If you have not done so, now is the time to catch the chance to win a Tauer scented soap:  “LIKE” woman’s picture on facebook. Brian Pera hosts a give away with 30 scented soaps that I have sent him, called “MANDARINES AMBRÉE”, made for the occasion. You cannot get them anywhere. The only thing you have to do to enter the draw: Like Woman’s picture on facebook. Here is the link http://www.facebook.com/womanspicture .

Brian Pera announced this draw on Evelyn Avenue, under “latest”, by the way, and always worth checking. There, you find more on Tableau de Parfums, Woman’s picture and what it is that Brian and me have cooking together these days. I got the last packaging zero series part on which I need to give the ok before it goes into production: The envelop for the 7 ml purse spray. This is the last piece and it is simple, like an envelope, to keep costs down, but protective, and will be in line with the sample envelop, and distinguish itself from the packed 50 ml flacon. And now I have to wait until all labels and envelops and boxes come in. As soon as they do I will publish pictures, as I cannot wait to share.

Initially, I wanted to pack the purse spray in a box, too. But I figured, that the purse spray does not need an expensive, vintage inspired box, like we get it done for the 50 ml flacon: With linen texture, printed card board inlays and all that. I rather try to offer it for a cent or two less.

Yesterday, on the way to the movies, my book keeper and me discussed on the stock we have these days and the expenses that we face the next weeks. For this year, my investments are sort of over. My stock grew heavily and the new brand Tableau de Parfums is all paid for from my savings. Building this brand is expensive, but important: Tableau de Parfums is different to Tauer Perfumes, in its aesthetics, in its fragrant language, in its source of inspiration. I cannot wait to share the first perfume, Miriam, early October in Los Angeles, at Luckyscent, who supported it all.

Today’s picture to the left shows you black and white take of stones on a beach at the state park “El Capitan” in Southern California. Made by nature. Smoothed by the sea and a lively contrast to the beach’s sand. Nature often works on a large timescale. We human beings tend to think in days, weeks, or years years while the ocean waves work for centuries on smoothly polishing the coast. As species, we craft objects since a few hundred thousand years. And we do so the longer the faster.

Thus, I want to share a little design detail with you on the upcoming PENTACHORDS flacons. Some of you might have realized it already: The label and the top cover are different to the rest of the line. The top cover is made from wood as all the other tops I use. But this time, we get it colored in white for all Pentachords, and print PENTACHORDS onto it. On both side, which is sort of expensive. On the top of the top there is a printed, silver pentagon.
The label that you see in the picture above is no sticker but more like a paper ribbon, folded around the flacon’s neck like a shirt (actually, there are two openings in the paper ribbon where the neck goes through. ) The whole ribbon is held in place with the scrimped on pump and by a little sticker on the backside. Each Pentachord comes with a colored ribbon. Not that simple to put on.

In a sense, a design proof of handmade.

Initially, I thought that the ribbon should not cover the TAUER sign on the flacon. But I feel now that this makes it just a bit more interesting. Maybe design is not only about showing and presenting things but also about hiding and pointing to things by just setting hints.

I think it fits well with the idea of fragrances that are centered around a reductionist approach, focusing our attention to a very minimal set of molecular structures.

A while ago I got myself an Adobe Illustrator to work with and to come up with labels and various designs later. It is rather expensive, especially here in Switzerland, where everything is more expensive, compared to buying it in the US. Thus, I am looking very much forward to buying some sneakers and my favorite jeans in the US when visiting LA end May. Companies like Adobe will run into troubles sooner or later with a business model that does not fit an internet driven global market place. There is no way how you can justify asking significantly more for a download product here or there. The same is true for fragrances to some extend. Thus, the isolation of markets and regions becomes the longer the more difficult. And hence the most effective and productive market places set the standard. I guess this is the reason why the largest online retailer for low volume fragrances sits in the US (luckyscent.com).

The internet is the place with the largest diversity of low volume and artisanal fragrances.

Anyhow. So I got the Illustrator and using Adobe’s online videos I am getting used to working with the software which is fun. Actually, it is a lot of fun. It reminds me in my earlier days when I started this perfume venture. Since then, let’s say 6 years ago, the number of  internet users has more than doubled. And the number of rude  and impolite users seems to have grown disproportionate. Many got a tool that allows them to express themselves in a way that thew would never dare in the real world. Facebook sure does not slow them down.

I guess the only way to face this low level talking is by setting a higher level.

Thus, I got my Illustrator and will use it in the next months and years to come up with labels and boxes for new ideas. Ideas that will help me to talk through fragrances to perfume lovers who are interested in exploring new fragrant worlds. to be continued….

