Soivohle’ Weekend

What a week, the sale has been keeping us very busy, and at the same time trying to create some inventory. This is always the problem, keeping up with the demand. I am going to have to set up to make samples, which is an all day job. Plus continuing to bottle and box. Love Speaks Primeval dropped this week, and for the first time we are selling more bottles than samples in the online shop. Usually people will purchase samples first. Not with this one. A lot of die hard vintage style chypre lovers out there. I am wearing it today. And I must admit, I smell goooood…… And for those who might be thinking it is too green, it isn’t. The balance of the actual chypre accord pairs nicely with the florals and other grounding notes. It is completely genderless on my skin.

Sneak Peek: I received an pdf file of the upcoming article on Oud featuring Oudh Lacquer for AYN Magazine. It is absolutely gorgeous. I am not sure when the magazine comes out, but have asked for permission to share the article. Wow do those folks do great work!

Monographs  – I recently wrote a monograph of Grand Canyon for The Scented Salamander Blog. After receiving several positive responses to the piece, I have decided to add Monographs of all the scents in the line. Or at least the ones that have a back story. I will work on these as I have the time, but eventually plan to add a section at soivohle.com, to showcase them. Some of the stories are very interesting, as I did a lot of research for them, as it related to the perfume that was being created. It isn’t going to come about over night but is on my list of things to do.

Satellite Location – I am no where near where I need to be to open the boutique next week,  and I have been thinking about renting a space in one of the big artist studio buildings in the city. Years ago I had a studio in the Pendleton Art Center, and am seriously considering renting a space. I have a few friends who have their art studios out away from the city as I do, and may be able to get a couple of people to share the space. The center has open house (gallery hop) every final friday and saturday of the month. It is well attended. Eight floors of studios. I would only use the space for the end of month openings, networking and retail sales. Sharing with a couple of painters would leave me some floor space to set up a counter/ display case for perfumes. It would be a great alternative to having a retail location in the city. Less expensive and I wouldn’t have to hire a staff… I would still take appointments for custom work at my  home studio as I do now. But not have the boutique.

That’s all I have for now, getting back to making up samples, my least favorite thing to do.

Peace & Blessings ZZ……..

We Are Having A Sale

SOIVOHLE HOLIDAY SALE

NOVEMBER 16TH THRU 21ST

10% OFF EVERYTHING IN THE ONLINE STORE,WITH COUPON CODE PERFUME
This is in addition to our everyday savings that include
free shipping on orders over 50.00
free shipping plus 10% off on orders over 100.00
HAPPY SHOPPING

Soivohle online: www.soivohle.com

Bath & Body

I feel like I have jumped a hurdle, and can take a long deep breath. I finished some of the web work today, and will start on the newsletter tomorrow. For those who have been hanging around long enough, as well as pre-soivohle, you will remember when my bath and body line was part of  our family business Peace Angel Farm. Over the past couple of years I have been trying to figure out how/or if the body products fit in with my vision for Soivohle’. I have finally decided to add them to the website full time, rather than seasonally. We will see how it goes. Many of these products have been around for a long time. Bath Salt Blends, Tub Teas, Oils, etc…  I have also been adding some new things, in particular the Best Balm and Cold Cream. I spend a lot of time researching ingredients, and learning about how natural plant based materials are beneficial to human skin and health. Many of the new nutricutical ingredients used in cosmetics are not new at all, but naturally occurring in many of the plant oils and extracts that have been around for years. It was because of my skins own refusal to take to many of the synthesized versions of these materials that I first started making my own products, using a high degree of natural materials. All natural in many cases. I am not a purist, in the sense of having an agenda against all things synthetic. I do see the benefits to some things, but feel that it is more about making intelligent choices and at the same time creating a safe product. Having said that, I am really pleased with how the line has evolved. The new cold cream is great, and I have been using it just about every day for several weeks. I am also using the new Best Balm, and have a pot of it here on my desk, one on my night stand and one down in my office. I am currently stocking our boutique shelves with the new products, and am happy with the packaging. It all ties in (sort of) with our perfume packaging, giving the entire scope of products a more cohesive look. Once I get past the growing pains of adding in this new line, I will be fine. We will be fine. Now it is on to  more boxing and gearing up for the holiday shoppers and meeting new people. Love that part.

