We first met Elise Pearlstine thru the blogosphere during The Mystery of Musk Internet Project and her fragrance "Verdigris". Next her Rose of Cimmaron created for The Natural Perfumer's Guild Outlaw Project" has all natural appeal that we love without losing any of the complexity of a wanton woman”. The Love Story continues when Senior Editor Ida went Behind the Bottle for Elise's Wild Chypre . Wanton, defiant fragrance from this soft spoken natural perfumer? Read on.
Profile: There are pioneers in my background, and musicians and teachers. I am a child of the American West but also a product of the many places I have lived. As a child I lived in Utah, Sweden and Ohio, in that order, returning to Utah for high school and college. My parents and grandparents were teachers and my family is full of musicians. There was always music in the house and one of my best memories is my father playing the piano every night as I was falling asleep. He had his own interpretation of all different kinds of music and his style was distinctive. Sometimes he would listen to me practicing piano in the evening while he was lying on the couch. I always did my best to play quiet songs to put him to sleep, probably with the idea of sneaking away. Even with his eyes closed and apparently asleep he would correct my playing when I hit the wrong note. My mother and her mother were excellent cooks and I treasure a small recipe book my mom finally printed herself a number of years ago.
Mom also always made her own hand lotion and I will forever associate that smell with my childhood, more even than the occasional perfume she wore. Visits to my grandparents usually involved picking strawberries, peaches, apricots, dark cherries or apples. My favorites were the apricots. The taste and smell of apricots takes me back to the top of a small apricot tree with the sun on my shoulders, the blue sky overhead and a warm, ripe apricot in my hands.
American Artisr Stefan Duncan
We traveled much when I was a child, often driving across country between Utah and Ohio in our huge nine-passenger station wagon. There was a bench seat in the back that faced backwards which was my favorite – I could watch the landscape go by or the stars pass overhead through the large back window. Grasslands of Kansas or mountains of Colorado, I was fascinated and I still love road trips. We usually camped on the way and I remember most the smell of pine trees in the mountains with a subtle underlay of mountains stream, late spring snows and leaf litter. The traveling didn’t stop as an adult and I have lived in Paris (for six months as a college student), in Texas, upstate New York, Japan, Nevada, South Carolina and now south Florida. Travels have taken me to Korea, China, Mexico, Costa Rica, Canada and most of Europe. I have found distinctive fragrances in each place I have lived. I particularly remember the herbal and aromatic smell of Texas from my time in San Antonio and visits to the coast there (Elise now lives in Florida).
The intense greens of the Japanese countryside, the smells of seaweed and fish, and the aromatic woods were all new to me and a part of the wonderful Japanese experience. Now I find myself surprised to be living in tropical Florida and growing aromatic orchids, trees, shrubs and other flowers. I often take breaks from working at the computer just to go outside and enjoy the sights and smells of my small yard. I walk in the mornings and have never experienced such a variety of rich, green and floral scents as I have here, particularly in the humid mornings of spring and summer. All these smells inspire my natural, hand-crafted perfumes.
Smells, tastes, even art, and the physical experience have always been intertwined in my memory. I love hiking and smelling, cooking and eating, gardening and harvesting fruits and flowers.
I love all kinds of music but I have to say that Van Morrison has provided a sound track for my life along with other artists of the sixties and seventies. Whether dancing or driving, studying or just listening, love that rock and roll!
Stefan Duncan Squiggles in the petals
On American Natural Perfumery: The use of all natural materials for perfumery is also a very physical experience for me. Whether I am blending a thick absolute into a base of alcohol or oil, cutting up jasmine wax for soap or a perfume, smelling three different perfumes or ingredients on each arm, grinding resins or harvesting and extracting plant material, it’s all physical. I also love the fact that natural perfumes react to a wearer’s skin and become an individual scent. My floral perfumes, especially, are inspired by American places, plants or stories. Sun & Flowers is orange blossoms and citrus, Magnolia is southern and sweet and Rose of Cimarron is the original outlaw woman.
–Michelyn Camen, Editor in Chief
Editor's Note; Elise's favorite artist is Vincent van Gogh, so I chose the art of Stefan Duncan aka the "American Van Gogh" who was born in Fayetteville, North Carolina.
There is so much beauty in this country; its traditions, its people, art, food, music and something as simple as stopping to smell the flowers brought me some peace today 9/11/2011. As i was reading about Elise's life , the words of "America the Beautiful" kept running through my mind.
Elise is offering a draw of 15ml of any of her 10 natural perfumes. http://www.bellyflowers.com/ To be eligible please leave a comment about something you liked learning about Elise and the fragrance of your choice! Draw ends September 13, 2011 PLEASE LIKE CaFleureBon Profiles in American Perfumery because this series will run throughout the remainder of the year; and your entry will count as two.