Odour
Very dry-woody, somewhat earthy and quite strong with a slightly cade-like topnote. The dry notes yield to an increasing balsamic sweetness as the oil dries out on a perfume blotter. Overall, it is less balsamic than the Virginia cedarwood oil, more reminiscent of the odor of Cedarwood Oil, Texas.
Blends well with
moss notes
Oriental bases
patchouli
rose notes
sandalwood
vetiver
Notes
Major part of production goes to the United Kingdom for isolation of constituents. The rectified oil is almost colorless. An almost cedrenol-free fraction is used as low-cost odor-masking agent. Cedrol and Cedrenol content depends upon sun exposure of waste wood prior to distillation. Little importance for American perfume industry due to similarity to Texas cedarwood oil.
Full Arctander text
#### Cedarwood Oil, East Africa.
The term "it smells like the pencil sharpener" is frequently encountered when various cedarwood oils are presented to laymen for odor description. The above term is particularly suitable for the essential oil of **Juniperus Procera**, a cedar, or rather a cypress, botanically related to the "Texas cedar" from Texas and Mexico and to the "Virginia Cedar" of the northeastern U.S. A. The east African cedarwood oil is furthermore olfactory related to the Texas cedarwood oil.
**East African Cedarwood Oil **is steam distilled from the waste wood in the saw mills of Kenya, East Africa where the trees are exploited for various purposes, e.g. lead pencils, boxes, hand carved figures, etc. The oil is a brownish-yellow or orange-yellow to reddish, usually very viscous liquid, occasionally showing a considerable deposit of crystals. The odor is very dry-woody, somewhat earthy and quite strong with a slightly cade-like topnote. The dry notes yield to an increasing balsamic sweetness as the oil dries out on a perfume blotter. Overall, it is less balsamic than the Virginia cedarwood oil, more reminiscent of the odor of **Cedarwood**** ****Oil,**** ****Texas **(see that monograph).
The annual production of **East African Cedarwood Oil **is quite impressive, usually between *55** *and 100 metric tons. The major part of the production goes to the United Kingdom. Here, it serves as a starting material for the isolation of its main constituents: **Cedrenol **and **Cedrol**, production of cedryl esters, cedrenyl esters and other chemical derivatives of cedrenol, etc. The oil is also rectified and fractionated for perfumery use in Europe. The rectified oil is almost colorless. An almost cedrenol-free fraction (consisting mainly of sesquiterpenes) is used as a low-cost odormasking agent in household products, for industrial perfuming, etc. This oil is a water white mobile liquid which does not deposit any crystals even on cooling. Its odor is dry and woody, quite typical of cedarwood, but virtually deprived of balsamic notes and with little fixative power.
Kenya (or "east African") cedarwood oil is a good fixative for soap perfumes, pine fragrances, wood notes, etc., and it blends well with rose notes, Oriental bases, moss notes, etc. In violet, fougère and chypre bases, and even in modern, woody-aldehydic perfume types, it may well modify the notes of vetiver, patchouli or sandalwood.
It is believed that the **Cedrol**** **and **Cedrenol**** **content of this oil is dependent upon the exposure of the waste wood to the sun prior to distillation. Due to the great similarity of this oil to the (American) Texas cedarwood oil, the **East**** ****African**** ****Cedarwood**** ****Oil**** **has little importance for the American perfume industry.
See also **Cedarwood**** ****Oil,**** ****Texas**.