Chai Musk • natural perfume
a l c h e m y
I put this on before a cozy autumn nap and waking up in it was like waking up to a milky amber sunrise at a spice market dotted with chai wallahs. Dawn mist twists with steam from decoctions of bed tea. There's curled Assam mamri along with gunpowder tea. Water buffalo milk. Jaggery brown sugar from the date palm. Molasses mother liquor dissolves in wild mother milk. Tiger fur and elephant breath. The warming spices of a cup of masala chai bed tea joined by an amber streak of musk make Chai Musk an intimate, creamy fragrance that is sexy and comforting. Color may vary.
Suggested fixatives: Amber, Animalic, Botanical Musk, Gourmand, Hay, Hive, Powdery, Spicy, Tea, Tobacco, Woolen. Wild Veil's natural perfume fixatives act as primers for the skin. Applied prior to perfumes, they can extend the longevity of your fragrance.
Amber fixative contains classically amber base notes from my handmade resinoids that I extracted from raw, wild resins using organic high proof alcohol. It is warm, powdery, and slightly boozy. Resinous with caramel undertones.
Animalic fixative features stunningly intense musk base notes. If you are looking to enhance the tenacity of your natural perfumes, and to fix volatile florals and top notes, this is a fixative worth investing in. Luxurious and powerful, its sleek fur coat undresses to warm amber powder underneath.
Botanical Musk fixative contains musky base notes. It is slightly dry and earthy, with intimate notes of skin, hair, and smoky roots.
Gourmand fixative contains gourmand, or edible, base notes of vanilla Madagascar, cocoa, and frangipane. It is not overly sweet, but rather dark and sultry, with a hint of sugar. The compounds used to scent the paste include my handmade absolute of raw, wild cacao beans (Theobroma cacao) from Peru, and my absolutes of bourbon vanilla Madagascar (Vanilla planifolia) and Vanilla tahitensis (Tahitian vanilla). The bourbon is from vanilla beans that I grew at home on my vanilla orchid vines by hand pollinating the flowers. I then cured and tinctured the beans in high proof organic alcohol, producing a completely organic absolute.
Hay fixative conjures the scents of sun-dried bales of hay, as well as warm, dry straw stored in a barn.
Hive fixative primes your skin with the sweet and musky base notes characteristic of a honeybee hive. It features my handmade in-house absolutes of raw honey, beeswax, comb honey, propolis, royal jelly, bee bread and pollen, and as such, changes seasonally depending on which extracts are fresh and mature. Some of the ingredients may come from colonies that collected nectar from Apalachicola Tupelo gum trees, North Carolina and Midwestern wildflowers, wild blackberries, sweet clover, thistle, black locust, poplar, prickly pear cactus, goldenrod, asters, buckwheat, orange blossoms, purple sage, and avocado trees.
Powdery fixative contains powdery base notes. With notes of tonka, sweet myrrh, balsam, and ambrette musk, it tends toward dry and warm and will complement fragrances across a wide variety of scent families.
Spicy fixative contains spicy base notes from my handmade spice tinctures and absolutes: tulsi, ginger root, clove buds, true cinnamon, star anise, aniseed, and cardamom whole and hulled. Green herbs laced with anise, earth, and brown amber.
Tea fixative blends warm, malted, fermented yellow-orange-amber teas with notes of honey, cocoa, dark woods, savory earth, caramel, and Brazil nuts. This fixative includes my tinctured absolutes of Assam Marangi, fermented Mannong Pu-erh, yellow dragon, Oolong Eastern Beauty, and roasted Oolong. This is a mellow fixative that will work well beneath just about any type of fragrance.
Tobacco fixative features my organic handmade absolutes of organic cured leaf: American Virginia Flue, Burley, and Canadian Virginia Flue. I also infused the raw beeswax and propolis (used in the base) with my aged tabacum tinctures to deepen the husky warm qualities of the composition. Sweet, amber, blackberry and mulberry notes with the anticipation of hand rolled smoke. Depending on the season and availability, it may include extractions of my homegrown nicotiana leaves and flowers.
Woolen fixative features funky sheep, meadow, and pasture notes from my handmade raw wool absolutes. These I concentrated by cold evaporation method from three types of unwashed sheep fleece that I had tinctured in high proof organic grain alcohol: Romeldale, Icelandic, and Churro. The unwashed Romeldale fleece is unbelievably soft. Romeldale-California Variegated Mutuant is an endangered breed of American sheep that produces high lanolin, very fine, multicolored wool. The resulting absolute has a creamy spring field and pasture scent. It’s sweet and reminds me of candlelight. The unwashed wool from a black Icelandic wether is funky and animalic. It is by far the oiliest and fattiest smelling of the three fleeces. Even with the barnyard leather overtones, it is warm and inviting. From another rare breed, the Navajo Churro wool has alfalfa notes amidst a southwestern desert profile. It's as if the heavy aroma of lanolin has been lightly dusted with sand and sage, and baked by the Arizona sun.
Photos: the solid perfume in a 60ml tin; my handmade tea absolutes and resinoids; my handmade clove bud, cinnamon bark, and date absolutes; cinnamon bark prior to tincture; liquid perfume in 5ml amber glass, solid perfume in 5ml and 10ml black violet glass jars, and liquid perfume in 5ml and 10ml black violet glass roller ball bottles.
s i z i n g ☽•☾
Liquid perfumes are available in sizes of 1ml (a sample of approximately 20-25 drops), 5ml, and 10ml. All liquid perfumes are packaged in glass vials or glass bottles. 1ml comes in a sample glass perfume vial with an applicator cap. PLEASE READ: 1ML IS A SAMPLE. 5ml and 10ml sizes come in a brown amber glass bottle with a lovely white cap with orifice reducer. 10ml is also available in a frosted glass roller bottle.
Solid perfumes are available in sizes of 1ml (a sample of approximately 20-25 drops), 5ml and 10ml. 1ml (sample size) comes in a hinge top pod. 5ml comes in a clear glass jar. 10ml is available in a glass jar or a round tin.
Please make your selection from the menu.
r a w ☽•☾ m a t t e r
Wild Veil natural perfumes are composed by me, Abby, using homemade, wildcrafted and organic aromatics in Vermont. These include my handmade enfleurage, tinctures, enfleurage extraits, absolutes, resinoids and concretes, and floral waxes. I spend as much time growing plants and foraging as I do composing perfumes.
l i q u i d ☽•☾
Wild Veil oil perfumes are suspended in an odorless base of organic MCT coconut oil. As they do not contain water, liquid perfumes do not expire, and may improve with age. While the volatile top notes (the ones that hit your nose first) will fade after a year or more, the base and heart notes will deepen and grow more complex.
s o l i d ☽•☾ b e e s w a x
In solid perfumes this silky transparent base (above) mingles beautifully with the earthy, honey musk of organic beeswax. Raw beeswax traps the aroma molecules, releasing them over time for an intimate experience.
h o w ☽•☾ t o ☽•☾ w e a r
The best way to experience a natural perfume is to apply it to well-moisturized skin, without rubbing in (absorption only shortens the wear time of fragrance) and without scrubbing off. Natural perfumes are dynamic and take a minimum of 2 hours to reach their final stage, or dry down. Enjoy the alchemical changes as they unfold from the initial intensity of top notes, to the warmth of the heart, to the depth of lower base notes.
☽•☾ Wild Veil ☽•☾ alchemy between earth and ether ☽•☾
☽•☾ All aesthetic material copyright Abby Hinsman 2019 ☽•☾