–   a review of Perfume Pharmer & Opus Oils’ Strawberry Passion Perfumes

Summers are short, sweet, filled with light and all too fleeting in this obscure part of Europe I call home. Days expand exponentially to twenty-one hours of daylight by Midsummer, and since the sun doesn’t sink further than eighteen degrees below the horizon, it never does get truly dark at night until late July. The elderflowers bloom, the wood doves coo their summer songs in the beech woods, the philadelphus bushes blossom and all the pent-up energy of long, dark winters explode with a fury as my fellow Viking descendants head straight for the beach on no provocation and the first hints of sunshine, ditching ten months of woolen layers as they go. Overexcited children wolf down ice cream cones the size of their heads, cats hiss and charge at the kitty TV just outside the window, and even cynical writer wannabes feel a pang in their hearts and a ray of sunshine in their souls.

It’s summer, and that’s the only excuse you need to indulge yourself in the fine art of dolce far niente, the sweet art of doing absolutely nothing but paint cloud pictures in the sky, play Frisbee on the beach and…indulge yourself in the one overriding sign of summer in these northern latitudes, a sign so important that it’s arrival makes the national news every year, with prognoses on how well – or bad – this year’s harvest will be…

Summertime is strawberry time, and it’s not summer until the strawberries appear at roadside stands and farmers’ markets, to be eaten straight from the punnet or plucked from a field in the very early morning, to splash with cream or turn them into tartes, jam, homemade ice cream, and dream our luscious, ruby-red dreams that this instant will never end and summer will be as infinite as our imaginings.

Now, Monica Miller of Perfume Pharmer and Kedra Hart of Opus Oils have captured that endless summer dream into two all-natural perfumes called Strawberry Passions, and now, maybe it’s even true that summer never does come to an end.

Strawberry flower essence is a flower essence said to boost low self-esteem, feelings of unworthiness and being ungrounded, and to confer dignity and poise, to be able to be fully present in the moment. Isn’t that something we could all use, any time of the year?

Monica sent her own strawberry flower essence to Kedra Hart, and Kedra returned with two shining, bespoke examples of summer-in-a-sample-vial, and whatever other effects these two might have on my crabby mood of late, it’s virtually impossible not to smile when I wear them.

Strawberry Green is the ode to the berry itself, the olfactory equivalent of biting into a fresh strawberry and letting that sharp, fragrant juice fill your senses with all its summery promises.

It’s the strawberry and the greenery around it too, all fruity tang and flowery punch and such flowers, they are, too. Once that jolt to your senses fades, here come the summer blooms dancing in on a sunbeam, a touch of rose, a whisper of tuberose, a hint of heavenly boronia and a lilting, laughing white water lily, all entwined around the greenery of an ivy and that bright bomb of blackcurrant that celebrates the sunlight and that perfect red strawberry of your most fevered, summer-starved January dreams.

I feel like I’m starring in an alternate version of one song that haunted my wanton twenties, only this one is called ‘Strawberry Beret’, and life will be happy, life will be grand, and summer will always be endlessly warm and infinitely sunny.

As it dries down, ambergris, sandalwood and patchouli gang up with the oakmoss to pull that strawberry back to earth and even you with it. Before you even realize it, you’re singing the lyrics to a song you thought you forgot, and remembering that other you that life somehow misplaced, the incurable optimist that ate up the summer and even life with every juicy berry, when one ruby-hued berry was one too many and two were not nearly enough!

Strawberry Cream was Monica’s wish to capture the cream teas of her British childhood, those decadent late-afternoon times hours with warm scones, clotted cream and strawberry jam, and it’s so delicious, I nearly want to eat my arm.

Perhaps you’re one of those – I would agree with you – whose thoughts of ‘gourmand’ and ‘strawberry’ want to make you run for the hills and far, far away in horrified memory of all those ultra sweet, fruity-floral, flesh-eating ogres that haunt so many perfumista nightmares.

These are berries of a very different sort, sweet as a cherished memory and as opulent as the caramel-tinged flavor of Devonshire cream itself as it seeps into the buttery, crumbly texture of a warm scone.

This is dolce far niente at its finest, when all other cakes seem so overwrought and overdone, this liquid ode to pleasure satisfies my sweet tooth just enough to justify being just a little wicked. Go on. Have another one. Marvel at the way the amber and the vanilla, the ambergris, the sandalwood and patchouli somehow combine so well you’re practically licking cream and strawberries off your fingers and the corners of your mouth. Never mind tomorrow. Forget all you knew about yesterday. Live a little. Laugh a lot. Lick cream off your fingers, too, just because you can.

I’m so not a fruity perfume person. Yet if anyone could convince me, it’s Kedra – and Monica – with these two odes to my favorite sign of summer. Strawberry Green is what I’d wear to kick out that crabby self and stand a little taller, happier and more confident. Strawberry Cream is what I’d dab whenever a cake craving strikes and there’s none to be had. When I want to feel a little reckless, a little daring, and metaphorically lick cream and strawberries off my fingers.

Never forget, that just as the flower remedy promises, you are deserving of all happiness and all pleasures – so why not indulge yourself? It’s summer! Kick back, be happy, be present in the moment and dream those strawberry dreams…forever!

Strawberry Passions is available directly from the Perfume Pharmer’s etsy site.

Notes for Strawberry Green: Martha’s Vineyard strawberry flower & leaf essence, pink pepper, white water lily, red mandarin, ivy accord, rose, tuberose, boronia, strawberry, blackcurrant, peach, green tea, sandalwood, patchouli, beach found ambergris, oakmoss.

Notes for Strawberry Cream: Martha’s Vineyard strawberry flower & leaf essence, pink pepper, bergamot, tangerine, boronia, peach, strawberry, raspberry accord, amber, vanilla, patchouli, beach found ambergris, sandalwood.

Disclosure: Samples of both Strawberry Passions perfumes were provided by Perfume Pharmer.

With special thanks to Tiger Powers, who pointed to the main image, which says everything you need to know about strawberries – and passions!