Perfume Making in Grasse France

Kindle reprint of a vintage magazine article originally published in 1908. Contains 14 Kindle pages, with 4 illustrations.

excerpt -

"In summer and at harvest time, the children, as well as the women, young and old, find a more. delightful occupation in the fields. In peasant caps, or wide ­brimmed hats, one sees them with baskets beside them gathering violets under the shade of the woodland trees, or out on the sunny terraces filling their aprons with tuberoses or cassia buds. Such baskets full of flowers we saw brought in and heaped up on the floors before us, each short stemmed blossom perfectly fresh and fragrant.

The process of manufacture is much the same for all perfumes except those made from rose or orange petals. Glass sheets, held by frames a few inches apart, are smeared rather thickly with lard, and between these sheets the freshly picked blossoms are scattered, touching the frames but not being pressed by them. In one day the oil of the flowers exudes, and the lard absorbs the precious drops. Before the grease is fully saturated the flowers are changed many times, the num­ber depending upon the amount of oil the flowers contain.