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This Is the Cheapest Way to Make Your Own Custom Cologne

Olfactory NYC offers a fully custom fragrance experience, in-store or online — but with guardrails, of course.

olfactory nyc custom scentEvan Malachosky

By Evan Malachosky

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Scent is a personal thing. Much like taste, what qualifies as either “good” or “bad” differs from person to person — hence why there are so many options for both. Sure, picking which takeout place to order from is certainly a struggle, but have you ever tried to shop the cologne counter at your nearest department store? It’s a hellish experience and a guaranteed headache.

That’s why brands sell sample sets and, if you like one, entire bottles direct by mail, bypassing the sensory overload of in-person shopping. But even though there are plenty of options in each set, it seems everyone settles on the same one or two standouts. Keyword: settles. Everyone smells the same, and everyone’s eager to find a new signature scent. Nowadays, while there are loads of cool-smelling colognes, none feel particularly unique anymore. You have no connection to the notes, which are abstract as is.

But there’s a small New York City shop that offers a new way forward: Olfactory NYC lets orderers of its custom scent package create their own signature fragrance for only $85, either at one of its brick-and-mortars or at home, by mail.

Olfactory NYC Custom Scent

Pros

  • You get a semi-custom scent for less than $100
  • The process can be completed in-person or at-home
  • You can easily reorder new bottles using your custom recipe

Cons

  • Only the label gets personalized

How Olfactory NYC’s Custom Scent Works

  1. Explorer Box
  2. Tinkerer Box
  3. Order Your Scent

If you live in, or are visiting, NYC, you can pop into either one of Olfactory NYC’s brick-and-mortar stores — in the West Village or Nolita. But the real appeal here, in my opinion, is that you can run through the same process via the mail, with virtual check-ins to assist you along the way.

First, you order the Explorer Box, which features sample-sized bottles of the brand’s 9 core fragrances. They arrive packaged with paper test strips, making at-home sampling easy. After judging them side by side, you’ll pick a favorite. From there, you’ll order the Tinkerer Box, which features 6 variations of your selected scent. Each one represents a different direction you take it, thanks to a select added ingredient.

olfactory nyc
The Explorer Box features sample-sized spray bottles of each base fragrance.
Evan Malachosky

When you’ve decided which you like best, you scan a QR code within the box and order your final scent. You’ll pick a color for the box and what the label says, but not how the bottle looks, per se.

Olfactory NYC Custom Scent Review

I started Olfactory NYC’s custom scent process as a gift for my fiancée. On the heels of our engagement, I figured a custom fragrance for the myriad events we’d be forced to mingle at the coming months was a nice gift — something she could wear now, while we’re still celebrating, through to our wedding day, whenever that ends up being.

That means we worked through all three steps together, making a scent that’s neither traditionally masculine nor too feminine. It’s somewhere in the middle — a lot like my fiancée but equal parts something she wouldn’t have necessarily ever picked out.

First, we sat down with the Explorer Box. It arrived fast, too — within three days of my ordering it. After plenty of spritzing, letting the scent percolate, picking it up the morning after and trying the same process all over again, we picked Jayden, a scent that’s rich with cedar- and sandalwood mixed with a little incense. It was made by master perfumer Harry Fremont, who has created colognes for Adidas, Diesel and Tom Ford, among others.

olfactory nyc
The Tinkerer Box shows how slight changes and subtle additions can totally transform the base fragrance.
Evan Malachosky

Next, we paid for the Tinkerer Box, which included Jayden and 6 variations of Jayden. It arrived just as fast, packaged nice and orderly and with even more paper strips for sampling.

  • Sample 1: extra cedarwood + incense
  • Sample 2: extra sandalwood, musk, hinoki and juniper
  • Sample 3: vanilla, cardamom, and tobacco leaf
  • Sample 4: Indian jasmine, extra cedarwood and bois de rose
  • Sample 5: driftwood and sea salt
  • Sample 6: oud, extra sandalwood, extra incense, cognac and suede

Some variations add smokiness, while others added spice. Some had a citrusy edge, while others were overtly floral. It was fun to see how certain additions changed the makeup of the original base. Plus, for someone super picky, this presents a way to truly personalize the scent you wear. Or, if you’re a budding perfumer who’s too amateur still to order a few dozen essential oils, carrier oils and alcohol, this offers an intro into the industry. Or, in my case, this process is a nice way to capture a moment. After all, scents make up our most powerful memories.

My Custom Olfactory NYC Scent

After plenty of deliberating, we went with Jayden as is. Sure, that means we didn’t really customize our cologne, but we felt like we did — we experienced it in all of its possible forms and picked the one we liked best. It’s undeniable but not in an annoying way, and the woodsy elements mingle well together. We got why it’s a mainstay in Olfactory NYC’s main collection.

olfactory nyc
The simple packaging lets the liquid inside shine.
Evan Malachosky

Next, we were able to customize the bottle. Appearing in typewriter font on the wraparound white paper label, your custom personalization can be up to 9 characters. Because we were doing this together, we went with our initials, stylized with two periods between them: E.N.

The custom scent took a little longer to arrive than either sampler, but that’s to be expected — each one is made to order. In person, the process takes about 45 minutes, but there’s something to be said for taking your time to truly experience each scent and its subsequent variations. Plus, this way there’s no one on the other side of the counter interfering with your experience. Olfactory makes it super simple to do on your own, even if it requires a little bit of back-and-forth in the mail.

Re-Ordering My Custom Olfactory NYC Scent

Pro tip: Hold on to your preferred recipe. Olfactory NYC lets you re-order your custom scent whenever you’d like, either in another full-sized bottle, a travel sampler, in diffuser form or as a body wash or lotion. Simply input the base and your chosen accord and order away. I haven’t done it yet, but that makes sense for folks who really love their custom (or not-so-custom) scent. We’ll probably do it next year, or two years from now, when our bottle runs dry.

Pros

  • You get a semi-custom scent for less than $100
  • The process can be completed in-person or at-home
  • You can easily reorder new bottles using your custom recipe

Cons

  • Only the label gets personalized

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