We will hit summer like temperatures again this week. This is nice, as it brings me back into T-shirt-all-day territory. On the other hand, the first tulips came, saw the sun and left a day or two later. For some of the delicate spring flowers these temperatures are already too much.

I guess this is true for the violet flowers, too. You see them everywhere these days. They are about as delicate as they are fragrant, very fragrant. But, helas!, only for a short while, before the nose will get tired due to the ionones and you do not smell a lot anymore.

Actually, these ionones in pure form are some of my favorite molecules to play with. Like Irisone beta that you find naturally in violet flowers. My absolute favorite when it comes to ionones: Irone alpha. (6-methyl alpha ionone)

This is violet and orris root heaven.With a bit of silvery wood and a hint of raspberry.

Unfortunately, for a price tag that is also quite remarkable: It is about Rose absolute divided by two. At least the quality that I am using. Now, what can you do with Irone alpha? – I think about everything. At least a pretty good PENTACHORDⓇ. And with this we sort of finish the non stop linden blossom talk of the last weeks and move forward to new exciting stories unfolding….

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EDITED:  March 09 17.30 Swiss time. THE DRAW IS CLOSED. Thank you to all who participated.

The winners, picked with random.org truly in a random way, are:

Olivia A.

Aster

Monica

Congratuluations again

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Believe it or not: We started working on the design and packaging for the Collectibles in  autumn. Some stuff we ordered in November. Now it is soon spring and as always: Everything gets in with delays. Accidents here, technical troubles there: I am getting used to it. In theory, I should be able to pour and label and box the flacons now, or no: Last week.

It will – in reality – be in about 2 weeks. For you this means that you have to wait a bit longer for the Linden blossom theme. But wait, here’s a treat:

I got the manual stamping things that I will use to stamp information onto the sample papers. Today’s picture shows you my first trials using them; as you may easily see: I need some practice there. The same stamps I will use to bring information onto the packaging. Kind of cool, as it allows me to easily change information from batch to batch (you remember: Collectibles are subject to change from time to time).

In order to celebrate my first happy stamping of the sample flyers, I will make a little draw: Be the very first to smell the COLLECTIBLE fragrance: ZETA-a linden blossom theme!

I will pick 3 happy winners using random.org in a  day or two. Just leave a comment below and you enter the draw and your chances are good to win a 1.5 ml sample in a spray atomizer. Once I picked the winners and close the draw, I will announce it here. The draw is international, independent of where you live. And, just in case you do not know what to write in your comment, here’s a question for you: “what means linden blossom to you”?

Your privacy is important to me: You have my word that I will not make any use of your private data except for contacting you after this draw, nor forward them or sell them to any third party.

Today’s picture on the left is a shot made with the i-phone somewhere in the vast Moscow Metro ( for a quick overview of its history: click here to visit the Metro Website in English). A lamp that shines its post Soviet light onto stone walls that seem to be built for eternity. The political system, the party and all that came with it was not built for eternity, but the metro in Moscow made me remember these days. There are pictures on the walls with parachutes and more brave pictures in socialist realism style.

And there is this very  art deco style that you find everywhere that I like so much. This is really wow. I love art deco. But as I stayed basically only 30 hours in Moscow, doing a training and visiting LE FORM boutiques, really chic and hip concept stores, Andrey (my business partner) and myself rushed through the underground system too fast to really appreciate all its beauty. Like the St. Petersburg metro the lines are really deep, deep down and the metro fulfilled also a function as shelter.

My pentagonal flacon is in a sense also  a little bit art deco, or makes a reference to art deco. Design becomes the longer the more important in my life. And guess whom I visited in Switzerland the day after my arrival: Yep. I visited my designer friend from the Designers Club, showed him the sample of the pentachords® flacon (the same pentagonal flacon, but a clear glass, with the faintest hint of turquoise). We had an issue with the color and I wanted to show him the flacon color that I needed to decide.

I will talk more about the pentachords in a few days. First, I need to talk a bit more on the Carillon pour un ange. I am sometimes forgetting that scents and flacons that are a thing of the past for me are all new for my perfume loving friends. Thus, this morning, when waking up, I realized that I need to to a PR sheet for the Carillon pour un ange.

And I think I have an idea how to do it. It should reach some points of sales physically together with a sample to show the shop owners what Carillon pour un ange is all about. And this PR sheet should reach some blogs electronically, to spread the news about the 30 ml flacon coming soon in May to the shops.

Thus, chances are good you will encounter it.

