Curbside violets

You bit the dust, again. Do you smell blood, or is that just the trucks on your overturned skateboard heating up under the slanting after-school sun? A quick check later, you’re sure you’re good (this time), but you stay pressed to the pavement for another few seconds as if lagging in bed after the first alarm goes off. You make eye contact with a stomped-out American Spirit lodged in a clump of violets sprouting, unlikely as ever, from the corner of the curb that bucked you off your board. One more deep breath, and you’re back, sweat sliding off your grinning upper lip. 

Meet Nosegrab. The latest scent from Pearfat Parfum in collaboration with Dirt and Simple Magic. This is the culmination of our editorial series Sensuous Skateboarding, featuring work about the smell under overpasses, the sound of brick, the feel of learning to skate later in life and the somatic memory of a childhood ramp. Now, we’re bringing the experience of skateboarding directly to your nose. 

Nosegrab has top notes of curbside violets, middle notes of tobacco and upper lip sweat and bottom notes of paraffin wax and hot metal. The name is a play on a beginning skate trick and…well, you know. Nosegrab is a limited edition perfume and expected to sell out. It’s a “mini pear” size 15ML and retails for $50.

Learn more about the process of developing Nosegrab in a conversation with Pearfat’s Alie Kiral, Simple Magic’s Cole Nowicki, and Dirt’s Daisy Alioto below. 

CN: So was the "curbside violet" note directly inspired by curbside violets near your house?

AK: It was, yeah. I think it goes really well with the earthier tobacco, and I thought it would be fun to do a floral. That's kind of unexpected, but then I saw them growing out of the curb and thought, “That's kind of perfect.”

CN: For the skateboarder, curbs are a pretty common obstacle. You're going to get sweaty down by the curbside violets. You're probably going to smoke a spliff. So you got your notes of tobacco in there. You already lacquered your curb. You're going to put a bit of wax.

AK: I used a material called opopanax, which is a waxy wood resin. It smells like an unscented candle. It's that oily, fatty, waxy, resin smell. I love working with it. So I was excited when you suggested paraffin wax. 

CN: I've spent a fair amount of money at the local drugstore picking up candles to go and wax local stoops.

DA: Alie, where does the name for your brand Pearfat come from?

AK: It was a funny joke because I am a Midwestern girl, and there is this French history of perfumery. French for perfect is parfait. It was my cheeky joke of mispronouncing it, and I also thought it had this evocative, juicy, sweet thing. And the third reason is practical. I wanted it to be the only thing that came up if you Googled it. 

DA: Our whole editorial series leading up to this launch is about the way the five senses are engaged in skateboarding. Cole, what is your first sense memory of skateboarding?

CN: It would have to be heat. The feeling of an oppressive summer heat up in rural Alberta. My hometown skate park was just a bunch of metal ramps, which get very hot in the summer. So you fall on them, your skin might get a little seared. There is a strong olfactory angle because I grew up in the prairies, it's just clean air and cut grass. But skateboarding is loud, it’s dirty. It usually smells like piss, but then you become accustomed to it and almost enjoy that set of experiences. 

AK: A lot of people that I've told I'm working on this project that are skaters are like, “Oh, so it's going to smell bad. Oh, so it's going to be stinky and sweaty.” So it's funny you say that.

CN: How do you bring an unusual scent to life? 

AK: In perfumery, we call some things a fantasy note if you're creating a smell for something that doesn't really have a smell. Things like metal are a good example of that because metal has a smell, but a lot of times, it's situational: it's rust or the oils from your hands on metal or things like that. Metal on its own doesn't have much of a smell. 

DA: The process of smelling something is not physical; it's mental as well. The fantasy note is also a fantasy note because it requires you to mentally participate in that image. 

AK: You're so right that it's suggestible. Describing smells is usually just a matter of good, bad, weird. I do some teaching for beginning perfumers, and one of the first things I say is “Strike from your mind bad/good smell.” Sometimes, something that smells bad is exactly what you need for realism. 

So saying you do or don't like things to me is irrelevant as a perfumer. One of the best compliments I can get is that after I tell someone what the notes are, they can smell all of them perfectly. I want it to be accessible and understandable. That's why I try to be very narrative in my descriptions.

CN: Where should people wear Nosegrab?

AK: I hope they wear it to skateboard. Maybe if they're an older person who doesn't skateboard anymore, and they want to be transported back to the skate park or to their favorite underpass. And I also hope that people like me, who never really got into skateboarding but have a lot of reverence for it, can wear it and feel like part of it. 

CN: I might put it on before going out and skating today.

This conversation has been edited and condensed.