Learning a new language is what stepping into the world of fragrance feels like. Whether talking about ‘top notes’ or ‘sillage’ there’s an exciting, whole vocabulary of terms that can be used to describe the tiniest nuances of fragrance. No matter if you’re diving into the joyous realm of essential oils or are just looking to find your olfactory match, getting familiar with fragrance language can make this exploration a little less confusing.
Check out this fun and educational guide where I break down basic fragrance terms and teach you about the lingo you need to know in perfume. It’s time to expand your scent vocabulary so let’s get ready to use these terms like a pro!
1. Top Notes
Top notes give you that initial burst of scent you get from a fragrance when you first spritz on a fragrance. These are the first qualifiers of the fragrance: usually light, fresh, and volatile. These evaporate, but quickly, and are essential in terms of making an immediate impact. HBNO’s Lemon Essential Oil or Orange Essential Oil, both of which have great zesty and energizing top notes!
Their top note is to draw you in. It’s designed to help you get a fresh start but will fade away after the first 15 minutes to an hour. Once that’s done, you’re in for the middle (or heart) notes.
2. Middle Notes (Heart Notes)
In general, once the top notes begin to dissipate, the middle or heart note is what takes center stage. The core of the fragrance is these notes and they are usually floral, fruity, or herbal. And they give the fragrance its depth and its complexity.
Ylang Ylang Essential Oil would be a classic example of a heart note — sweet and exotic. Top notes tend to fade sooner than other notes, exhaustion happening a few hours after application; however, middle notes remain longer, lingering perhaps for several hours.
3. Base Notes
The base notes are always the foundation of any fragrance. The heaviest, lingering scents in a perfume, are needed to extract a perfume’s longevity. Notes can be rarer and more complex than top and middle notes and may contain woody, musky, spicy, or other elements. Cedarwood Essential Oil or Frankincense Essential Oil are base note essential oils, that are warm and grounding.
Base notes do take time to bloom, sometimes hours after you apply your fragrance—but they’ll stick with you the longest.
4. Sillage
Sillage is the S ear of the conscious that a given fragrance leaves as you walk. It’s a French word, really meaning ‘wake,’ that’s the scent trail a ship leaves. A slightly longer-lasting fragrance means it will leave a good sillage (the trail that people catch the scent of) in the air around you, but a subtle impression only on whoever comes past you.
Sillage is affected by the concentration of the fragrance, which leads us to an important concept: fragrance concentration.
5. Fragrance Concentration
So idea is how much perfume oil is put in alcohol and water and what is fragrance concentration? The more fragrance the higher the concentration, the stronger and longer lasting fragrance. Depending on concentration, eau de toilette (lighter) to parfum (stronger).
Say, if you’re in the market for a heavy long-lasting scent, then you better go for a high concentration of essential oils fragrance just as HBNO Frankincense Fragrance Oil is since it gives you a beautiful deep aroma. An eau de toilette however is more delicate and lighter and is perfect for daytime wear.
6. Notes
In the world of fragrance they call notes the different scents that are added to create the overall fragrance composition. These notes are categorized as top, middle, and base notes (as you have read above described), that eventually unify to produce a harmonious whole. Every note, however, plays a crucial part in defining the personality of the fragrance.
The types of notes tend to be important when you explore fragrances. So, imagine Peppermint Essential Oil for tops, Jasmine in the heart, and Cedarwood in the heart, resulting in a fresh, floral, and grounding experience.
7. Accords
Harmony is a bunch of several other notes combined to generate a new and dazzling fragrance. You can call it the backbone of any fragrance and it’s something of a primary character of a scent. Something like that, I want to take lemon, lime, or orange, and blend into it a citrus accord, being zesty and refreshing.
Accords can, almost by definition, inform the overall personality of a fragrance. For instance, if you have HBNO’s Citrus Essential Oil Collection, including Lemon and Orange oils, you could create an energetic, bright, uplifting citrus accord to support you on an energetic day.
8. Olfactory Family
The general character of scent is determined by the fragrances into which they are placed: olfactory families. The flowers are the main families, including floral, citrus, woody, oriental, and fresh. Different variations may exist within each family, and understanding those makes choosing fragrances that suit you a little easier.
Assuming that you’re a big floral scent person, you’d lean towards fragrances with notes like Roman Chamomile Essential or Jasmine. If you prefer a woody aroma choose a fragrance with notes of Cedarwood or Pine Needle Essential Oil.
9. Longevity
Durability is how long a scent will reside on your skin once you’ve put it on. Your fragrance concentration, ingredients used, and your skin type are all variables that can alter just how potent your fragrance is. Essential oils tend to naturally have varying longevity: some oils are better than others.
Because of this, we have Cedarwood Essential Oil and Sandalwood that will last a long time, while some of the lighter oils such as citrus oils may fade quickly.
10. Fixative
Some ingredients in fragrances help extend the scent’s life on your skin, these are known as fixatives. It helps the more volatile notes stay in play just a little bit longer and helps the depth and longevity of the fragrance. There are natural and synthetic fixatives and many are of plant resins, such as Frankincense Essential Oil.
By introducing fixatives, the perfumer can make sure that your fragrance doesn’t smell out quickly.
11. Chypre
The Chypre fragrance classification is typically defined as oak moss, bergamot, and patchouli. A complex, sometimes complex fragrance family, that’s earthy, woody (or woodsy) and can be floral or not. When it comes to a rich, layered scent, you’re more likely to seek out chypre notes — a mix of fresh, earthy, and floral notes.
12. Fruity Notes
The fruity note is anything that brings you the scent of fresh, sweet, or tangy fruits. Some are sharper than a lump of lemon or lime, others have juicy, sugary mincemeat of mango or cherry. These scents work great in creating a bright, youthful scent profile and it works well for daytime or warmer months.
Conclusion: Embrace Fragrance Terminology with HBNO
Learning your way around fragrance terminology unlocks a whole wealth of scent possibilities. Think about when you’re looking to dive into the complexities of notes and accords or knowing how to decipher fragrance concentration, having the right scent vocabulary can be an exciting thing if you’re deciding what perfume to try next.
Here at HBNO, we provide you with a huge selection of essential oils and scents to explore and experiment with such as Frankincense, Tea Tree, and Cedarwood Essential and Fragrance Oils. Learning the terminology gets you not only choosing the more suited scents but also opens you to the art of fragrance in a better way.
