yourself in perfume creation to using only the 26 Fleuressence^® bases included with your Perfumery Training Kit K26. In fact, you are encouraged to learn new aroma materials and use them. The Perfumers Workbook software will make suggestions to you as to what additional aroma materials you might want to add to a particular composition. But, by using these 26 bases, A to Z, as your starting point, you can begin to develop credible fragrances of your own far faster than many perfumery trainees inside the top fragrance houses!

Bases have always been an important tool for professional perfumers. Some of the greatest of the great were largely self educated in perfumery and, when offered bases that would help them in achieving a particular fragrance goal, they jumped on them, overlaying these bases with "prime" materials, just as you can expect to be doing as your skills develop.

But what about the 26 Fleuressence^® bases that come with Perfumery Training Kit K26? How far can you go in perfume creation with these 26 bottles alone? The answer is that you can go farther than you now dream could be possible. Using these 26 Fleuressence^® bases alone — once you get up to speed on their characteristics— you can create masterpieces ... fragrances so beautiful that no one but yourself would ever guess that you were working with just 26 materials!

I like to think that working with just the 26 bases, A to Z, is like Shakespeare writing sonnets. A sonnet has exactly 14 lines of a particular structure, which might seem very limiting. Yet for Shakespeare those 14 lines offered unlimited creative opportunity. Likewise, working with just 26 bases, A to Z, offers unlimited opportunities for you, the creative perfumer!

At present, my own most successful perfume (see below) is one which I created entirely from the bases I received with my own Perfumery Training Kit K26, with the exception of a very, very small amount of another aroma material suggested by The Perfumers Workbook software.

Restocking and adding new perfumery materials

You can go a long way in your perfumery training using just the supplies you receive with Perfumery Training Kit K26. But at some point you are likely to need resupplies of the bases that you find yourself using the most — as well as new aroma materials you may want to try with your compositions. (The Perfumers Workbook will make recommendations for you!)

These materials are available from PerfumersWorld, in quantities as small as 10 grams (an excellent choice if you want to sample a new aroma material to see what it smells like!) or up to as large a quantity as you may need. Links are provided with the email you will receive with your password and starting link for the course.

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You can start making perfume within an hour after you have received your kit.

Philip Goutell
Lightyears, Inc.

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