How much chemistry would I have to know to make commercial grade synthetic perfume?

Question

Would I need a degree in chemistry, or would some college classes suffice? Also, is building the lab in say your garage realistic, or does commercial grade synthetic perfume (like chanel no. 5) require super expensive hardware to produce? 

Answer 1

Jason,

As I understand it, making a perfume doesn't really involve chemistry. You have to decide what "top note" (the first odor you smell, is the most volatile component usually), "middle note" (the odor after the top note evaporates off), and "bottom note" (the smell that lasts the longest, after the top and middle notes have worn off) you want. Then you start combining little bits of pure chemicals with those odors, and testing them on a piece of filter paper. Each of these "notes" may in fact consist of more than one pure chemical, also; an experienced perfumer has hundreds of them, each one of which he/she knows exactly, to work with. There are so many separate types of odors known already for chemicals, that it's unlikely that you'd need to try to synthesize any *new* chemical for this, and adding the required chemicals together to make the perfume (usually with some unsmelly oil added, to prolong the odor release) is very easy. However, for *analysing* an existing perfume -- for that you need a gas chromatograph with a mass spectrometer detector, to tell you what's in it. Of course, an experienced perfumer can also tell you that, just by smelling it (over the course of time, on filter paper). The ingredients of perfumes such as Chanel #5 are pretty well known; however, you should be aware that producing knock-off perfumes is an industry full of scams, and it would be difficult to get established as an independent producer due to that (as well as, perfumes may be protected by copyright laws or the equivalent). That being said, it's fun to produce perfumes at low cost on a small scale by enfleurage (look it up).