Natural Perfume vs Synthesis: The Duel, Myths, and Reality of Chemistry

Synthetic Products: Two Distinct Categories

There are 2 types of synthetic raw materials:

• Those obtained solely by chemical reactions: esters, aldehydes, lactones, macrocyclic musks like some white musks, methylionones for violet notes, etc.
• Isolates coming from natural products, like indole found in jasmine, geraniol in rose or geranium, linalool and linalyl acetate in lavender and bergamot, certain musks found in animal musk. Many synthetic raw materials are constituents of natural products.

What Does Synthesis Bring to Perfumery?

1. It brings creativity

Synthesis brings original notes to the perfume, like aldehydes or marine notes for example. They therefore enrich the perfumer’s palette and give abstraction to the perfume. There are about 3000 synthetic products.

Synthesis presents real advantages: synthetic products can be obtained at any time in the quantities desired. It allows the perfumer to reproduce fragrant floral notes too fragile to be distilled, especially flowers that do not yield their soul like lily of the valley, lilac, freesia, lily, honeysuckle, gardenia, wisteria, peony, violet flower, etc.

They also allow reproducing the smell of fruits whose essence is impossible to extract like strawberry (C16), peach (C14), coconut (C18), plum, raspberry (frambinone), etc., with a few exceptions.

2. It improves tenacity

It brings power and sillage to the perfume.

3. It sublimates natural notes

For example, to enhance a natural vanilla with a gourmand effect evoking a pastry, an ingredient like ethyl-maltol which smells like caramel will be added. Thanks to research and advances in chemistry, we manage to design ingredients that immediately have an extraordinary power of evocation.

Perfumers are increasingly in search of “naturalness” that paradoxically some naturals cannot offer them. A note of hedione will better sublimate the rose and bring more naturalness (freshness of the morning dew) than bergamot or lemon.

Synthetic Molecules Highly Appreciated Currently

• White musks, which give “comforting” notes, “cashmere” notes, “baby” notes.
• Addictive, powerful, diffusive notes like cashmeran or ambroxan.
• Sweet notes like caramel: ethyl-maltol.
• Nervous ambery woody notes that appeal to men. Like limbanol or cedramber or ambrocenide, karanal or Z11.
• Real “oud” notes are rarely natural (very expensive) often replaced by a blend with natural and synthesis.

Preconceived Ideas and Masterpieces Born from Synthesis

However, some preconceived ideas die hard, like the one that a quality fragrance must only be natural. Without synthetic ingredients, modern perfumery would not exist.

• Without aldehydes, Chanel N°5 would never have seen the light of day.
• Without coumarin, vanillin, and linalool, the first modern perfume Jicky by Guerlain would never have existed.
• Without ethylvanillin, Shalimar by Guerlain would not have offered such a memorable sillage.
• Dior’s Eau Sauvage without hedione (extremely transparent floral and jasmine note) neither.
• Acqua Di Gió without calone (which reproduces the smell of the sea and iodine).
• Mitsouko by Guerlain would not be as perfect without the fruity peach fruity note (aldehyde C14) used for the first time in this fragrance.

Some Commonly Used Synthetic Products

• Alpha Damascone: with an apple-cider smell, used in Nahema by Guerlain and Jardins de Bagatelle by Guerlain.
• Ethyl-maltol, Maltol: molecules with a sweet smell, caramel, used in Angel by Thierry Mugler or in La Vie Est Belle by Lancôme, La Petite Robe Noire Intense by Guerlain.
• Dihydromyrcenol: fresh citrus note, modern. Ex: CK One by Calvin Klein, Cool Water by Davidoff.
• Heliotropin: smell of white glue, almond. Ex: L’Heure Bleue by Guerlain, Après l’Ondée by Guerlain.
• Galaxolide: powdery musk, fruity blackberry, clean. Ex: White Musk by The Body Shop.
• Cis 3 hexenol: smell of cut grass. Ex: Herba Fresca by Guerlain.

Objections on Synthesis and Price

We often hear these comments: “A good perfume is a perfume that contains only natural ingredients.” or “new fragrances are all synthetic!” Synthesis should not be considered negative, even if nature possesses real added value.

We also hear, “synthesis is cheaper”. Irone is a synthetic molecule that exists in iris and it costs around €2000 per kilo. A “luxury” molecule with a powdery scent (white musk) costs around €600, whereas a natural essence of lavender costs €150 per kilo, that of neroli, €3000 and an essence of orange only €10.

You should know that it sometimes takes several years of research using very sophisticated techniques to succeed in discovering certain odorant molecules interesting for perfumers and which can then be produced on a large scale.

The Natural: The Soul Supplement

There are about 1000 natural materials. Natural is subject to climatic conditions or other catastrophes: harvests can suffer shortages, for example: during the great earthquake in Iran, the entire Galbanum harvest was wiped out.

