Rose as A Symbol and Perfume Material
Raw Materials

by Matvey Yudov
03/19/22 01:03:46 ( 16 comments )

The title "The Name of the Rose" arose almost by accident and suited me because the rose as a symbolic figure is so full of meanings that it has almost no meaning: the rose is mystical and the tender rose lived no longer than the rose; the war of the Red and White Roses; Rose is a rose is a rose is a rose; Rosicrucians; a rose by any other name would smell as sweet; rosa fresca aulentissima. The title, as intended, confuses the reader.

Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose

The theme of roses is inexhaustible, including in perfumery. Once I tried to walk you through the substances that form the smell of roses in nature, and some of the synthetic materials that are now available to perfumers. It is clear that any attempt to delve into the details claims, if not for a plump monograph, then at least for a lengthy article.

With all the variety of roses growing on earth - and there are tens of thousands of different varieties - roses that are important for perfume making can be counted on the fingers of one hand. The Damask Rose would be the main one, its official name in Latin is Rosa × damascena.

There are several stories of how the Damask rose came from Damascus to Europe. According to one of them, the French crusader Robert de Brie, who participated in the siege of Damascus in 1148 during the second crusade, brought the rose from the capital of Syria. According to other sources, ancient Romans brought it to their colonies in England, and according to the third legend, the doctor of King Henry VIII presented the king with one rose plant around 1540.

For a long time, scientists assumed that the Damask rose is a hybrid of the French rosehip (Rosa gallica) and the dog rose (Rosa canina), spontaneously formed in antiquity and subsequently cultivated. The modern point of view was voiced in a joint work of Japanese and Californian scientists, published in 2000. Analysis of polymorphic DNA with random amplification showed that the Damascus varieties studied by scientists (they took four varieties considered the oldest) have an identical profile, which indicates their origin from the same ancestor. As the parent species of the initial hybridization, scientists have established three: Rosa moschata (musk rosehip), Rosa gallica (French rosehip) and Rosa fedschenkoana (Fedchenko rosehip, originally from the Tien Shan and Pamir-Altai).

As a primary raw material for perfumery needs, the Damask rose is grown in Turkey (mainly in the region of Burdur and Isparta), in Iran, in Bulgaria (I already mentioned that some botanists distinguish the Kazanlak rose as a separate species - after several centuries of selection, it differs significantly), in India, France, to a lesser extent - in Morocco, Tunisia, and some other countries in the Middle East (the Taif rose, which often appears in the descriptions of fragrances, is also Damascena, most likely this rose was brought from the Balkans by Turks, who occupied this territory in the XIV century), Moldova, China, Afghanistan, Chile.

Of course, depending on its origin, Damask rose absolute has different nuances, this fact is well known to perfumers. The Bulgarian rose is perhaps the freshest, "watery", rich in green nuances, the rose from Morocco is the most floral and sweet, the Turkish rose is the spiciest, with animalic and gourmand confectionery nuances. The already mentioned Taif rose is often described as delicate, powdery, with tea-honey facets.

The yield of rose absolute is significantly (about 6 times) higher than the yield of rose essential oil: 0.13% versus 0.02% - therefore, rose oil is produced significantly less and it costs more (2.100€ and 10.000€, respectively).

In addition to the essential oil aka direct oil (plus the accompanying hydrolate, which is of greater importance for cosmetics) and the absolute, obtained by a classic two-stage extraction, there are several other popular materials made from the rose: for example, an essential oil with phenylethyl and some other rose alcohols (geraniol, citronellol, eugenol) replenished back from their hydrolat. LMR calls this product Rose Essential. Petals left after hydrodistillation are sometimes subjected to additional extraction, such a product you can find under the name Rose Ultimate. The absolute can be subjected to additional molecular distillation - this is how dyes and allergic methyl eugenol are removed from it.

Damask rose is cultivated not only for its fragrance and beauty (by the way, the famous Ispahan variety is also a Damask rose, it belongs to the so-called old garden roses, that is, to varieties known even before hybrid tea varieties that arose in 1867; these are hybrids that have lost the appearance of wild rose and have received the familiar appearance of a rose). Damask rose has also great culinary significance, it is used as a spice (for example, as part of the Moroccan mixture ras el hanout), in desserts (Turkish delight, jam, marzipan, pudding, yogurt), dried petals are brewed as tea, even in savory meat dishes dry powered rose or rose water is added for additional flavor (chicken with rose is a popular dish in the Middle East).

