vero profumo

The Epiphanies of 2014

C4crown

  • the thrills and spills of the past year in perfume

It’s that storied time of year again when I finally sit down and decide on my favorites of (the thankfully passé) 2014. In spite of a frantic year that was frantic for all the wrong reasons, and in spite of far too much to review and not nearly enough time to write about it, I did indeed, thanks to dear and generous friends and my own initiative, get to stick my nose in not a few things I loved this year, many I very much liked and a few I absolutely loathed.

This time, instead of posting three separate lists, I’ve decided to mix things up a bit on one ultra-list, otherwise you and I will be here ‘till Doomsday, and I don’t know about you, but I have a long to-do list this year…

Another thing I feel compelled to point out is that many of the perfumes that have made it to this list have yet to be reviewed. Some because… well, that’s a surprise I’ll be getting back to in a bit. In so doing, that violates a principle I have about only including the things I reviewed, but we all have things to do. Some will be reviewed here on TAG, and others… well, I’m getting ahead of myself here.

The Worst of 2014

We might as well get the bad stuff over with.

Which means that whoever is in charge chez Parfums YSL will be the first to go down in flames in my revolution dream. It evidently wasn’t enough to slaughter one of the greatest perfume heritages of the late 20th century in terrible/lazy/rushed refomulations, nor even to pour ‘PVC+phthalate doll accord’ into the dregs of (badly reformulated) Paris and call it ‘Parisienne’. But did whomever-should-be-shot-with-current-version-Tabu stop to think about how we would perceive Black Opium? Because it is neither ‘black’ in the slightest, nor Opium in the least particular. It’s as forgettable and unremarkable as last year’s haute blondes. Henceforth, I shall proceed to call it (“perfume”) Methadone, except it neither alleviates Opium withdrawals nor the nostalgic pangs of prior highs. When Hedi Slimane, chief designer at YSL, finds it necessary to dissociate himself from it in a press release, you know it’s one terrible idea. Horribly executed. Alas, not fatally.

Oud

Perfumers and perfume houses: I have a announcement for you:

I. Am. So. Over. Oud.

And yes, I do like oud, except not so much the barnyard stable ‘fierce’ ouds, and certainly not the synthetic oud that passed for the real thing this past year. This is a trend that needs to die. You still have flowers, woods, resins, plants, all with their own languages to explore and their stories to tell. Start listening.

Hyperinflation

True luxury, stated a friend of mine in the know, is always inclusive. Meaning that inflating an already hefty price tag on a niche perfume, pouring gold dust all over the bottle (or whatever gimmicks are used to justify the price tag) and marking it all up by at least 5000% is not, in fact, luxurious at all. It’s simply, as I see it, pandering to the lowest audience of all: those who are too unsophisticated and too rich to know better. There are far too many ‘hyper-luxe’ sheep masquerading as big, bad wolves worth their prices. If I ever have 1000€ to spend on perfume (because I can dream!), I hope to spend it where my business is properly appreciated, not where I leave with a big, fat “SUCKER” tattooed in risible ink on my forehead. Roja Dove and Diaghilev extrait, here’s looking at you, and I say that because Diaghilev in extrait is literally flawless. And forever and always out of my reach. Damn it.

Flankers.

Because they display a distinct lack of inspiration or ambition, and I can’t decide what’s worse. Maybe both?

Worst idea:

Guerlain Shalimar Souffle de Parfum. I spent the better part of two hours trawling through a large Copenhagen Sephora this Christmas on the first day of the sales, and lo and behold, there was Shalimar and Souffle, and I thought I might as well live a little. While I was certainly impressed with the original current-version Shalimar (although I much prefer the amped-up vanilla frangipane of Shalemur), this was a baby-faced powder puff girl desperately trying to look about 30, because that’s, like, old. Or mature. Or something. I wonder whether the marketing department of Guerlain has a huge THINK YOUNGER neon sign somewhere. The problem is, those ingénues don’t have the cash to go to town on perfume. We gens d’un certain âge, on the other hand, do. Grow up, Guerlain! Thierry Wasser – you’re better than that. And you know it.

