Delices De Cartier: A Cartier fragrance launched 2006. A beautifully blended women's fragrance. The classic perfume for women.
Aroma Notes: Freesia, Amber, Pink-Pepper, Violet, Bergamot, Jasmine, Tonka Bean and Cherry
Amber is fossilized tree resin (not sap), which has been appreciated for its color and natural beauty since Neolithic times. Much valued from antiquity to the present as a gemstone, amber is made into a variety of decorative objects. Amber is used as an ingredient in Delices De Cartier fragrance/perfumery, as a healing agent in folk medicine, and as jewelry. "Amber" perfumes may be created using combinations of labdanum, benzoin resin, copal (itself a type of tree resin used in incense manufacture), vanilla, Dammara resin and/or synthetic materials.
Labdanum is produced today mainly for the perfume industry. The raw resin is usually extracted by boiling the leaves and twigs. An absolute is also obtained by solvent extraction. An essential oil is produced by steam distillation. The raw gum is a black (sometimes dark brown), fragrant mass containing up to 20% or more of water.
It is plastic but not pourable, and becomes brittle with age. The absolute is dark amber-green and very thick at room temperature. The fragrance is more refined than the raw resin. The odor is very rich, complex and tenacious. Labdanum is much valued in perfumery because of its resemblance to ambergris, which has been banned from use in many countries because its precursor originates from the sperm whale, which is an endangered species: although the best-quality ambergris is found free-floating or washed up onshore (long exposure to sunlight, air and water removes offensive-smelling components of the fresh substance), and thus raises no ethical objections, a lower-quality version can also be recovered from some fraction of freshly slaughtered whales, and so may encourage poaching of sperm whales.
Labdanum is the main ingredient used when making the scent of amber in perfumery. Labdanum's odor is variously described as amber, animalic, sweet, woody, ambergris, dry musk, or leathery.
Freesia is one of 16 species of flowering plants in the family Iridaceae, native to the eastern side of southern Africa, from Kenya down to South Africa, most species being found in Cape Province. The plants commonly known as "freesias", with fragrant funnel-shaped flowers, are cultivated hybrids of a number of Freesia species. They are widely cultivated and readily increased from seed. Due to their specific and pleasing scent, they are often used in hand creams, shampoos, and Delices De Cartier perfume/perfumery.
Viola is a genus of flowering plants in the violet family Violaceae. It is the largest genus in the family, containing between 525 and 600 species. Most species are found in the temperate Northern Hemisphere, however some are also found in widely divergent areas such as Hawaii, Australasia, and the Andes. Some Viola species are perennial plants, some are annual plants, and a few are small shrubs. A large number of species, varieties and cultivars are grown in gardens for their ornamental flowers.
In horticulture the term "pansy" is normally used for those multicolored, large-flowered cultivars which are raised annually or biennially from seed and used extensively in bedding. The terms "viola" and "violet" are normally reserved for small-flowered annuals or perennials, including the species. Viola odorata is used as a source for scents in Delices De Cartier women's fragrance and the perfume industry. Violet is known to have a 'flirty' scent as its fragrance comes and goes. Ionone is present in the flowers, which turn off the ability for humans to smell the fragrant compound for moments at a time.
A pink peppercorn is a dried berry of the shrub Schinus molle, commonly known as the Peruvian pepper tree. Although a peppercorn is the dried fruit of a plant from the genus Piper, pink peppercorns came to be called such because they resemble peppercorns, and because they, too, have a peppery flavor. Dried berries from the related species Schinus terebinthifolius (the Brazilian pepper), are sometimes also called pink peppercorns (baies roses de Bourbon). The dried berries of that shrub are employed as culinary spice.
In 1982, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States banned the import of Brazilian peppercorns from France into the US, asserting that people who eat the berries risk an array of acute symptoms, such as swollen eyelids and indigestion. In response, the Government of France maintained that the berries are safe to eat if grown in prescribed conditions. The United States later lifted the ban.
Jasmine is considered an absolute and not an essential oil as the petals of the flower are much too delicate and would be destroyed by the distillation process used in creating essential oils. Other than the processing method it is essentially the same as an essential oil. Absolute is a technical term used to denote the process of extraction. It is in common use.
