Since the very first post published here (29.08.2016), The Plum Girl Perfume Site celebrates perfume as an art form! Unique and in-depth reviews, news from the Industry, reports from Esxence Milan, Pitti Fragranze, travelogues with information about perfume shops, interviews, and all the other content regarding niche/artisan perfume and people of perfume – researched, written, edited, and shared to readers of this site over the past six years.
And yes – I’m still madly in love with perfume!
It all started in Grasse, France during my visit in August 2016. I managed to make a fusion of a family vacation with my hobby, nurtured for years before this. I’ve planned my stay well in advance, including taking courses and classes at the Musee International de la Parfumerie (MIP), like Initiation A La Creation D’un Parfum (you can find the list of their workshops for 2022 here), and a couple of other notes&accords classes, and to explore further possibilities of education, like GIP Summer School.
So, while my family roamed around Cote d’Azur and its beaches, I was running from one end of Grasse to the other, trying to grasp every opportunity, to learn as much as possible, to get my nose on as many raw materials as possible, and to participate actively in all the classes (in French, of course).
After five days of attending all the possible workshops, one of my teachers asked: “What are you going to do with what you’ve learned? Do you plan to work within the Industry?” I answered that I don’t know, I just wanted to know more, to learn more. And then she told me: “Why don’t you write a blog about perfume? For what is knowledge, if not shared…”
When I returned home, I couldn’t forget these words. I sat down one night, opened my WordPress account, and didn’t stop till the next morning: The Plum Girl Blog was born, with the mission to share the love for perfumes, celebrate perfume as an art form, and strive for editorial excellence.
When I started The Plum Girl blog, I had no idea how many perfume blogs already existed worldwide, big ones, influential ones, impressive ones…I had no idea. I was reading regularly just a couple of perfume blogs, and that was it. Even then, people were saying that blogging is dead, that YouTube is the new must, and that Instagram is the posh place to be, I didn’t care less. I kept writing. Exploring, learing, talking, and sharing.
A lot has happened on The Plum Girl journey since then. Contrary to my beliefs that only a handful of people will read my reviews, thoughts, and musings – you, dear readers, kept me going on. One of the most wonderful things that The Plume Girl Perfume Site brought me is all the beautiful people of perfume I met over these 6 years, my dear friends from all over the world!
I kept writing. Sometimes more often, sometimes less frequently, but always present, at a time and for a while also for another, quite a renowned perfume site. I kept smelling, it all the time, and with years, the number of perfume samples tested and worn over a single year grew huger and huger.
In the past six years, The Plum Girl was nominated for awards, and awarded for editorial excellence by The International Fragrance Foundation and Perfumed Plume (multiple times). The Plum Girl Perfume Site is an official media partner with Esxence Milan, a signee of The Perfumery Code of Ethics, and regularly present & reporting from Pitti Fragranze in Florence.
I never stopped learning about raw materials and perfume making – this was always a very important part of The Plum Girl journey over the years.
When everything closed down due to Covid, I regarded that as an opportunity and decided to complete the Osmoart advanced perfumery training Systematics of Scent (by Pierre Benard Segu, professor at GIP Grasse and ISIPCA). Initially, Pierre developed this training was developed internally within the company PAYAN BERTRAND for the employees of the company, and students from schools of the profession, such as ISIPCA and the GIVAUDAN internal school in 2020/21. I completed the training, and got my certification in 2022!
2022 was special to me also because of the release of PANTHER FANGS by Calaj Perfume, a perfume Miguel Matos and I dreamt about during the long periods of isolation in 2021., and The Plum Girl is the artistic director! We’ve one other great fragrance from this period (I love it so much), and I hope it shall be released sometime soon.
There’s more: I plan a surprise for you, dear readers – quite soon too. It has to happen before The Plum Girl leaves for Florence, to report from Pitti Fragranze again!
Yes, I will continue to write. Even though there’s so much talk about blogging being dead, IG being taken over by Reels – trying to look like TikTok, and TikTok being the end of written blogs and YT vloggers. I believe in reading & writing, and this is what The Plum Girl will keep doing. This website is my primary and independent platform I finance myself – still madly in love with a perfume, still sharing that love!
Thank you. I’m grateful for everything The Plum Girl Perfume Site journey has brought me in the past six years. There’s always a handful of tears and a bag of laughter in everything one does with love!
