Ingredients · Woods · dry-down

Iso E Super

Say itEYE-soh EE Super

Pencil shavings and warm, clean skin.

Perfumers call it ambery: warm, dry and softly sweet, like amber resin.

What it is

A molecule made in a lab, first made by IFF in 1973.

Where it comes from

Made from myrcene, a molecule found in many plants.

When you smell it

Dry-down: hours later.

What perfumers do with it

Ubiquitous volumiser: adds radiance, diffusion and a woody-amber halo, from traces to over half a formula.

Worth knowing

Most of its smell comes from a minor isomer present at only a few percent; the rest is nearly odourless.

Known in

Molecule 01 (Escentric Molecules, 2006); Terre d'Hermès (Hermès, 2006); Féminité du Bois (Shiseido, 1992)

Rules

Limited. IFRA 49th Amendment limits; up to 20% in fine fragrance.

Also called

OTNE; tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes; Orbitone (Takasago); patchouli ethanone; Isocyclemone E

On the label of 83 of the 232 perfumes read so far

SauvageDior · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”Good GirlCarolina Herrera · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”Bleu de ChanelChanel · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”Coco MademoiselleChanel · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”Tobacco VanilleTom Ford · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”Santal 33Le Labo · printed “Tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes”

See all 83