Soivohle Weekend

I spent the better part of the afternoon trying to get my web service to work on my office computer. Ready to upload web pages and no web. Went in and reconfigured everything several times and it finally started to work. Thought it might be my ethernet cable, but it worked fine for the airport wireless on all the other computers. Pulling out the hair. Anyhooo… I did get the pages up and did a quick run through to make sure all of the shopping cart links work. So far so good. I am not happy with the header though, will fix that tomorrow. Thanks go out to Nathan Branch for letting me use his image of Tobacco & Tulle for the index page. It is such a festive shot with the light shining through the red paper. I thought it would be pretty for the holidays.

I am also adding a sale page to move out some of our overstock on a few perfumes. This will coincide with our  site wide sale that starts next week, so lots of savings there. All of the details will be in the newsletter, which goes out Monday.

LOVE SPEAKS PRIMEVAL – is now available on our website. I will officially announce it Monday, but a heads up to some of my readers who have been waiting for it. I don’t have a number but know that I sent out around fifty free samples of LSP with orders over the past month. So at least a hand full of folks have already tried it.

JoJo and Sunset Rider are also back online in the parfum mini. This for all of our  die hard Jasmine lovers.

SOIVOHLE BATH & BODY – Finally, was not sure that this would be ready for the web, but hey, miracles happen everyday, or at least that is what I have been told. The bath and body line are available in our shop all year round, and now will be a permanent addition to the web store. I have a lot of other news and things to add, but for now I am calling it a day.

Peace & Blessings, ZZ……..

Boots and Stuff

From time to time I check out the perfume links here on this blog. Perfume Posse I think it was March, and her picture of boots today had me thinking about my own boot fantasy. Beverly Feldman’s “Tart” Boot in black. There is a picture of them in the current issue of Cincinnati Magazine, and I am tempted to go get me some. They are very bikerish, lots of buckles and sturdy, but sexy. Very sexy. And then I am thinking about this new Oud  (agarwood oil) that I have been playing around with. It is very sexy too. And from how I have been feeling about Ouds in general, I know that Oudh Lacquer is just the beginning. And yes, I realize that there are a lot of them out there, and yes I know that some houses have made their reputation on this one note, and no I really don’t care about all that. I just want to follow my feelings and let the muse take me in whatever direction it pleases.

I am still working on our website updates and glad that no one had bets on how long it would take me to get it all done. I guess going in I didn’t realize that there was so much to do. And I am hungry! Day three of my vegan diet and although I am eating like a horse, I still get hungry quicker. But am going to make a big pot of veggie soup tomorrow.

An old acquaintance of mine passed recently and his wife called today. Mortality isn’t something that I think a lot about, particularly since I am faced with it all the time. With animal rescue, I have seen a lot of death. I have lost quite a few people as well. It doesn’t scare me that I will someday die. I have come to terms with it. The thought though of being the one left behind is not all that comforting. I would not be good at it. But then I never have been. I carry everyone with me, just beneath the surface. When my father died sixteen years ago I felt  completely numb for the longest time. I have been feeling that way a lot lately. The ripple effect of transcending energies.

Peace & Blessings ZZ…….

Soivohle’ Weekend

Still at it. Work, work , work….I will get some of our updated web pages up today, and start working on the newsletter. It seems that early holiday shopping has begun, as we have gift wrapped several orders this past week. I even ran out of gift wrap this a.m.. A basic white. I will have to go out for a small roll, while I wait for the new shop roll to arrive from our supplier. I am also waiting on the last two boxes. The one for our Tub Tea in the glass jar, and the one for our creams. I also ran out of dropper bottles for the essential oil blends that we have in the boutique. I know I said it before, but by this time next week everything should be in place.

As the year winds down I think of all that happened this year. I turned down more projects than I accepted, and am still being quite picky about who sells our perfumes. We have had a lot more press/interest in our perfumes from around the world. As well as several great reviews of our new perfumes.  I have read recently some nice interviews with commercial perfumers on Fragrantica, and am amazed actually by the bodies of work.  Of course this is work they do for other people, but still turning out a lot of perfumes, some of them quite good. This has been our most productive year. And when it is over  we will have released three new original scents. Oudh Lacquer, Bottleneck Blues and Cumberland TI. Everything else was a reformulation of a former scent, including the new Love Speaks Primeval that will be released next week. The first version of that scent I created for myself years ago, it was called Chanteuse. All of the original wedding scents in our boutique collection were reformulations, and  two are now available online. Acoustic Flower and Daybreak Violin. I also have a scent, not a wedding scent, but a trial scent that I started for a client that I would like to finish for our Studio Collection. I have dozens of these sketch formulas, and would love to do something with them, but for practical reasons must keep the collection manageable. If I released every scent that I created I would have a collection that numbered into the hundreds, if not more. This year I tried to focus on things that are close to my heart. The Oudh Lacquer was a three year project. Cumberland TI took more than a year to develop, Bottleneck Blues grew out of a series of songs that I wrote awhile back and the new Love Speaks Primeval is updated from a 1980’s original.