Let’s celebrate together:
I’ve prepared 5 Panther Fangs (Calaj Perfume) 2 ml perfume samples – 25% concentration,/Extrait de parfum for 5 readers (samples – not full bottles)!
All you have to do is to comment under this post, EU & UK only, please (shipment is on me). Let me know what you like about The Plum Girl Perfume Site, what’s your favorite The Plum Girl review over the years, or what type of content you’d like to see more. The draw closes on 09.09.2022!
THANK YOU for being here with me.
Pssst! There’s another surprise coming up…and I’ll do everything I can to make it fantastic for you!
You can support The Plum Girl as an independent perfume site by buying me a Coffee!
Feel free to use the button below, thank you!
21 Comments
Congratulations!! I agree, reading and writing still matter, and I’d rather read (and write) a blog than deal with video. I love being part of the Scent Semantics crew with you and the others! I hope you blog for years to come.
Thank you! It’s wonderful to be a part of Scent Semantics – writers should unite around projects like this.
Perfume has taken backstage the last few years, partly because of lack of access, but the blogs have always been my favorite part and I just recently discovered yours! I loved the reviews from milan, they allowed me to live vicariously through you! Happy anniversary!
Thank you! I’m so happy you were in Milan with me
Draga Elena čestitam ti od srca. Sa velikim zadovoljstvom pratim tvoje pisanje i zahvalna sam ti na tome jer sam preko tvojih objava upoznala neke parfeme za koje možda ne bih ni znala. Potaknuta tvojim pisanje pošla sam u potragu za istim parfemima i shvatila da imaš istančan ukus za parfeme. Nadam se da ćeš još dugo voditi ovaj blog na veliko zadovoljstvo čitalaca.
Hvala, Žaklina – puno znači priznanje od ljubiteljice parfema i aktivne ćlanice zajednice kao što si ti!
Pls contact me with your address! :-*
Dear Elena!
Congratulation to anniversary and hello from Prague!
I am happy for your words about the blogs and I totaly agree. There inside a universe of brief-texts social media is not an other platform or possibility how to describe the small worlds. The small inspirative worlds of art, niche products, interesting people, hobbies, specialities, so the niche and artistic perfumery as well.
Niche topics are not interesting for the mainstream media thus we – bloggers – are responsible for. Our passion and community are valuable for a small improvement of human lives – the good scent never killed nobody. 🙂
I appreciate your effort and concentration with which you strive to deep knowledge of perfumery. Your new career in niche perfumery is GREAT!
I wish you and “your” brand lots of fans, beautiful and fun scents…fingers crossed!
Stay blogging!
Romana from Frangipani.cz
Dear Romana, thank you. We’re in this together. Here’s to written words relating to perfume as an art form!
Dear Romana, pls contact me via mail with your address!
Dear Elena,
What I like about The Plum Girl Perfume Site is your passion for perfumes’ and scents’ world which I knew nothing about until I found your brilliant articles and sharings of your own learnings and your huge knowledge. In essence it shows your essence as passionate lover and explorer of art for nose and all accompanied senses. This is what I admire, congratulate and salute you for, for your boldness and persistance, to reveal yourself to the world, and your world of scents in most beautiful way! And to continue to reveal many novelties in this magic world of perfumes which doors you have opened, I am sure for many of us for the 1st time. With love and respect and wishing you much more to come, Ksenija
Wow. Thank you from the bottom of my heart – to inspire people to embrace the world of scents and fragrances as an art form is worth it. Just worth it.
Dear Ksenija, pls contact me via mail with your address!
I just found your blog now, because I would like to learn more about fragrances and I like to read about new scents. I’m a big perfume lover I like to try new perfumes, but I’m not professional.
Congratulations for you! 🙂
Hello and welcome! I hope you’ll Enjoy the ride!
Dear Katalin, if you’re located in EU&UK, please contact me via mail with your address!
Oh, thank you! I’m located in London.
Great! Pls do send me a mail with your address – elena(at)theplumgirl.com
Elena, čestitam ti od sveg srca, pratim tvoje objave. Puno toga sam naučila uz tebe. Uvijek se oduševim novim spoznajama.
Hvala!
Dear Olga, pls contact me via mail with your address!