Tree Bark

Note Profile

Botanical 21 perfumes

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About

Tree bark is a generic note name, not one material. No species and no commercial extract is behind it. The one source that says what bark should smell like calls it green and earthy, and not sweet.

Scent Profile

Tree Bark smells dry and woody first, whatever the bark. A green, earthy note runs close behind it, the smell a stretch of forest is expected to carry. A dry mineral edge sits over the surface. It carries none of the sweetness you would expect from a gourmand note.

ScentWheel

Breadthbroad

EnvelopeBase · ~12h lasting

Family Woody & Earthy, Green & Aromatic

Read off the wheel, not a label applied to the note.

WorldSee it in Note Island

ScentArt

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Origin

No material is sold as tree bark. The term covers the outer layer of any tree and whatever a perfumer builds to suggest it. The barks that do have named notes do not agree with one another: aspen bark is cold, thin and medicinal, the salicylaldehyde smell next to aspirin; yohimbe is dry and quinine-bitter; thanaka is powdery and sandalwood-like. So the name works the way 'roots' works in this vocabulary, as a category rather than a substance, and the same warning applies: the spread inside it is larger than the distance between many separate notes.

Usage in Perfumery

An evocative, non-standardised note name used to place a fragrance in a forest or against a tree. Six Parfumo mentions across five brands and none on Fragrantica. Imaginary Authors lists Tree Bark in Yesterday Haze alongside fig, iris, cream, tonka and walnut bitters, and gives no description of what the note contributes, which is the pattern: the name does the work and the material is left unstated.