Yuzu Flower

Note Profile

Botanical

About

Yuzu flower is the blossom of Citrus junos, the Japanese citrus whose peel is already published here as yuzu. It reads as a soft green-citrus floral. Premiere Peau calls it 'delicate green-citrus-floral' with 'neroli-like transparency', and places it below orange blossom: 'less sweet than orange blossom, less indolic, more restrained'. Rising Sun Botanicals, selling a distilled oil, calls it 'crisp, fresh, clean, floral with citrusy woody undertones'. It is not the fruit note. Both sources put the flower softer and more floral than the peel.

Scent Profile

Floral is the body of the note, because both sources lead with it: Rising Sun Botanicals reports 'a predominantly floral character', Premiere Peau 'delicate green-citrus-floral'. Citrus sits just under it and is named by both, as 'bright citrus top notes' and as the citrus half of 'green-citrus-floral'. Green comes from Premiere Peau's 'subtle green bitterness from petitgrain-type compounds' and from Rising Sun's 'hints of green' in the dry-down. White_floral carries the 'neroli-like transparency' both times it is claimed, and is held well below neroli's 0.82 because the same source says the note is 'less sweet than orange blossom, less indolic, more restrained'. Below: a slightly woody dry-down (dry_woody, the 'characteristic yuzu tartness' (sour, the petitgrain-type herbal edge (aromatic_herbal, and the 'clean' read (clean_musk.

ScentWheel

Breadthmedium

EnvelopeHeart · ~4h lasting

Family Floral, Fresh & Citrus, Green & Aromatic

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

Origin

The flowers of Citrus junos, a citrus tree grown mainly in Japan, Korea and China. Extraction is rare. Premiere Peau states that 'no significant commercial extraction exists' and that 'yuzu flowers are rarely harvested for aromatic purposes'. One supplier, Rising Sun Botanicals, does sell a yuzu flower essential oil and gives a yield of about 5,000 kg of fresh flowers per 1 kg of oil. Both statements can hold at once: a real extraction at boutique scale, not a material in general trade. Most appearances of this note in finished perfume are reconstructions built around linalool and other citrus-blossom materials rather than a distilled flower oil.

Usage in Perfumery

Used as a heart note where a citrus blossom is wanted without the weight of orange blossom. It gives the transparency of neroli with a tart edge and a green bitterness of the petitgrain type. Six Fragrantica perfumes carry it. It sits with neroli, petitgrain, hedione-type florals and light musks, and it does the work of a citrus top note that survives past the first minutes.