What Makes Classic French Perfumes One of Their Kind

 France is renowned for its perfume industry and has always been home to some of the world's most famous Classic Frenchperfumes producers, such as the Maison Guerlain.

Today, while the big names of the perfume industry are based in Paris, and "French Perfumes" are particularly appreciated, the real heart of the French perfume industry is located actually in the small town of Grasse, which is in the Alpes Maritimes department, northwest of Nice.

The most delicate fragrances have been around since Antiquity and have been used in countries in and all around the Mediterranean. It is a widely known fact that as recently as the 18th century many people preferred to use perfume rather than soap. Some 20 km from the coast and at an altitude of 350 meters, Grasse has and enjoys a mild Mediterranean climate that is particularly suited to horticulture, notably which enhances the production of jasmine, which is one of the most important natural aromas used by the perfume industry. But Grasse is also famous for its production of many other natural fragrances, including lavender, myrtle, roses and mimosa. 

With the exception of Cologne in Germany, which is famous for the invention of "eau de Cologne", it was predominantly in the hills around Grasse overlooking the Bay of Cannes that techniques developed to extract "pure" perfume using the method of distillation or using alcohol as an excipient. 

How are these perfumes made? 

Modern production methods have of course evolved and the millions of flowers used by the industry are now largely imported, although the best professionals who design the perfumes are still based mainly in Grasse and Paris. They work and produce subtle blends of perfumes using a collection of tubes filled with different scents, known as a "perfume organ". 

In these two perfume capitals we learn that perfumes are classified into seven olfactory groups. We also learn that French perfumes are made not only from the petals of flowers, but also from other plant matter, such as fruit like oranges and vanilla, resins such as myrrh and incense, grasses and roots like verbena and vetiver, spices such as cinnamon and even wood bark.

Also, perfumes are created from animal fats and secretions, such as musk and beeswax!

 Visitors to Grasse have numerous opportunities to discover the history and scope of the French perfume industry, as the town is where the International Perfume Museum, and the Fragonard perfume museum are located. Several perfume houses there also offer free guided tours for tourists.

The perfume industry in Grasse involves some sixty different companies, and employs almost about 3,500 people and even though Grasse has moved on with the times and now produces synthetic as well as natural fragrances, still it is the natural fragrances for which it remains widely famous. The great art of perfumery is extracting the fragrances of flowers and concentrating them in forms from which they can be transformed into the perfumes that are eventually sold in bottles for very high amounts. The historic methods of extracting fragrances from flowers are either by maceration which is soaking the flowers in a liquid that will absorb their fragrances or by distillation. The resulting liquids are known as "essential oils", and it is from these that perfumes are blended and made. 

How do they keep their authenticity intact? 

Recently, the natural fragrances extracted from flowers and other plants have been largely replaced by chemically produced synthetic scents, which can be easily produced in huge amounts anywhere in the world. But for the production of top-of-the-range and high quality perfumes, made from natural extracts of plants, nothing can replace the learned skills of France's master perfume producers. There is something in the secrets and techniques that are passed down from generation to generation in the area of Grasse that just cannot be replicated or copied. In spite of the lucrative nature of the Classic French perfume industry, other countries have so far found it impossible to challenge France's reputation as purveyor of fine perfumes to the world.