For anyone having a ‘sort out’ in the home, here’s some top advice from perfume expert Jonny Webber from PerfumeDirect.com on where and how to store perfume to ensure it stays fresh and fantastic not old and fusty.
“According to our recent survey, a massive 45 per cent of people store their perfumes or aftershave on show in the bedroom and 39 per cent in the bathroom, leaving only 16 per cent of people actually storing their scents correctly.
So where is the best place in the home to keep fragrances fresh and prolong the ‘just opened’ scent of your perfume?
Make perfume last longer – Store perfume in a dark place
With so many gorgeous and intricately crafted bottles that help to lure us into buying certain perfumes, it’s tempting to proudly display perfume bottles on a shelf or drawer top, worse still a windowsill. It’s handy too – for quickly adding that final touch to a morning or evening routine.
But exposing perfume to light and frequently altering temperatures is a sure fire way for perfumes to lose their original aroma.
Exposure to both natural and artificial light breaks down a scented liquids’ makeup, which over time can cause it to discolour and its chemical composition to change, altering its smell.
Keeping perfume in a cupboard, drawer or wardrobe will keep exposure to light to a minimum and help to keep it in its original state for longer. Alternatively, it can be kept on view but store it in its boxed packaging (or a decorative box).
Keep it at a cool and consistent temperature
Similar to the effect of light on scented liquids, perfume doesn’t like going from hot to cold and vice versa. Temperature fluctuations can alter the physical properties of a perfume’s ingredients.
Humid environments like bathrooms, and bedrooms that might get hot in the summer and are kept warm with central heating in the winter, are the worst places to actually store scents. Keeping bottles of perfume at a consistent temperature of between 60 and 70 degrees is the best option. So pick a cool space that’s not prone to extreme temperature change to store your perfume.
Perfume can also be kept in a fridge – just like you would store a fine wine or bottle of champagne.
Fresh air is not a fragrance’s friend
A perfume won’t begin to ‘age’ until it has been sprayed at least once. It’s the introduction of oxygen that begins the oxidation process – much like when foods are opened from airtight containers. Keep bottles unopened until you’re ready to use them every day, or once opened and used make sure you keep the lid on the bottle to help to seal it.
In general, your perfume likes to be used fairly quickly and not sat in the bottle. This is because half-empty bottles leave room for oxygen to break down the scent.
PerfumeDirect.com’s Jonny Webber added: “One of the most commonly asked question to our team is how long will a bottle of perfume last for? The simple answer is that it depends on how you store it.
“If stored correctly, using our three top tips, perfume can last for two or even three years once opened. Some scents have a symbol on the bottom of the bottle that indicates how long the product should be open for. On average this is 24M (two years).
“Most people use on average two bottles of open perfume at a time – one for everyday and one for going out. The majority said that they get through a bottle of perfume every six months but do tend to keep some for at least a year.
“It advisable to accept that if you love the look of the bottle – keep it on display but make sure it’s empty. This way you won’t be tempted to spritz with a spray that’s past its best.”
For more information visit www.perfumedirect.com