Often, it’s the sensual things that we remember about our travels, even more than the experiences we engage in. The senses may help us remember for the rest of our lives. For centuries, the Bahamas have been a source for perfume ingredients created and sold all over the world. Their fruits and flowers add lushness and tang. Now, you can buy locally crafted scents and make your own at Freeport’s The Perfume Factory on Grand Bahama Island! I was happy to be hosted to experience it.
The factory is based in a reproduction of one of the island’s grand mansions and painted pink. Inside is like a luxurious, colonial-era feminine boudoir. That’s where you can sit at a dressing table to select fragrances and mix your own. I was surprised that most of the fragrance notes that you select from are imitations of standard fragrance brands. As a foodie with a tiny bit of a green thumb, I know what many flowers, herbs and spices smell like. I guess most other people -- tourists -- don’t. So, they take a scent they know they already like and they tinker with it a bit. There are women’s and men’s options available. Your perfume is then bottled, labeled and named with whatever your name it. Be sure to make your handwriting clear! I guess mine wasn’t, so the name isn’t quite what I picked. They keep your fragrance formula on file and can ship perfumes all over the world!
If you keep to original ingredients, the oils are chiefly florals and gourmand elements, along with musk and patchouli.
Further inside the building is a perfume factory where they make fragrances (both liquid and solid) and scented beauty products.
