Maison 21 G

What do you think of creating your own scent? This was a question I asked myself when I got contacted by Maison 21 G to offer me their bespoke services (bespoke is adjective that means “made for a particular customer or user”). I was intrigued but nervous, the premise was simple: you choose some notes or accords, they do the rest, everything is done online and you receive a bottle or roll-on with your fragrance. Too easy to be good? Would this be a quality scent or a cheesy un-usable scent? I decided to try it out and will tell you about my experience

The Process

First, why the name? Maison 21 G, well…the 21 G comes from the idea that our soul weighs 21 grams and also because the perfumes are offered at a 21% concentration, that’s pretty cool right? Also, Maison is the French word for Home…which ties the whole idea together, so, there you have it, a pretty cool story for the name!

The process is all self-service and done online, you go to their page and select how you want to create the perfume, you can choose from (1) Based on your personality, (2) based on a fragrance you love already or (3) full custom where it’s based on your ingredients. To be honest, I tried all 3 but found the “based on your ingredients” to be my favorite, manly because I’m not a huge fan of quizzes (option #1) and I wanted to create something unique (which steered me away from doing a “inspiration” which is option #2).  

When you create your fragrance, you first select if you want a Day Perfume or a Night Perfume, I think this is good because it already starts filtering notes and accords for you, I selected a Night Time one…then, you select you Heart Note or main ingredient, which can be floral, woody or aromatic, for example…on floral you can select Lily of the Valey (Muguet), Jasmine, Tuberose…and others, plenty of options and the same is true for the other options, lots to explore! After you select your top scent, you select your base…and those change based on your top which I considered to be super cool becaus it takes the guessing out of which accords can complement each other. After you select both notes (or accords), you can customize the bottle by adding one of the images they offer or uploading your own, super easy and someone who isn’t technical can figure it out easily. My advice? Go check out the website and play with the options yourself, I think you’ll like what you see.

My fragrance

As I explored all of their accords….one struck me as different, Frangipani, also known as Plumeria, this strongly perfumed white flower is endemic to the Caribbean and Puerto Rico, that called on me
immediately, I decided that was my heart note, then…I needed to decide on a base….and I couldn’t decide between patchouli and Oud, sometimes I thought Musk would be good as well, I decided to email Maison 21 G and ask for their advice, they answered almost immediately and said “We like where you are going with this, we think you should do Frangipani, Rose, Oud and Patchouli”, I was in heaven just thinking about that combination, the sweet Frangipani, the depth of Rose, the sweetness of Patchouli and the character of Oud, “I’m in” is all I answered back and they helped me create the fragrance.

Three days letter, I received my fragrance which I called “El Morro” for the old fort in Puerto Rico and the fact that it reminds me of going out at night, it came with the custom photo I uploaded. The package was perfectly wrapped with a blotter on top that had my fragrance already on and a hand-written note. I was impressed, this is quality delivery..then I grabbed the 30ml bottle, it’s heavy, thick glass, comes with a little bag, the label is high quality and the cap is almost as heavy as the bottle itself, the sprayer is very decent, the whole thing screams quality and had I received this as a gift from someone, I would be impressed and would think it cost way more than it did. Had I received this as a present, I would’ve been blown away!

My fragrance opens up floral & sweet, white floral without the powder, white floral with a twist of rose that rounds things up in your head, the opening is amazing and perfectly unisex. It’s niche quality and stretches me. Soon the patchouli sweetens things up further and creates that bubble we all love from patchouli, that character….but, here’s the kicker, the fragrance never goes fully sweet or fully floral, it plays right in the middle of the two with a very distinct character on the background, I can’t tell you that I detect the oud by itself but there is a creaminess on the base of the fragrance that I often associate with agarwood, it’s deep and comforting. This is extremely well blended and it’s hard to pick one scent from the other, it truly is a night time fragrance and is quickly becoming a staple in my floral fragrances collection. I am very happy I went with Frangipani and even happier the company helped me round things up with the other ingredients, I wouldn’t change a thing from the fragrance I created, not a thing.

Conclusion

I was nervous about creating my own scent, I thought it would be cheesy, low quality and underwhelming, I was completely wrong. The process was easy, the bottle is high quality, the company was very easy to reach and my fragrance came out as fantastic and one I will use and treasure. This would make a great gift  specially with the customized bottle names and photos….but at the end, I think this is perfect for someone looking to create their own thing, looking to create something that when inevitably asked “What are you wearing?” you can answer….”this? I created this myself”, and I think that is awesome. Well done Maison 21 G, you have a customer for life.

Thanks for reading,

Xavier.

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Maison 21 G was cool enough to offer a 10% to my readers, you can use “M21Gxavier10” at checkout! 

Links

Frangipani on Wikipedia - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plumeria 

Maison 21 G - https://maison21g.com/ 

21 Grams Experiment - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/21_grams_experiment 

Carmanah by Wild Coast Perfumery

Questions:

What do you think of natural perfumes?
What do you think of Indie perfumery? 

Wild Coast Perfumery (WCP) is all about transparency and telling us what ingredients go into their creation, all natural, visit their website, their pledge is right there. I’ll admit, when I started really collecting I stayed away from indie mainly because it was a high risk with a potential high reward situation, but, it could also have a potential low reward, I told myself that trusting the “big” companies was better, I was under a blanket of security of thinking “they know better”, well… I’ve been proven wrong, time and time again, for example: Laurie’s creation: Carmanah.

Carmanah is an all natural creation from Wild Coast Perfumery in Vancouver Island, it opens with a really strong Lemon Verbena, a scent profile I often struggle with because I like it but don’t love it, the first 1.5 minutes are all about that Lemon…but, it’s not headache inducing or “too much” and it’s natural, it’s pleasing. After that initial blast…. OH MY! The flower heart of this fragrance opens up in a fantastic blossom that includes a very real jasmine enveloped in this amazing green bubble from the petit grain, absolutely welcoming, again, extremely natural and airy, like standing in a rain forest during a windy day.

The mid and dry down do bring some oakmoss to the mix, the green aspect of the fragrance becomes louder and although I couldn’t pick up the Lavender or Vanilla by themselves, I imagine is what keeps the balance on the fragrance from either going too floral or too green, it sits on the middle, exactly as you would expect as this is not an “aquatic” green, this has a backbone to the green notes, they sit on wood but wood doesn’t dominate them, it’s really well blended and perfectly unisex. My favorite aspect of this fragrance is how good it feels on your skin, it’s welcoming, fresh, clean and just complements you, that feeling is immediate and the fragrance (with 6-9 sprays) lasts over 8 hours on my skin, I like this so much that I’ve found ways to wear it 3 days in a row….I wouldn’t be surprised if that trend continues.

Look, getting into Indie fragrances can sometimes feel like a high risk, I get that, but, the 50ml of this fragrance is about the same price as Bvlgari Aqva Amara (same size) and I can tell you, hands down, this is better. In fact…and this was hard for me to accept, I prefer this to Creed’s Green Irish Tweed by a small margin , not because they are similar scents because they are not…but, rather, because I would use this fragrance on the exact moments I would use GIT and this is more unique and welcoming to me (I prefer oakmoss-y scents as well). The performance is better, the uniqueness factor, the clean green scent, everything is just amplified better…also, when I buy from WCP, I’m buying from Laurie up in Vancouver Island, not from some big company, Laurie makes the fragrances by hand, bottles them, prepares the packages in what I consider the best boxed presentation I’ve received…. and that is amazing.

Have you tried anything from Wild Coast Perfumery?

Thanks for reading,

X. 

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More Photos!