"Is it to do with an old legend ? .......... On the island of Usedom there is a recently made-dry swamp called Thurbruch, also Auerochsenbruch. Much of the area used to be covered by forest, in which griffins were said to be living. Once a herdsman took his little son with him in the forest, while grazing his herd. When he had to leave his son alone for a while, a griffin came and took his son with him to his nest, where he put him between his own young. When the herdsman returned and didn't find his child, he immediately knew what had happened. He hurried to the griffin's nest, and found the old griffin already flown out again. The father bravely climbed into the mighty fir-tree, and saved his son who had managed to keep clear from the griffin's young. When they stood on the ground again, he put the fir-tree on fire to destroy the griffin's nest. In that he succeeded, but unfortunately the whole forest was set on fire. So, until recent years, peat-diggers will sometimes find carbonized tree-trunks in the swamp, that reminds them about that big wood fire....... and the woody swampy herb notes of Impromptu."
Deciding on the Griffin all began with wanting an animal image because the fragrance is a "leather" perfume, albeit botanical. When I mentioned this to Greg he said, "It should be a bird because of the wings." I asked, "Why a bird?" He said "I used the wings because it represents freedom and spontaneous, fleeting creation." Love that, but a bird didn't seem right. Then the Griffin popped into my head which led me to do some research to find that in ancient cultures this mythological creature, like the dragon, is a symbol of divine power and guards treasure.
In alchemical texts both the lion and the eagle are solar creatures often depicted in relation to the achieved goal, alchemical gold, and a new direction. This juxtaposition and dualistic nature stems from the Griffin having the attributes of two powerful beings.
Since the color harmony for Impromptu is a antique mossy gold, chosen from Gregs illumination and Impromptu as a fragrance contains spice and smoke, the association of the sun and a spiritual guardian of gold seemed auspiciously appropriate.
Impromptu is a woody, smokey, leather perfume. The first rendition was not documented since it was created with the contents of bottles from multiple experiments. This new manifestation has been built by looking over the formulas of those experiments and rebuilding based on the fumes emanating from the two large empty bottles that housed the original version.
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