A chance meeting with a master perfumer
Mette SkjærbækIn 2009, I was lucky enough to meet our master perfumer quite by chance. This fortuitous encounter opened the doors for me to continue my passionate journey into the magical world of fragrances. Read Mette’s story below.
I fell in love with aromatherapy when I was an 18-year-old living in London. A whole new world of fragrances opened itself up to me. It was far more extensive than anything I had experienced before with the perfumes I had used as a young teenager. Aromatherapy is therapy without words, and for this reason we only use Nature's fragrances in Karmameju Skincare.
In a small aromatherapy boutique in a narrow London alleyway, I drifted between all manner of scents, noticing for the first time the effect it had on me. My journey into the world of fragrances has been unfolding ever since.
Travelling as a model over the next 10 years, I took my favourite scents with me everywhere. I spent a lot of my time at hotels, and on my arrival, I always felt the need – and still do – to “set the scene”; to fill the room with aromas and music to make myself feel at home. I always turned on a lamp and dripped essential oil or perfume onto the light bulb and allowed the heat to disperse the sensory fragrances into the room.
In 2009, I was lucky enough to meet our master perfumer quite by chance. This opened the doors for me to continue my passionate journey into the enchanting world of fragrances. That meeting would become the start of Karmameju Skincare.
I am forever grateful for our cooperation over the years. Always based on mutual respect; with him as the master and me as the student – and the rebellious wild-child, who does not always think we need to follow the rules.
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It is very rare for a skincare brand to have a perfumer behind the fragrance in the products. This is one of Karmameju’s many core strengths – uncompromising integrity behind each and every scent composition. The LOVING, CALMING and ENERGIZING ranges are like a pharmacy for feelings. I use them to point me in the direction I desire for the day, and the ranges span wide including both body and face products.
We also have three Eau de Parfums in the Karmameju range. Years went by before I felt ready to create our first perfume. In a world full of fragrance, how do you choose the direction? I had to be schooled and to personally develop on my skills my nose to ensure that I could create the ultimate experience in Karmameju’s first signature fragrance POWDERBLOOM, subsequently with the work with NECTARFLAME and URBAN OUD and the latest addition, our anniversary scent, STORYTELLER Eau de Toilette, was equally tough and nerve-wrecking. I had to build on my knowledge and experience before I felt that I could rightfully engage in the ancient art of perfumery.
There are so many perfumes on the market. Do we really need more? Fortunately, we never tire of music, poetry, film, art... or sensory fragrances. Expensive natural fragrances are not used all that often in the conventional perfume industry at high levels, leaving space for those that do use them to stand out and explore the original art of aromatherapeutic perfumery.
If you ask me, natural scents are incomparable to synthetically produced fragrances created in a laboratory. The natural, warm fragrance of the amber note derived from Labdanum or the magical drops of Angelica Root, the finest elixir from Bulgarian Rose and the countless other gems found in the wild – they seduce my nose and my heart and improve my day.
I am incredibly proud of working with the ancient art of perfumery and I am so grateful for the positive feedback we get on how unique our fragrances are. Thankful for the way that our consumers "discover" that Karmameju Skincare is unique in this field, both for the mind and for the skin.
- Mette Skjærbæk, Karmameju’s founder
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