Clove Leaf

Note Profile

Botanical 15 perfumes

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About

Clove Leaf is the steam-distilled leaf oil of Syzygium aromaticum, a different article of trade from clove bud oil. It runs 80 to 92 per cent eugenol but only 0.20 to 1 per cent eugenyl acetate, and that missing ester is the whole difference. It smells of clove without the sweetness.

Scent Profile

Clove Leaf smells hot and raw, a sharp clove spice that lands hard rather than softly. A harsh, medicinal edge sits behind it, close to a dentist's surgery at full strength. A dry, woody body runs underneath, faintly peppery, with a thin trace of green leaf. There is no sweetness and no floral roundness here, unlike clove bud.

ScentWheel

Breadthfocused

EnvelopeHeart · ~7h lasting

Family Spicy, Woody & Earthy

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Materials That Can Make This Note

Perfumers can build Clove Leaf from materials such as:

Natural extract Clove leaf oil spicy · sweet · woody
Eugenol clove · cinnamon · spicy

Smell words come from published sources.

Allergens perfumes with this note can list: Clove leaf oil, Eugenol

A given perfume with this note may use some of these, or something else, and may or may not contain the allergens above.

Origin

Steam distillation of clove leaves, mostly in Indonesia, Madagascar and Tanzania, at a yield of about 3.5 per cent after eight hours. Indonesia alone makes around 2,500 tonnes a year. The crude oil is dark brown, far cheaper than bud oil, and it is the main industrial source of natural eugenol rather than a fine-fragrance material.

Usage in Perfumery

A cost-effective eugenol source. It appears in carnation, rose and white floral accords and in functional perfumery, and it is a feedstock for vanillin. Trade sources say it is little used in fine fragrance because it brings an old, heavy and voluminous effect, and formulators reach for clove bud oil or isolated eugenol instead. Eugenol is IFRA-restricted and an EU declarable allergen.