I have not checked the sales records yet, but can say from the frequency in which we ship them out. Oudh Lacquer, Pink Praline, Tobacco & Tulle, Grand Canyon and Underworld are the most popular naturals. In the Moderne and Studio Collections, Daybreak Violin, Violets & Rainwater, Green Oakmoss, Domino Viole’,  Sonoran Leather, Raspberries & Black Pepper and Cassis et Violette are the current best sellers. Although we have not  had regular hours in the boutique that much over the summer our best sellers in house are Ankhara and Writing Lyrical Poetry.

So with all of the rush to get ready for the local shopping I have pushed back the new hours until I can get our body products on the shelves. Once we do open it will be daily until the end of the year. Crazy, yes it is… Be back soon with the final draft…

Peace & Blessings ZZ……..

 

Building Blocks

I am getting ready to restock the shelves in the boutique. Have been batching out some perfumes and in general pretty much on schedule. So I am down in the lab this morning. Mr Z. flips the breaker switches to turn off the light in the up stairs foyer. I think, great the breaker blew, leaving me in the dark, so I go switch it back on. Mr. Z gets a shock. oops!… He could have told me that he was turning off the lights. Men..#$%$#$^&%$$….

I have all but a couple of web pages updated, and decided that I would make a packaging change to our tub teas (sachets). Instead of  the oversized tea bags that I had been using I am going with a loose tea in a jar. A bit more upscale and at the same time making it more appealing for gift giving. I am also going to do the same with some of our salt blends. In the meantime waiting to get my lights back down in the lab so I can get my work done. I do not like being interrupted in the middle of something.

 

Soivohle’ Holiday Shopping Guide

It seems to me that our holiday season (online) has already begun. I am trying to keep up and at the same time have yet to add our new web pages or send out the holiday newsletter. We will be adding back our body line, as well as a new natural parfum. Over the next few days I will try to get all of the updates finished and hopefully the newsletter by the end of next week. Some of our outside projects have been put on hold, and boy am I glad that I said no to a few folks. Otherwise I would have no idea which end was up.

I ALSO HAVE A LITTLE SURPRISE FOR SOME – As we were getting settled into our larger lab space, I found (while moving) two boxes of bottled perfumes. The Limited Edition Oils. I remember thinking back in the summer that I was short a few things, but in all of the craziness, assumed that we had sold them. I will be offering these final bottles, and will post a list of what is available as soon as I sort them out.

I am adding to our website a special page for Limited Editions, Special Projects and Studio Exclusives. Not everything that I create is part of a collection, nor is it something that will go on and on. Particularly where exceptional materials are concerned. If I create a scent using an enfleurage or tincture of a particular years flowers from my garden, I can’t very well offer an unlimited supply. These things are what they are. Everything doesn’t need to be predictable or fit into a neat little box. So for those fleeting out of the box adventures, they will soon have their own room.

I sent along the final (I hope) images for the inclusion of our Oudh Lacquer in the debut issue of AYN  fashion and lifestyle magazine based in Qatar. We have had several  press inquiries in the past weeks, one that didn’t pan out. We were actually cut from the piece in a Fall/Winter issue, where we were led to believe that it would be featuring fall/winter scents (which is what, (by request) we sent them). In the end they chose to showcase a selection of spring/summer scents, which made no sense at all. Go figure.

So, as I get back to work, know that by this time next week everything should be in motion for our final offerings of the year. I know I have not answered everyone’s email, but hopefully the newsletter will take care of that.

Peace & Blessings, ZZ…….