Every year, new natural raw materials are discovered or rediscovered:

• Classics revisited like clear patchouli or patchouli heart: a patchouli stripped of earthy and old-fashioned notes.
• Recently beautiful natural fruity notes are available: an apple pear ester and certain isolates etc.
• Many new natural products have allowed creative perfumers to move forward with unprecedented accords, for example blackcurrant bud (1970) used for the first time in Chamade by Guerlain.
• Canadian pine needle absolute, Seaweed absolute, Eucalyptus absolute etc.

Why Natural is Unique

It would be false to say that natural products can be replaced by synthetic products knowing that, for example, a natural rose can contain up to 700 molecules, therefore irreplaceable by synthesis or by an accord. However, when nature does not allow the distillation of certain flowers, the perfumer is capable of recreating certain notes, ex: lily of the valley, mock orange, lilac, gardenia.

Natural gives a soul supplement to the perfume! It lives with the skin, it creates a unique alchemy, it possesses vibrations. It evolves! We could say that: “It is the woman or the man who enhances their perfume”. The same perfume on different skins is sometimes unrecognizable, or conversely sublimated, exquisite!

However, natural is less stable than the synthetic product. Depending on the climate, the soil, the treatment of the raw material, the quality can be different from one year to the next, hence the creation of communelles (blends).

Note that a baby perfume contains very few natural products (for a baby’s skin, let’s avoid allergies due to natural essences, and moreover “sensitive” synthetic materials are also avoided).

A 100% natural perfume is difficult to work with and sometimes struggles to hold and diffuse. Some are successful but others can smell like pharmacopoeia or be harsh. It will also be very expensive when it is truly 100% natural.

Sometimes a perfumer will favor in a formula, synthetic products more “modern” than “natural essential oils” which can sometimes seem “old-fashioned”.

The History of Synthetic Products: Chronology

• 1833/34: Dumas and Peligot isolate cinnamic aldehyde from cinnamon essence.
• 1844: Cahours finds in anise essence, its main constituent: anethole.
• 1868: The English chemist: William Henry Perkin synthesizes the odorant principle of tonka bean: coumarin.
• 1882: Coumarin is used for the first time in Fougère Royale created for Houbigant.
• 1869: Discovery of heliotropin used in Après l’Ondée, which also contains the molecule of anisic aldehyde discovered in 1887.
• 1874: Chemists Tiemann and Reimer manufacture vanillin industrially.
• 1880: Discovery of leather notes which are present in Russian Leathers: quinolines, do not forget that there were several Russian Leathers, that of Chanel, of Guerlain and many others.
• 1888: Chemist Baur creates an artificial musk much less expensive than tonkin musk (the latter is now banned).
• 1889: Jicky Guerlain uses in many natural products (which give a unique alchemy with the skin), the first synthetic products: coumarin, vanillin, and linalool to boost real vanilla, and tonka bean.
• In the 1900s: Moureu and Delange discover Octine and Methyl Heptine Carbonate, with a violet note (leaves).
• 1903: Blaize and Darzens participate in the creation of aldehydes.
• 1905: The Dupont company will have renowned manufactures such as ionones, methylionone, as well as alpha amylcinnamic aldehyde, acetivenol.
• 1908: Creation of hydroxycitronellal starting from citronella essence etc. At this date, creation of the peach note (C14) which will be used for the first time in Mitsouko.
• 1962: Great discoveries like hedione (Firmenich) (isolated from jasmine) allowed the creation of the sublime perfume: Eau Sauvage by Dior.
• 1963: Sandalore added to natural sandalwood allowed the creation of Samsara by Guerlain. Ethyl maltol was created in 1963: famous caramel note used for the first time in Angel by Mugler.
• 1966: Calone, the marine note used for the first time in the perfume New West Aramis.
• 1970: Damascones (isolated from the rose) (Firmenich) were used for the first time brilliantly for the creation of Nahéma and Jardins de Bagatelle.
• 1973: The creation of a very used molecule: iso e super very soft woody note.
• 1990: Helvetolide: a powdery musk.

Creativity and discovery: every year new synthetic molecules appear as well as novelties in naturals.

Conclusion

A perfumer constitutes their organ with about 1000 products in total, which they choose according to their affinities from a choice of natural and synthesis of 4000/5000.

Synthetic products have brought to perfumery notes that have enriched the perfumer’s organ: the violet note, the lilac note, lily, lily of the valley, fruits that cannot be obtained naturally. All these discoveries contribute to the development, renewal, and enrichment of creation in perfumery.

A perfume containing a lot of synthetic products would be more linear and more stable on many supports: strips, fabrics, skin etc., it will also be more tenacious and will have more sillage.

A perfume containing more natural products than synthetic products will evolve according to each skin, and will sometimes be unrecognizable, this kind of perfume possesses different vibrations. It will have a soul supplement.

So the ideal is to have in a fragrance natural products in large proportion and synthetic products which will be more products that will come as complements.

The most important thing beyond all this natural/synthesis debate: to have a beautiful perfume, you need at the origin a strong creative idea, a beautiful olfactory aesthetic, an orchestration well mastered by a talented perfumer.