Mimosa Absolute

Latin name :

Acacia dealbata

Botanical profile :

Mimosa is the flower of a shrub of the Mimosaceae family and the genus Acacia.

Geographic origin :

Originally from Australia, Mimosa is now grown mainly in the Mediterranean region, particularly in the Grasse region and in the Tanneron massif, in the Var (France), and in Oceania.

Chemotypes :

There are only two varieties of Acacia used in perfumery:
Acacia delbata: Known as Mimosa (Mimosa Absolute / Mimosa Concrete), native to Australia but mainly cultivated in France.
Acacia farnesiana : or Mimosa de Farnese - (Cassie Absolue / Cassie Concrete), with a deeper and greener smell than the 'classic' mimosa
It is very easy to distinguish the two varieties since the Cassie has mucrons (thorns), while the mimosa does not have.

Extraction process :

The only cultivated mimosa for perfumery is wild mimosa, in opposition to the horticultural mimosa, which would be the planted mimosa. Wild mimosa has a richer fragrant principle.
Mimosa blooms from the end of November to March and is harvested during this period. Harvests are done manually by cutting the head of the tree and cutting the branches that carry clusters of flowers. Part of the leaves and wood are kept, as they have an olfactory interest too. Agricultural workers can harvest an average of 60 kg of flowers per hour of labour. Mimosa can be cultivated green, semi-bloomed or bloomed. In the cas of green or semi-bloomed mimosa, it is put into a greenhouse. Inthis warm room, water makes steam, and forces mimosa to bloom, to form a maximum amount of smelling compounds.
The fresh plants are introduced into an extractor and are extracted with hexane to obtain the concrete, after the flowers are removed and the hexane has evaporated. The concrete is heated to be softened and introduced into a glazing tank. The concrete can be diluted in alcohol to precipitate the waxes by cooling the mixture down to 32 °F, to keep only the fragrant principle of the flower: the absolute. The absolute is obtained by filtering the precipitated waxes and evaporating the alcohol from the mixture.
The yield of the absolute is 2 ‰.
The mimosa absolute can be diluted in a solvent such as DPG to make it less viscous at use.

Major Components :

Heptadecene (≈7%)
Nonadecane (≈2%)
Ethyl Palmitate (≈1%)
Heptadecane (≈1%)
Docosane (≈0,5%)