The jasmine crates arrive at the factory (which is only a two minute drive from the field) and are loaded onto a 10-foot-longish conveyor belt that takes them from the ground level to a lofted area (see photo above).

The flowers are then dumped (by hand) into a large metal vat, which contains 2,000 liters (just over 528 gallons) of oil solvent that will extract the essence from the flower. There are five layers of flowers placed in this vat (a total of 330 pounds of flowers). And these layers of flowers will go through three different solvent baths. (The first one smells a bit like rubber cement.)

After the essence of the flower is extracted by the solvent, the petals (which post-solvent baths look like icky dead flowers, above) are tossed into a pile where they will be used as compost.

The extracted essence is still combined with the solvent at this point and it looks like a rust-colored solid perfume called concrete. This concrete then must be put through a distillation process to separate the waxes and resins from the perfume. It goes into a Willy Wonka-like machine that boils the substances until the solvent becomes steam vapors and is completely removed from the perfume. The solvent is reused indefinitely after this process, which results in zero waste -- pretty impressive.

Once the two substances are separated, the perfume pours out in a crystal clear color (and at this stage is called absolute). They only do this extraction/distillation process once a day with jasmine. Once the perfume is ready to go, it's either stored by the Mul family or shipped off to Chanel where their perfumers, Jaques Polge and Christopher Sheldrake, can work on blending it with other raw and synthetic materials to create a fragrance, which is a whole other story for another time.

So am I the only one fascinated by the story behind the making of fragrance or do you find it compelling too? Next time, I'll share a lipstick lab experience ... if you're into this science-y stuff.