Worst trend:

Before I shoot myself in the metaphorical foot here, let me start by saying this is me. Your mileage may vary. Yet for all I adore consuming both chocolate and coffee, sometimes together, I’m emphatically not a fan of wearing either of them. (There are a very few exceptions.) It could be my skin chemistry, it could be something else, but as soon as I try, virtually all the perfumes I’ve tried with either note just grows and grows and grows into an espresso-choc Godzilla, the second before I’m eaten alive. Argh!

The Best of the Best

Biggest Overall Unexpected Surprise:

Jardins d’Écrivain’s Junky.

Please forget that I’m a perpetually immature overgrown teenager who took an inordinate amount of glee in wafting Junky a good deal of this past summer and fall, and then laying it on my unsuspecting audience when they asked what I was wearing. But Junky – just as the other things I’ve sniffed so far from Jardins d’Écrivain’s line – is a super-seamless unisex green floral I can’t get enough of whatever the season or the reason. I’m hopelessly addicted. You can bet your vintage My Sin I hope to explore the rest of Jardins d’Écrivains in detail, tout de suite!

Best Seamless Floral, Part One:

aroma M Camellia Perfume.

If your heart belongs to that grand age of perfumes à la Française, if Coco Chanel had a few great ideas in perfumery at least, if you like your flowers bold and luxurious, if you also love the glories of frankincense all wrapped up in a bow of Parisian Ooh la la!, if in short you’re a nostalgia freak like me, then you might love aroma M’s stupendously beautiful Camellia Perfume.

Best Perfume I didn’t expect to like, but did:

Parfums Serge Lutens Borneo 1837

It smells like unearthed secrets and undiscovered sins of the most glamorous, Baudelairean kind. A dry, dusty, ever-so-slightly rose-flecked, cocoa-dusted patchouli that shouldn’t work at all, but does. This past autumn, I’ve been rereading J.K. Huysmans’ Against Nature and The Damned. I suspect Des Esseintes would be all over Borneo, just as Huysmans would be all over Parfums Serge Lutens, when the paradox is actually the other way around!

Honorable Mention: I’m ashamed I haven’t tried this one before now, even considering I’m such a fan of leather perfumes. But Chanel’s Cuir de Russie has been growing on me like a fungus, and the more I wear it, the more I love it. Who knew?

Best Mainstream releases:

Even in my backwater part of the world, miracles happen. Such as the time I discovered Dior Homme Parfum

in my local chain shop. Since I consider the original Dior Homme (and Dior Homme Intense) among the greatest masculines ever made and I wear them whatever the label, I had to sniff this one. I was not disappointed. François Demachy, you have almost redeemed yourself. I dreamt about smelling this on the right kind of man for days. Lacking that option, I’d wear this super-sexy film noir beast, too.

Balmain Ivoire Eau de Parfum:

The original (I have a vintage eau de toilette) Ivoire is such an all-star favorite of mine, it was the very first true perfume review I wrote. There is neither a season, a reason nor an occasion when it is less than perfectly satisfying, perfectly lovely in its green soapy-sappy-aldehyde aura and perfectly appropriate. So I was expecting another hot-mess reformulation when Balmain launched the eau de parfum in 2014, only to find they’ve kept virtually everything that made the original so great except the oakmoss base. And speaking of…

Best “We’re not worthy!” perfume, Part One:

Every so often, it happens that a perfume launches I suspect Planet Perfume isn’t entirely prepared for. In 2014 came Bogue Profumo’s MAAI. Holy St. Mary Magdalene! Antonio Gardoni took tuberose, that most erotic of flowers, and super-glammed and super-sexed it up, and up and up and UP. No Superman would stand a chance against this perfume Kryptonite. It is as luxe, as grand, as velvety-plush, as mossy, as heady and did I mention s-e-x-y? as anything the Eighties ever dreamed of. I’m saving that sample for a date night with definite ulterior motives, presuming that ever happens. As they say, hope springs eternal, and Signor Gardoni – I’m not worthy! Of either hope or this perfume, I can’t quite decide… 😉

Best New Perfume House:

Aedes de Venustas. AdV, the storied Greenwich Village perfumery store, has a very special place in my black and decadent heart, because once upon a time, their printed catalog provided all the perfumes I had – to dream about. Some time later, my sister brought me back a modestly priced perfume from Aedes, and whoever sold it to her was also sweet enough to provide samples for a severely aesthetically and perfume-starved woman. I never forgot it. So when Robert Gerstner and Karl Bradl launched their own perfume line in 2012 with their eponymous Aedes de Venustas, naturally I sat up and paid attention. Fate had plans when I was sent samples of everything AdV and they all blew me away. The running theme of Aedes de Venustas is incense – heartstopping, sacred, swoon-worthy incense, in unexpected combinations that both intrigue and hugely please this jaded perfume writer. I’ll be getting to those marvels in future posts. On that note…

