These independent perfumeries are sharing the art of fragrance with their customers, enhancing the olfactory experience and adding a personal touch. Featuring Wit & West's Bespoke Perfume Experience.
Caldera Flower may also be Wit & West’s most lavish and sophisticated creation to date. Artisan perfumer Wit has a true talent for using white florals in her natural perfumes, and her knack for this fragrance style shines brightly in this creation. The fragrance features gardenia in its purest and deepest form. Wit used both a rare gardenia absolute and a gardenia enfleurage in the formulation.
Wit & West is the only 100% natural perfume brand in this list, and I got to try out their newest launch Caldera Flower. This scent is inspired by the lush tropics of Panama and has notes of Bergamot, Neroli, Ginger, Gardenia Absolute, Magnolia, Ylang Ylang, Sandalwood, In-House Tahitian Vanilla Tincture, and Ambrette Seed. I love the lush symphony of white florals that dominate here and the warm undercurrent that hushes the perfume’s initial brightness. Ginger is such an interesting top note and one I rarely get to experience. Overall, Caldera Flower is a transportive fragrance that’s breathtakingly beautiful.
Panama’s lush aromas surround me, and Caldera Flower in all its beauty seeps into me, each inhalation threading into the recesses of my mind. Wit & West Caldera Flower is a creative shared experience that captures a beautiful memory’s essence and deeply imprints it in my heart, a fragrant moment forever carved in time and fragrance.
Caldera Flower gives my previous brand favorite, La Valse, competition as owner of my heart! It is an exceedingly transportive tropical floral fragrance. The more I wear it, the more I like it and appreciate its photorealism and ability to transport me to Panama. Well done, Wit!
Whitney Swales, the owner and perfumer for Wit & West Perfumes, grew up in Colorado Springs and has always been drawn to fragrance. Her dad owned a British import shop when she was young, and she especially loved the apothecary section. They stocked Floris London Perfume, and Swales fell in love with the intoxicating scents as well as the history of the company and of fragrance itself.
“I’ve always loved perfume. It’s always been a part of my life growing up,” Swales said. “Both my parents wore perfume … I just thought that it was normal that everyone wore perfume.”
With 2 fragrances featured in our July 2024 Olfactif Collection, we thought you should get to know these wonderful people and the intoxicating compositions made by perfumer and co-founder Whitney Swales, so let us introduce you…
"For me, natural perfumery is something I do simply because I love working with natural ingredients. I love their depth and complexity. They are challenging and finicky, and I love a good challenge. I also have a love for the historical and classic styles of perfumery as well as artisan methods of extraction including enfleurage, tincturing and distillation. My goal is to show people that natural perfume – as a genre of perfumery – is beautiful and unique in its own right."
"Wit & West is a small-batch botanical perfume company based and made in the USA. We love Wit & West because they're cruelty-free, 100% vegan, and made from conscious natural ingredients. Their brand philosophy is to create unique scents, so you don't smell like everyone else."
"...at Wit & West, we don’t outsource any of our fulfillment or logistics processes. Everything from ingredient and packaging sourcing, inventory management, and fulfillment is done completely in-house."
"...The Wit & West vision and ethos is centered around authenticity as an independent perfume brand that values perfumery as an art and creations that don’t smell like everything else..."
La Valse was intended to be the waltz to end all waltzes. La Valse seems to be a rose fragrance to end all rose fragrances. Whitney Swales, ballroom dancer and natural perfumer for Wit & West, describes the story behind La Valse as a dance of grace and elegance transporting you to a different time.
...Wit & West's The Violetear opens with a mystical flittering of bergamot flanked by the other delightful waftings from a stunning garden cared for with loving, grateful hands. It is then mixed with the components of the earth to create a beautiful Fougere that dances on your skin. It is not an overpowering fragrance but has an astonishing, lasting presence...
...Whitney Swales shatters the myth that iris flowers are mute and produce no scent. In The Violetear, the opulence of the reserve iris enfleurage rises in a rainbow of amethyst, mauves, periwinkle, and plum. This gorgeous fragrance expands our knowledge of what is possible in perfumery...
...Honestly, it’s a total shame that majority of people will never discover perfume beyond the department store and Sephora aisles. They will never discover perfume as it should be, as it used to be, before labs and big corporations took over. I’m hoping to change that one post at a time. Wit & West perfumes are full of depth, complexity and interesting note combinations that are totally addictive...
Our 2023 Holiday Gift Guide is spilling over with treasures tailored for every nook and cranny of Mile High living. It’s our annual celebration of all things local and lovely—most of the items you’ll see are made right here in Colorado for you and those you’re shopping for to enjoy.
Wit & West Fleur du Riad opens with a seductive veil of animalic honey. This perceived note is surely the product of Moroccan Neroli with its powerful combination of effervescent citrus, verdant vegetation, sweet white florals, and indole. Green mandarin adds a juicy fruitiness and light silky texture, like saturated air on a hot summer night.
...Clean perfume brands like Henry Rose may be Sephora-famous, but did you know there is an entire world of niche perfume houses turning nature into olfactive art? These hidden gems are well kept secrets within the fragrance community, largely untouched by capitalism (thank goodness) so they can remain true to their roots and produce in small batches to the highest standards.
...But there are many who strive to keep the magic of natural perfumes alive. In Colorado, Whitney Swales of Wit & West Perfumes also works tirelessly to concoct dazzling scents with pure botanical extracts. “Natural ingredients are nuanced, complex, and bring a depth and richness to perfumery that requires patience and flexibility.”
