Dominique Roques – författare

'[An] immersive debut... with detailed accounts of his trips and vivid descriptions of the scents ... [Roques'] rich travelogue will transport readers' Publishers Weekly (Starred Review)In Search of Perfumes is a fragrant journey across the world, revealing the beauty and mysteries of the perfume trade.Fruits, flowers, spices, bark, leaves, and branches are just some of the natural ingredients from the plant world that are used in the creation of perfume. Dominique Roques, travelling from Andalusia to Somaliland by way of Bulgaria, Laos, El Salvador, Indonesia and Egypt, describes his search to find the best natural ingredients, precious to perfumers everywhere.In Search of Perfumes demonstrates how the prestigious multi-million-pound perfume industry may begin its life as a single plant harvested by producers surviving on ancestral traditions and techniques and often risking their lives in the process as they combat the rising threat of climate change. Roques reveals the beauty and mysteries of a familiar trade; a return to the source of the world's scents.

In order to pro­duce one kilogram of rose oil, one million flowers must be picked, by hand. This book is my homage to the harvesters of the world.When it comes to nature, Dominique Roques is a unique authority. He has spent the last thirty years working closely with local communities across the globe to establish a sustainable supply of natural ingredients crucial to perfume making. From resin cultivated by traditional methods in El Salvador to rose oil distilleries in India as old as the Taj Mahal, his network reveals an elusive trade built on the fault lines of tradition and modernity.With In Search of Perfumes, Roques takes us on a fragrant journey from Andalusia to Somaliland, revealing seventeen of the industry's most precious ingredients and the vast but delicate ecosystem sustained by the artisans who are its caretakers.Roques shows us the beauty and mysteries of a familiar trade. This is a return to the source of the world's scents.