Its flowers are either extracted by the labor-intensive method of enfleurage or through chemical extraction. It is expensive due to the large number of flowers needed to produce a small amount of oil. The flowers have to be gathered at night because the odor of jasmine is more powerful after dark. The flowers are laid out on cotton cloths soaked in olive oil for several days and then extracted leaving the true jasmine essence.
Some of the countries producing jasmine essential oil are India, Egypt, China and Morocco. Jasmine scent has been reported to have sedative properties. Many species also yield an absolute, which is used in Delices De Cartier/perfumery and incense.
Bergamot orange, is a fragrant fruit the size of an orange, with a yellow color similar to a lemon. Genetic research into the ancestral origins of extant citrus cultivars found bergamot orange to be a likely hybrid of Citrus limetta and Citrus aurantium. Bergamot peel is used in perfumery for its ability to combine with an array of scents to form a bouquet of aromas which complement each other. Approximately one third of all men and about half of women’s perfumes contain bergamot essential oil.
Bergamot essential oil is a cold-pressed essential oil produced by cells inside the rind of a bergamot orange fruit. It is a common top note in Delices De Cartier/perfumery. The first record of bergamot oil as fragrance ingredient is 1714, to be found in the Farina Archive in Cologne Germany. One hundred bergamot oranges will yield about three ounces (85 grams) of bergamot oil.
The scent of bergamot essential oil is similar to a sweet light orange peel oil with a floral note.
The Cherry is the fruit of many plants of the genus Prunus, and is a fleshy drupe (stone fruit). The cherry fruits of commerce are usually obtained from a limited number of species such as cultivars of the sweet cherry, Prunus avium. The name 'cherry' also refers to the cherry tree, and is sometimes applied to almonds and visually similar flowering trees in the genus Prunus, as in "ornamental cherry", "cherry blossom", etc. Wild Cherry may refer to any of the cherry species growing outside of cultivation, although Prunus avium is often referred to specifically by the name "wild cherry" in the British Isles.
Piperonal, also known as heliotropin, is an organic compound that is commonly found in fragrances and flavors. The molecule is structurally related to benzaldehyde and vanillin. It exists as a white or colorless solid. It has a floral odor commonly described as being similar to that of vanillin and cherry. It is used as flavoring, e.g. in Delices De Cartier/perfumery or chocolate.
Heliotropine was discovered in 1869 by Fittig and Mielk who synthesised it and thus made the 'cherry pie' note of the heliotrope flower, for which it is named, available to perfumers for the first time - it was already in use in fragrances by the early 1880s. It is used for vanilla or almond accords to bring a balsamic character and also has powdery, floral aspects. Despite having acquired the name heliotropine for its similar scent to that of the heliotrope flower this chemical does not itself appear in the flower scent and so cannot be extracted from those flowers.
Delices De Cartier
Tonka beans had been used as a vanilla substitute, as a perfume, and in tobacco before being banned in some countries. They are used in some French cuisine (particularly, in desserts and stews) and in perfumes. Its use in food industry is banned in the United States by the Food and Drug Administration. Many anticoagulant prescription drugs, such as warfarin, are based on 4-hydroxycoumarin, a chemical derivative of coumarin initially isolated from this bean.
Coumarin itself, however, does not have anticoagulant properties. Tonka bean oil is extracted from the seed of the Dipteryx odorata. The oil is composed primarily of coumarin, which is used to flavor tobacco. It is neither a pressed oil, nor an essential oil, but was traditionally obtained by soaking the large, single tonka bean seed in rum or other alcohol for 24 hours, after which crystals of coumarin appear on the outside of the seed, and are collected. The seeds contain up to 46% oil by dry weight.
In more recent years, most commercially produced coumarin is synthetic, which has reduced the demand for tonka beans as a crop. Coumarin derivatives are also used medicinally, as anti-coagulants. Coumarin is a fragrant organic chemical compound in the benzopyrone chemical class, which is a colorless crystalline substance in its standard state. It is a natural substance found in many plants. Coumarin is used in certain perfumes; Delices De Cartier for women being one and fabric conditioners.
Coumarin has been used as an aroma enhancer in pipe tobaccos and certain alcoholic drinks, although in general it is banned as a flavorant food additive, due to concerns regarding its hepatotoxicity in animal models.
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