Best Resurrected Floral, Part One:

Why carnation has such a fuddy-duddy, dowdy reputation is completely beyond me. I can’t get enough of carnation; peppery, rosy, clove-ish, fiery, feisty, thick, sweet and utterly delicious. Carnation sprang into my awareness with a bang when I had the chance to try a brand-new carnation (or so I thought) through a perfume split of Aedes de Venustas’ Oeillet Bengal. I bought a decant blind and promptly… adored it. Oeillet Bengale – actually, the name of a rare China rose – is a peppery, rich, rosy incense-laden wonder that shot to the top of my Hotly Coveted FBW wishlist, especially since that decant is going, going…

A Rose is a Rose is a Marvel… a.k.a. Best We’re Not Worthy, Part Two:

Not many perfumers can claim to have not one perfume that doesn’t do me any favors. The one who does like no other is Vero Kern of vero profumo. Heaven help me, I love all her work in any version: Rubj, Kiki, Onda (Onda did take a while) and Mito. So Vero gave us Rozy, her fragrant tribute to Anna Magnani in ‘The Tattooed Rose’, and just when you thought there was nothing new to say about rose, here is Rozy: emphatic, dramatic, sensuous and earthy, with a honey-flecked sweetness that shows a true maître’s effortless hand. I’ll have a time-travelling tale for Rozy’s crimson glories, but more on that one later…

Best Heatwave Antidote/Best Re-Release:

Tauer Perfumes’ Cologne du Maghreb.

Bless dear Andy Tauer for re-releasing this instant 2011 classic, for it subverted much I thought I knew about Tauers and everything I assumed about colognes, mainly that most of them are boring, as Cologne du Maghreb never, ever is. It is sparkling, subtle, intricate, cooling, distinctively different and utterly delicious, and over several sweaty weeks of a summer heatwave, it kept me and my composure as cool as a glass of chilled cedary lemonade. I think of ‘July’, and I think of this cologne. Because It’s That Good.

Best All-Round Unisex:

Olympic Orchids’ Blackbird.

‘Fruity’ – as in ‘berry’ – and I don’t get along that well. But Ellen Covey’s perfume for Seattle store Blackbird is an exception to that rule. This wondrous green concoction with a heart-of-darkness is an ode to the blackberry bushes (something of a plague) of the Pacific Northwest, and if you think blackberry and balsam firs don’t mix, think again. Many of Ellen’s creations have an extraordinary sense of place, and Blackbird’s verdant ode to where the sweet wild things are has been known to make me sing in the dead of night and high noon too, showing just how much one of my favorite perfumers just keeps on getting better and better. And better.

Best Bottled Gothic Autumn:

Neil Morris Fragrances’ October & Chasing Autumn.

Neil Morris is another perfumer whose nose has an exceptional sense of place, and never more dexterously demonstrated than in his two tributes to the beauty of a New England fall, October and Chasing Autumn. Everything I love and adore about autumn is here: the scent of apples on trees and on the ground cradled by leaves, burning leaves and bonfires, the breath of forest trees breathing their seasonal farewells as flaming leaves dance a timeless measure to the forest floor. I do mean everything. If October is mulled wine, apple cider and all things sweetly great on a peerless Sunday October afternoon, then Chasing Autumn is a forest… of Halloween bonfires and eerie shadows in the dark beyond, a resolutely Gothic ode to all things autumnal with no signs of that fabled new England restraint. Nathaniel Hawthorne could do them justice. I’m not sure I could. I’ve never come across anything quite like either of them, and since they’re Neil Morris creations, I know I never will.