The first batch of 30 ml flacons however will go to Russia, with joy, this week.

It felt like an endless story and it was a bumpy road where the story took developed and turned up and down in strange twists. But now we come to the end of the poetic search for the perfect inlay. Yesterday, I placed the final order for the inlay, at a German company. The folded origami style paper, the black sheets of paper crumpled: all suboptimal. Nice as it may have looked, it was not protecting the contents, my precious flacons, good enough and it was too much work folding these inlays.

Thus, we will soon get a preformed inlay, perfectly matching the flacon, made from high durable polypropylene sheets. I wished I could have done it all with paper but this is the compromise we have to make.

The inlay comes with a velvet surface that feels like the fur of a desert poodle right after trimming. So soft and fine. So gentle.

The grey color fits with the metal box and presents the flacons well.

Now, the company that will produce them, needs to first make the metal mold, as they have made a wooden mold first. Then they will produce the inlay. And then they will ship it. And then my inlay journey comes to an end.

Picture to the left: A scan of the inlay with the rose vermeille flacon.

Today, I share another picture of last week’s tulips: the flowers opened up and I made pictures of them on Saturday in the afternoon sun. This time, I show you a tulip in black and white. Quite amazing how different the same flower look: It is the same structures, the same shapes, but the missing color lets us focus on them differently.

If I look at the picture, I feel that the missing color adds depth to it, and adds questions.

In a sense, this is the effect I aim at with the collectibles. We will not describe the fragrance with notes or ingredients (other than the EU law allergens). I discussed this long time with my designers from the Designer Club. The fragrances in the COLLECTIBLES line (the first launch is the Linden blossom theme in April/May 2011) are limited and subject to change over years of production. The are “out of the lab”, consequent, without compromises, expensive, modest, and will not use any pictures or body parts to advertise.

Thus, we discussed for a while how to give a hint nevertheless, a few words that code it if you so want. After a while I decided that I will make a HAIKU for this fragrance, as good as I can.  As I will make a manual stamper, in order to stamp the labels on the packaging and the samples information, this initial haiku might easily be changed to another one.

For instance a haiku that I select from a competition, once the fragrance is out and folks can sniff it. This is important, as a haiku needs the moment of experience.

But for the launch we will use the haiku that I sent to the designer yesterday:

A LINDEN BLOSSOM THEME
Linden shade in June-
sweet rose petals and the light
of Syracusa.

Yesterday, I got the scented cards, perfumed with the scent of the CARILLON POUR UN ANGE, delivered to my house. Hurray! They smell -like the test we did beforehand- gorgeous and incredibly close to what you get out of the flacon. Thus, this week is definitely a Carillon week.

These cards are a bit difficult to make pictures of. But I tried….The paper is actually snow white, but in order to get the relief out, I used different colored lights…

The front page has a relief embossed: Tauer and IMMERSIVE SCULPTURES at the bottom.

Here a detail of the relief. In this resolution, you can guess the fine structure of the paper that consists of super extra long fibers. It holds the perfume for weeks and weeks and weeks.

Each of the cards is wrapped in a little Polypropylene bag that seals the cards.

relief detail

The back side shows the negative relief and the name of the perfume, in fine Avant Garde letters.

Love it!  Soon in perfumeries nearby…..And I will use it to ship with  orders.

backside of scented card

In case you have not done it: leave a comment in YESTERDAY’s post (click here) to make sure to take your chance in the draw for a Carillon pour un ange. Today, we go back to normal and discuss a design detail that I forgot yesterday while cheating with Photoshop.

First, it is amazing how nicely you can bend reality using pictures and photoshop. What I forgot yesterday: The cover top.

The HOMAGES line of fragrances (Carillon pour un ange, une rose chyprée and the rose vermeille) get a new top. I mentioned it once here on the blog. The black top that you know is made from beech wood. The new cover top for the HOMAGES I wanted to be different.

The glass pearls inside the 30 ml flacon are a little bit like gravel or sand on a beach. Thus, I and the designer from the Designers Club (or the other way round) in Zurich figured we continue in this association. The cover top should look  like driftwood. You can see the texture of the wood and it feels like it has been worked hard by the elements. To get this effect, we picked American walnut wood. Then we get it brushed real hard by hand, to bring the texture out. Then we get it lacquered to protect the wood, without any added color.

From now on, we send all HOMAGES flacons out with such a wooden top. A detail, but it adds to the exclusivity of the line and helps underlining what the homages scents are all about.

The picture to the left shows you the top cover on the Carillon pour un ange flacon.