Virginia Cedar is a woody note from the eastern red cedar, Juniperus virginiana, a North American juniper rather than a true cedar. It smells dry, clean and sharply woody, very much like freshly sharpened pencils, and is one of the most widely used woody materials in perfumery.
What does Virginia Cedar smell like?
This is the classic pencil-shaving cedar: dry, straight and slightly sweet, with a faint resinous smoke and very little of the honeyed roundness of Atlas cedar. Its clarity makes it feel modern and minimalist. A subtle, dusty facet recalls old wardrobes and chests. As the oil evaporates, a mellow, almost powdery cedrol note remains for days. It is cleaner and less smoky than Texas cedarwood oil, from Juniperus ashei, and flatter and more linear than Atlas cedar, which perfumers often see as a strength because it does not fight with other materials.
Where Virginia Cedar comes from
The eastern red cedar is a hardy evergreen of the cypress family, widespread across the eastern and central United States. It colonises old fields and pastures so readily that it is often considered a weed tree, and its aromatic, pinkish-red heartwood is used for fencing, closets and chests. The crude oil can be sold as it is or split by fractional distillation into cedrene-rich and cedrol-rich parts.
- Also known as: Eastern red cedar, Virginian cedar, red juniper, red cedar oil
- Fragrance family: Woody
- Type: Natural (widely supported by synthetic cedar materials)
- Main origins: United States, notably the south-eastern and central states
- How it's obtained: Steam distillation of wood, stumps and sawdust, sometimes followed by fractionation
- Key aroma molecules: α-cedrene, thujopsene, cedrol
Virginia Cedar in perfume history
The tree's soft, fragrant wood was once the standard material for pencil casings, which is why its smell is so strongly linked to pencils. Demand eventually outstripped supply of old trees, and pencil makers moved to other woods. In perfumery the oil became an inexpensive staple of American and European soaps and colognes. Its fractions also fed the aroma-chemicals industry: acetylating cedrol gives the smoother cedryl acetate, while cedrene fractions give methyl cedryl ketone, sold under names such as Vertofix, and these became foundations of countless woody, fougère and chypre bases in the second half of the twentieth century.
Virginia Cedar in modern perfumery
Because the tree spreads aggressively and the oil is mostly made from timber by-products, Virginia cedar is considered a comparatively low-impact natural. Perfumers use it widely in fresh masculines, clean unisex woods, soaps and detergents, and as a base for fractions and derivatives. Comme des Garçons notably paired it with rosewood in its Palisander, from its Series 2 Red collection.
How Virginia Cedar wears and what it pairs with
Virginia cedar is a long-lasting base note with good presence in the heart. It pairs with bergamot, grapefruit, lavender, vetiver, iris, pink pepper, musk and ambery woods.