Favorite Perfume Experiment:

Sometimes, instead of simply chasing after the Next New Things, it can be good to take a deeper look at what you actually have. The results may surprise you. I was very surprised to learn I owned no less than 22 different Serge Lutens/Christopher Sheldrake creations in varying degrees of full bottles, decants and samples. I then proceeded to wear each of them consecutively over the course of about two weeks, and gained a whole new artistic and aesthetic appreciation of all of them. It goes without saying I don’t have nearly enough of any of them, and wish for at least eleven more…

Happiest Perfume of 2014:

Amouage Sunshine

On rare occasions on Planet Perfume, a concept, the execution of that concept and the final result come so seamlessly and perfectly together it’s all you can do to keep your cool before you surrender with a helpless shrug and a laugh in the face of such beauty. Sunshine arrived with impeccable, supernatural timing at a time when I was seriously considering to pack it in as a perfume writer and just give up the ghost of ever trying to capture the ephemeral art through words. Yes, I reviewed it. No, my words didn’t convey what I had hoped they would. But a few scant days later, I held my daughter as she made me a grandmother to a lovely little girl, and since it was the only thing I had with me at the time, I gave her Sunshine. To see the joy on my daughter’s face as I did was all the sunshine that cold night in November needed. To experience the arrival of a new generation perfect baby girl was all the immortal sunshine I needed. Apropos finding the right words…

Proudest Moment in Prose, 2014 edition:

Amouage Journey

I’ll be honest – Christopher Chong made it very easy for me. Shanghai in the 1930s, Chinese film noir and all things grand and great (noblesse oblige!), wrapped up in the two parts of Journey Man and Woman, one a fiery gold Chinese dragon, the other a sublime osmanthus song, my story of Journey counts among my finest – and hardest – hours as a perfume writer. It took me into new and wondrous places in my research and made me wonder at that story’s continuation of ‘a celluloid cliché of a Shanghai that was an improbable fiction anywhere else but here’. You’ll find no clichés in either Journey, but just as all the best journeys do, you’ll be a changed person when you return home. Whenever I wonder at why I even bother to write about perfume, which happens at least once a day, I look to Amouage. Oh. Yes. That’s why.

Greatest Shapeshifter Perfume of 2014:

Aftelier Palimpsest.

Mandy Aftel’s Palimpsest, inspired by the layer-upon-layers-and-lines of ancient manuscripts, is without question the greatest shapeshifter I encountered in 2014. I’ve never experienced a perfume containing the Australian firetree before, which partly explains it, but this thick, honeyed animalic-peachy-ylang-ylang growl in a bottle did two spectacular things: It completely flummoxed a perfume writer of four years’ standing, and shape-shifted entirely from ‘dead-wildebeest-wearing-ylang-&-jasmine-wreath’ on a blonde semi-vegetarian to a sumptuously sexy come-hither Mae West on Ms. Hare, the carnivorous brunette. Which only goes to prove the artistry of Mandy Aftel and also the maxim, written through several layers of parchment… chemistry is everything.

Best Resurrected Floral, Part Two:

DSH Perfumes Scent of Hope

Among vintage perfume lovers, a select few perfumes stand out for their greatness of execution, their scope of imagination and their sheer, jaw-dropping sleight-of-hand artistry. When perfumer Dawn Spencer Hurwitz was given the bespoke assignment of recreating one such perfume, Jacques Fath’s fabled 1947 Iris Gris for a private client, she apparently succeeded beyond all imagining and expectation. Luckily for those of us who don’t have access to the Jacques Fath original (and being an iris lover, trust me, it’s on my list!), Dawn decided to make it available for the rest of us, and if the original Iris Gris is even 10% of this, then by Golly, it deserves its reputation. Scent of Hope is the apex of Great, Grand Perfume and the perfumer’s art: a peerless, perfect contradiction of everything you’d suspect an orris-centric perfume could be, warmed by the caress of a sun-kissed peach. I thought she outdid herself with Iridum, another of her iris perfumes, but Dawn has had an astonishing creative year and Scent of Hope is among the stratospheric best perfumes I’ve ever encountered. In my life. Why my fixation on the art of perfumery? (Also) Because miracles like Scent of Hope happen. Stay tuned!

