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Fragrance glossary: sillage, longevity, notes and accords, defined
The words perfumery uses, defined plainly. These are the same definitions ScentGraph shows in the app, written in the house voice.
- Sillage
- The trail a fragrance leaves in the air as its wearer moves. From the French for the wake a ship leaves on water.
- Longevity
- How long a fragrance stays present on skin, from the first spray to the last trace.
- Note
- A single ingredient as it is smelled: bergamot, iris, cedar. Notes are the vocabulary a composition is written in.
- Accord
- Several notes composed to read as one impression, the way a chord is more than its keys.
- Note pyramid
- The order in which a fragrance reveals itself: top notes first, the heart as they settle, the base for the hours after.
- Top notes
- The opening. The brightest and most fleeting materials, carrying the first quarter hour.
- Heart notes
- The centre of the composition, arriving as the opening settles. Most of a fragrance's character lives here.
- Base notes
- The foundation. The deepest materials, slowest to leave, and what remains by evening.
- Concentration
- The proportion of perfume oil in the bottle. Richer concentrations tend to wear deeper and longer.
- Eau de toilette (EDT)
- A lighter concentration, commonly 5 to 15 percent perfume oil. Brighter in the opening, quieter by afternoon.
- Eau de parfum (EDP)
- A fuller concentration, commonly 15 to 20 percent perfume oil. The modern standard, made to carry a day.
- Parfum
- The richest concentration, 20 percent and above. Also called extrait. It sits close and stays longest.
- Decant
- A small measure poured from an original bottle into a vial, for living with a fragrance before committing to it.
- Sample
- A maker's small vial, enough for a few wears. The considered way to meet a fragrance.
- Wear
- A day's entry in the journal: the fragrance chosen, and what it was chosen for.
- Scent of the day (SOTD)
- The one fragrance chosen for the day. Logging it builds the record your ScentGraph is drawn from.
The Lexicon is part of ScentGraph, the fragrance journal for iPhone.