SCENT-MAKING AT GRASSE

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 96, 17 January 1921, Page 6

SCENT-MAKING AT GRASSE

Lying some thirteen miles to the north of Cannes, in the French Riviera, is Grasse, fumed for its flowers and its scents. It is the centre of the perfume industry. Practically everyone in Grasse and its neighbourhood is engaged ill this picturesque vocation-cultivating tho flowers, gathering the blossonrs, or extracting the oil from which the scent i» ' n The annual turnover in flowers _and ethereal oils (says the Newcastle Weekly Chronicle”) amounts to a million pounds sterling.. Official reports show that 2000 tons of orange flowers, IjOO tons of roses, 1200 tons of jasmine, W0 tons of violets 300 tons of tuberose, 100 tous of mimosa, GO tons of reseda, and 50,000 tons of jonquils, in addition to many other plants, annually enter the manufactories at Grasse. These thousands of tons of blossoms, carried into the ancient town in baskets and piled up in great heaps in the storerooms, constitute one of the sights of t»c place. From month to month, practically throughout year, they form a glorious symphony of colour and scent.

It is very essential that the blooms are gathered just when they will be of most value to the scent manufacturer. Rose* are picked when just about to open, as soon as the dew has vanished. Violets must not be picked when wet nor when the sun is too hot. They are gathered in the early morning, after the dew has disappeared.» Then tho scent of some ■ flowers is so evanescent that they will not bear transportation to the factories, so the manufacturers send their distillation apparatus to the fields. The essential oils of thyme, rosemary, and lavender are thus extracted almost on the very spot where they grow. To obtain the scents from the flowers, the manufacturer resorts to various complex processes, different per- - fumes demanding different treatment.