The next most important perfume rose is the Centifolia rose, Rosa × centifolia. It is sometimes called Rose de Mai or May Rose, however, do not confuse it with Rosa majalis (also sometimes called "May rose" or cinnamon rosehip) - the most common dog rose, widely grown in Europe and Russia for its rose hips rich in vitamin C.

Some consider Centifolia a subspecies of Rosa gallica (French rosehip) and is designated as R. gallica var. centifolia (L.) Regel. However, the modern understanding of the Centifolia rose is that it is a complex hybrid of the Damask rose, Rosa gallica, Rosa moschata, Rosa canina (dog rose) and Rosa phoenicia (Phoenician rosehip).

Centifolia rose is cultivated in French Grasse (the absolute of this rose is honey sweet, much less spicy), as well as in India, Egypt, Morocco, India, and some quantity of it is also produced in Italy and China.

In Crimea, specific frost-resistant hybrids of the Damascus rose are cultivated. Some time ago in the Nikitsky Botanical Garden, the essential oil variety "Krasnaya Krymskaya" of the species Rosa gallica was bred, which for a long time was the main industrial rose in Crimea. Modern essential oil varieties cultivated in Crimea are hybrids of Rosa alba (white rosehip), Rosa damascena and Rosa gallica.

It is worth mentioning, perhaps, that sometimes comparatively exotic varieties are grown for essential oil production: in Bulgaria, for example, rose oil is obtained from Rosa alba, in China - from Rosa rugosa (wrinkled rosehip).

The range of perfume roses is as wide as perfumery itself, it is difficult to imagine a genre in which a rose would be out of place. The rose is omnipresent in perfumes, and when we see it in the notorious perfume pyramid it does not give us any information at all – there are so many kinds of rose smell in perfume! On the other hand, What's in a name? That which we call a rose / By any other name would smell as sweet.

It seems that the rose subject in perfumery has been thoroughly explored and exhausted with all possible and impossible combinations of perfume roses. However, perfumers continue to create rose fragrances with admirable tenacity; for many, this is a certain challenge. “In order to create something new and worthy of attention with a rose, you need to have enough experience,” says Dominique Ropion, the creator of Portrait of a Lady.

This year, big popular brands have presented us with roses yet again.

Tom Ford's Rose de Russie is a good example of the fact that everything new is a well-forgotten old, and that fashion, including perfumery, is cyclical. Tom Ford perfume team often revisits classic perfume combinations and recreates them with new materials and a modern beat. But this time, isobutylquinoline (leather) is not old or niche anymore.

Rose de Russie is sometimes compared to Jean-Claude Ellena's Rose & Cuir, they both combine rose and leather. However, even though Mr. Ellena, as he admitted, was inspired by the classic perfumes by Edmond Roudnitska, in particular, Rochas La Rose, he created a modern perfume, a contemporary reinterpretation of The Beauty and The Beast. While Rose de Russie is an attempt to re-introduce the actual classic. There are echoes of Miss Dior, Femme Rochas, Bandit and Cabochard in it. But at the same time, it is a recognizable Tom Ford's perfume format: fashionable, catchy, and almost safe.

Another recent rose is Kilian's A Kiss from a Rose. No matter how much Alberto Morillas has been reproached for repeating his own commercial creations which after so many replications start smelling featureless and boring, some of his works make me tremble in amazement. It happened to me after smelling Gucci Mémoire d'une Odeur - I am a big fan of this fragrance. A Kiss from a Rose cause the same awe and goosebumps, I'm simply fascinated by it.

It is now modern to explore neurophysiological reactions provoked by scent, but sometimes it is not science but the talent of the perfumer that makes your body and mind react to the scent so strongly. Commercial perfumery usually tries to avoid such impact, but sometimes it just happens.

A Kiss from a Rose, like any other great perfume, is more than a sum of its components: fresh greens, astringent currant, unusually shy jasmine, hyper-realistic rose with waxy petals and dew drops, and a soothing, hypnotic musky-woody undertone. This Rose, like Chamomile by Gucci before it, hits the right nerve in my soul, its clever mechanism tweaks something in my subconscious taking over my will, so that it even scares me a little. if you are not afraid, try it when you have a chance.