IFF (International Flavors and Fragrances) is one of the largest fragrance manufacturers worldwide to create perfume creations for the big names in the cosmetics and beauty industry. In a massive greenhouse just an hour outside of New York, IFF grows 2000 of the rarest flowers and plants to be harvested for surprising new fragrances.
By harvesting I don�t mean cutting. The experts employ what is called the living-flower-technology. They harvest a flower�s scent by placing a glass bowl over the flower head in order to keep the scent molecules together. An opening in the bowl is connected with a filter, which attracts the molecules and sends them through a connector to a device called �gas-chromatograph�. This device helps to take apart the �scent dna� of a flower and to analyze the different components. This is very helpful for the fragrance designer as every single flower scent is already a perfume in itself consisting of 60 to 100 main ingredients and 200 minor ingredients. With this detailed map of ingredients the designer or rather chemist can recreate all components synthetically to get them ready to be added to a scent composition.
As the name says the living-flower-technology enables the chemists to work with living flowers. Every flower emits an aroma throughout its life cycle and depending on whether it just starts to bloom, is ripe, or almost dying it emits a different scent. As soon as the flower is cut and does not take in nutrients from the soil in which it is planted, it smells differently.
It gets even more interesting when two flower heads share a glass bowl together. This is called the �romance of flowers� because each flower changes its own scent when they are so close together and yet other new scent variations can be achieved.
Finally, the NASA flower tops everything. You might not have heard of the �Overnightsensation Rose� that John Glenn took with him on his space shuttle flight in 1998. The tiny pale pink rose plant, secured in a box, traveled 10 days through space and as expected developed a very special and unique scent with a hint of raspberry and lemon. Shiseido secured this scent for its first Zen perfume. The rose plant is now sitting safely in the Greenhouse outside of New York and who knows, may be you are wearing its scent at this very moment.
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