Working the Bench II

I own Justine Cranes first book, Working The Bench 1 , which is a great starting point for a natural perfumer. I wanted a book more in-depth and this book is it! It's extremely thorough and very enjoyable to read. It's astonishing how much information is packed into this book. While reading the book I felt as though I was her apprentice, being divulged secrets that are only learned through experience. This book is very hands on. Be prepared to get right into the art of creating natural perfumes! I really love that she's included a kyphi recipe! She also explores creating your own soap, incense, and candles. The descriptions and information regarding raw materials is excellent, and I find the plethora of information on natural isolates is a great reference. She explains top notes, middle notes, base notes, bridge notes, modifiers, fixatives, fragrance families, and everything inbetween! The part of the book I have found most valuable is evaluations and dilutions. The author uses the French method for creating natural perfumes, which is how I've been creating perfumes since I started, so I was very happy to learn the best way to perform trials, the best dilutions for materials, etc. She even includes her own notes in parts of the text. I really love making my own tinctures, enfleurages, and distilling herbs, plants, trees, flowers and resins. I have found it essential for learning the aroma profiles of natural ingredients and for creating a natural perfume that is unique and all my own. I especially love resins and trying to capture the scent of the many fragrant flowers in my garden. The information in this book regarding tincture, enfleurage, and other extraction techniques, is a perfect starting point for anyone that wants to make their own aromatics, I wish I'd had the information when I began creating my own aromatics. I've been using aromatics for a long time, but in the last couple years have really been enthralled with creating natural perfumes. This book has been very helpful in guiding me to create something that is more than a simple blend of aromatics! I recommend Working the Bench 2 to anyone interested in making their own natural perfumes!

This book could benefit greatly from a professional editing treatment. The information contained in the book is valuable (some of it anyway), but discerning the valuable out of the stream-of-consciousness writing style (WORDSWORDSWORDS -!useful nugget!- WORDSWORDSWORDS) is an exercise in frustration. It’s so difficult to read! The content is totally disorganized. The chapter headings and subheadings sometimes don’t even remotely relate to what’s actually in that chapter. The book is clearly a self-published print-on-demand job, unfortunately printed directly from a poorly-formatted Word document. The author does not know what the word “opaque” means, which makes me wonder what other bits of “knowledge” she imparts might also be totally wrong. A few of the pronunciations in the Glossary gave me a chuckle (in that they’re silly AND wrong). Pages upon pages of the book are filled with nothing more than copied and pasted blank tables meant to show how you should record the results of your trials. The Bibliography & Sources section is completely nonsensical. So yeah, in a word, frustrating.HOWEVER. The author clearly know her materials, and knows them well. So I can’t discount the whole book based on the amateur writing and lack of editing. I do feel a bit cheated having paid a lot of money for very little usable information, but the 30 or so pages of REALLY useful stuff may very well prove to be worth it. I’m mainly referring to her thorough descriptions of a number of natural isolates, though I do wish she would have included info on what materials the isolates are typically derived from. She does seem to know what she’s talking about. If only she would find herself a decent editor.

I am reading this book every day. You can go to any page and learn something. Justine pours her heart in this book because of years and tears of trying and learning and planning and working the bench. Excellent! I am very pleased!

Great a lot of information for perfumers rare info on natural isolates.

I highly recommend Justine Crane’s new book “Working the Bench II” for everyone wanting to study the art of natural perfumery. Justine is a master of this art and she shares with you her years of passionate study and experience of making perfumes, soaps, incense, enfleurage, and even baking with aromatics! This book will takes you deep into the world of natural perfumery and you will be able to teach yourself by studying your materials and making systems for taking notes and evaluations. This is an art that takes years to master and you are on your way with this thorough and delicious book. It covers everything from working in dilutions to the beyond yummy ~ Kyoto Cherry Rose Tea beignets! She also gives great insight about what it's like to be a artisan perfumer.This book is a treasure.

A well written book, there are a lot of information that I did not found online or in other books. The design and paper used are wonderful too. Lovely

I wish there was more!

There are not many books on perfumery and this one is currently the best, in my opinion. It is a very good starting point with lot of personal experience shared. Strongly recommended.