Homemade Perfume

Miss_Penny_Pincher_2

I just bought some Tisserand rose pure essential oil on ebay to use in the bath. It arrived today and it smells so lovely I thought it would be nice to use it to make my own homemade budget perfume! Does anybody have any tips? Is this plausible?

Any suggestions welcome

rainbowsox

Yes, it is plausible - perfume at its simplest can be made from a combination of essential oils, water and alcohol - For perfume you need 15 - 30% essential oil, plus 90 - 95% alcohol (the purer the better, but i haven't been able to buy pharmaceutical alcohol in this country, so vodka does as well, the higher the proof the better (and if the perfume fails, a shot of vodka and coke works wonders!!!), plus some distilled water (which you can get from independent chemists) - it's best to experiment with the various percentages to get the fragrance which suits you...- if you use just essential oil and vodka then the fragrance evaporates too fast, so you need the water too. i found Valerie Ann Worwood's book "The Fragrant Pharmacy" really helpful - you can blend essential oils to make a "therapeutic" fragrance just for you...tbh I wouldn't buy Tisserand just for perfume...there are cheaper sources of essential oils for fragrance, the Tisserand stuff is really lovely and best for therapeutic use IMHO.
HTH and enjoy your lovely rose oil...

anguk

When I saw this thread was started by Miss Penny Pincher I thought it was PPs daughter making perfume from rose petals and water the way we used to when we were kids! :rotfl:

Faith_2

So did I! And then I looked at the time, it was 10 pm and I thought PP would have her DD safely tucked up in bed by that time, not surfing MSE!

Churchmouse

anguk wrote:

When I saw this thread was started by Miss Penny Pincher I thought it was PPs daughter making perfume from rose petals and water the way we used to when we were kids! :rotfl:

You've just transported me back years!!!! Hot summer days and a gloopy mess of soggy rose petals in mud-coloured water !:rotfl: Ours never smelt like we imagined it would, but oh the fun of trying!:D

lara1983

Lol! Exactly what I thought. It took me back! The petals always looked lovely until you smushed them up into a big brown mess, then tried to get your mum to put some on!
I imagine it's not so hard to make perfume, and if you'd seen the ugly chemicals and vats of toxic stuff that go into perfume before it's put into pretty bottles you wouldn't be so keen to pay!

nuttyrockeress

Have to say it bought a huge smile on my face on this wet and miserable day!

Grandma had no roses left by the time my cousin and I had finnished!

Sharra

You could try diluting the essential oil in sweet almond oil (as for a massage) and dabbing that on. I think its 1 drop per ml of oil.
Also I second, the Fragrant Pharmacy is a nrilliant book - mines falling apart now

I remember making that perfume from soggy petals too - I once had the bright idea of adding green food colouring to it to 'improve' the colour - then I tried to sell it to my family....

mamaoba

to make a solid purfume, melt a little beeswax, the same amount of almond oil, and then mix a few drops of essential oil into it as it cools. pour into cleaned lip balm pots. (Sterilse the pots 1st ideally).

...it lasts a good 6 months (mine gets used up by then lol!), but if you wanted to make it last a bit longer you could add a little bit of grapeseed extract to the mix.

To use just rub a little behind your ears -the wax melts and the fragrance is released.

I have excema so can;t use alcohol based perfumes. As this contains no alcohol it's far less irritating. I also like the fact it can't spill in my handbag.

melancholly

mamaoba wrote:

to make a solid purfume, melt a little beeswax, the same amount of almond oil, and then mix a few drops of essential oil into it as it cools. pour into cleaned lip balm pots. (Sterilse the pots 1st ideally).

...it lasts a good 6 months (mine gets used up by then lol!), but if you wanted to make it last a bit longer you could add a little bit of grapeseed extract to the mix.

To use just rub a little behind your ears -the wax melts and the fragrance is released.

I have excema so can;t use alcohol based perfumes. As this contains no alcohol it's far less irritating. I also like the fact it can't spill in my handbag.

i was actually looking around this weekend for no-alcohol versions of perfume - i know i bought one 5 years ago but now it's run out and i couldn't find anything. now i can go make exactly what i want!!

i'm quite daunted by the prospect of picking all the essential oils myself.... I know it's the kind of thing that OH will do his best to avoid giving an opinion on (often by physically running away :rotfl:)! if anyone has any real ideas/suggestions of what combinations work, i'd be really interested to hear them!

mamaoba

OK the condensed results of my perfume making experiments over the years:-

rose is lovely as it's such a classic scent and fairly non-irritating , rose geranium is a much cheaper alternative for those who like florals. Pure rose or rose geranium always smells really expensive for those times when you are looking to impress

Frankinsense adds incredible notes to any perfume making it go from a cheapo scent to out of this world - it's incredibly expensive tho but you literally need just 1 or 2 drops to make all the difference. It's a great mood enhancer too for anyone prone to feeling a bit down. I'd include it in anything I made for anyone with PND.

I love lavender for the laundry but have gone off it for perfume after having to make a batch too many lavender bathbombs at Xmas over the years (i sell a few to friends) - it bores me to tears now.

my all time fave is vanilla and cinnamon (go easy on the cinamon as it's a really strong scent that can overwhelm the vanilla - add 1 part cinnamon to 5 parts vanilla). It's a lovely "warm scent" and makes a lovely every day pick me up.

lemon is nice mixed with other stuff as it gives a nice "tang" that prevents sweeter smells getting to cloying. I find it a little irritating tho. But I do have extremly sensitive skin. lemon and ylang ylang with mandarin was a lovely combi I tried once.

sweet orange is the cheapest oil so might be worth trying just to get the hang of making it - also quite nice at this time of year. It's not my fave though as it smells like the cheap bodyshop perfumes and I wanna be a "classy bird"

I'm no expert the above is just my personal observations, scent is such a personal thing that other people may violently disagree with me. I use essential oils wherever possible as opposed to fragrance oils as I have v, sensitive skin and always do a 48 hour patch test on my inner elbow (easily hidden if there's a reaction) before trying on my neck (not so easy to hide an angry rash if you have a reaction).