 

 

 

Life Is A Jar of Cold Cream

It is cool this a.m. and I am getting ready to go make cold cream. I set my work space up last night so all I have to do is piece it all together. Cold Cream is one of those retro things that people do not use much these days, or at least not as much as they did when I was a kid and every woman had a jar of it on her night table.. When I decided to create a new version of this old school product, I spent a lot of time looking at the labels of what is currently on the market. Same old… And not surprising. The main ingredients are still Water and Mineral (petroleum) oil. I remember years ago as a young girl laying out in the sun in the summer, slathering my body with baby oil, another product then made with mineral oil. I also remember one of my neighbors, a hip young mother telling me that mineral oil was not good for the skin because it clogged the pores. I later did some research on mineral oil and indeed clogging the pores was one of its negative raps. It is made from petroleum, and unlike botanical oils, is not readily absorbed into human skin. Rather it sits on-top of the skin (like petroleum jelly) creating a barrier. This would be a good thing to apply I suppose if one were on their way to the football game on a below freezing day. Just apply a layer to exposed skin to protect it from the elements.

So as I was doing my research, I began to wonder why no one had bothered to make a really luxurious version of cold cream. The way it is made does lend itself to interpretation. A simple Borax and Beeswax emulsion today, based on the original oil, water and wax (then olive oil) formula created in the second century by Galen. In some parts of the world cold cream is called Galens Wax.

Traditionally (recent history) Cold Cream has been used to take off makeup. In my formulation I wanted it to be a good make up remover, but one with a lot of added benefits for the skin. It was also important to me that it be a stand alone cream for use on dry, chapped and sensitive skin. This is why I chose to use rose water instead of plain water. A plant based oil instead of a petroleum product and a carefully selected synergy of essential oils. It may be surprising to some folks, but much of the new breakthrough technology and ingredients in anti-aging etc. touted by the big cosmetics companies, can also be found in nature. Natural oils, herbal extracts etc, can offer comparable benefits. Some of the very same chemical compounds that are being sold to the public as new are also found in nature. Of course it takes a lot of time, reading and researching to piece it all together and most people are not interested in connecting the dots. I however live for connecting dots. I should put it down on my resume as job title: Connector of dots.

I am off to make up a killer  brunch for my people, and then to work. Hope everyone has a lovely day.

Peace & Blessings, ZZ……

Soivohle Weekend

It is raining here, not cold, but dark. At least the pretty colored leaves are still on the trees, and I can see them outside my window. As I mentioned in my morning tweet, we took the kittens to the vet today for their nip tucks. It seems strange when a fairly sizable chunk of energy is missing from the house. I wonder how it feels to them  when they are alone in the house and us humans have gone out for the day.

Now that I am finally caught up on shipping, I have no energy to do the other things that I had planned for the day. I have a sample of the new Symvanil on my work bench down in the lab. It is a natural vanillin made from rice. It is a bit yellowish, a powder and smells yeasty. Traditional vanillin natural and synthetic is white, and of  a light fluffy crystalline consistency. It has no yeasty odor, but is a very clean smelling vanilla. I finally got some numbers from the company on how to dilute it (symvanil), best materials to use for dilution etc.  So when I get my groove back on I will go make up the dilutions. Beyond that I am waiting for a few materials to arrive so that I can finish out the body products for fall and winter. I was low on several of the essential oils for the body and bath oils, as well as some key materials for use in my body cream. I am also going to try out a few vegetable (vegan) waxes, and will likely offer my balms in both bees wax and the alternative. Personally I don’t have a problem with bee products. I have known several bee keepers and when he was still living my next door neighbor kept bees. Right against the fence line by my veggie garden. Never were my harvests more bountiful than when the bees were near by. It was a beautiful relationship between man and nature, bees, and beans. I remember vividly three different occasions  when wild swarms would  congregate in our pine tree just on the other side of the neighbors bee boxes. The queen I suppose would land in the tree and all of the other bees would pile on around her creating a funnel shaped cone that would trail down to just a couple of bees at the end. I remember once they called in a professional crew to capture the renegade hive. I sat out there all day watching them move the hive from the tree to the boxes. I have photos somewhere and will try and remember to look for them. But anyway, it was way cool, and I miss the bees.

I rarely get a chance to just hang out, so while I am waiting for my supplies I will be doing just that. Puttering around, but not getting in a big hurry about it. Monday comes so fast, it is nice to have a few hours to myself from time to time.

Peace & Blessings, ZZ….