Best Floral Reinvention:

Envoyage Perfumes’ Fiore di Bellagio

Readers, bear with me. I tried. I truly did. I tried to think of something else, tried to stir things up a bit, tried to come up with alternatives and be a little different this year. Only to have to give up the ghost, shrug in surrender and kowtow to the spectacular talent of Shelly Waddington of Envoyage as she once again blew my proboscis to smithereens with the companion perfume to last year’s no less spectacular Zelda. Fiore di Bellagio, her ode to Ernest Daltroff’s 1927’s Caron classic, Bellodgia, is neither Zelda nor Bellodgia, but something altogether otherwise and resolutely one of a kind. If you could somehow wrap up all the glamour, all the glitz, all the decadent fun and all the flowers of a 1920s summer day in a luxurious villa at Lake Como, you might come up with something this great, this grand and this glorious. Or, if you love carnations, summers, epically great perfumes and all those words imply, you could take the easier route and head straight for Envoyage and buy a vat of Fiore di Bellagio, the instant before you plant Shelley Waddington on an onyx pedestal in the Perfume Pantheon of Fame and crown her with 20 carat diamond-studded dianthus blooms. This was another high apex of 2014 perfumery for me and although I realize I’m repeating myself (and an army of other perfume bloggers and writers), but there is method to my madness: I recognize greatness when I smell it. That’s all. Go buy it!

My Greatest Perfumers of 2014:

I can’t even hesitate here, and if you’ve read this far, this is a foregone conclusion. But with everything I’ve stuck my nose in this past year, I’ll have to hand it to two. Understand that even the names that made this (overly long) list are at the very top of their game, but these two outdid themselves and their justly deserved stellar reputations:

Dawn Spencer Hurwitz & Shelley Waddington

I’m not quite sure what to say about Dawn Spencer Hurwitz, since I know I’m preaching to the choir, but Dawn has had the most amazing, productive and creative year. Whether it’s her tribute to the Impressionists in her Passport à Paris collection, her Cannabis Culture Collection (review pending), her Brilliant Collection (ditto) or the utterly flabbergasting Scent of Hope (likewise totally ditto), Dawn should be right up there will all the Great and the Grands of perfumery, indie and otherwise.

Shelley Waddington nearly did me in. After taking my breath away with Zelda last year, she pulled another epic rabbit out of her proverbial top hat with Fiore di Bellagio. I had some intimations of what I was in for. Only to find that they weren’t nearly big enough. But Shelley Waddington certainly should be. Make it so…

A Waft of Things To Come

Anticipation is part of the pleasure of writing about perfumes. I’ll never know what pleasures lie ahead. But apart from spending this winter catching up on my review backlog and returning full-speed as a perfume writer to the best of my capabilities, I anticipate becoming acquainted with two ‘new’ brands that have been on my radar for a while: Oriza L. Legrand and Stéphane Humbert-Lucas’ 777. Stay tuned!

Another thing to anticipate is the arrival of not-your-usual perfume book at some point in the year. If you appreciate my perfumed fictions, you might like this book, which will feature not just the Greatest Hits, but also ten brand-new perfume stories, some of which have not been reviewed yet. Watch this space for a book by yours truly with the salacious title: Stories of L’Eaux.

Rumor has it that Neela Vermeire Creations (another all winner line for me) will launch her newest perfume later this year. Are we excited yet? I know I am!

So what are you, dear readers, anticipating in the year to come? What took your breath away this past year, what do you hope to try, what floats you out the door in a cloud of scented bliss?

Tell me all about them in the comments! And have a happy, healthy, fortuitous 2015, too!

With special and perpetual thanks to my greatest enablers and loudest encouragers: Val, Portia, Lucy, Shelley, Dawn, Maria, Neil, Ellen, Andy and Mandy.

Photo: The crown of Danish king Christian IV, 1596.

The Very Best of 2013 – Worn and Adorned

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–  Being the True Confessions of an Alembicated Genie

Oh, to be a perfume writer, you readers might think and sigh with envy, to sit at your leisure and wax poetic on the wafting wonders of the world. Imagine such a thing – to be able to translate concepts and PR releases, to read eaux and extraits as well and as easily as any bestselling novel.

Well, I hate to burst any soapy aldehyde-scented bubbles here, but the simple fact is… being a perfume writer/blogger is about on a par with being a writer of erotica – both are equally hard to do and for very nearly the same reasons. You are trying to translate the untranslatable into prose.

As a perfume writer, you are trying to capture the Muse as she flies from your skin to your nasal receptors and on to your pathetically limited (and verbally challenged) brain, trying to find a metaphor you haven’t already flogged to death five reviews ago.

When I left for Pitti Fragranze, I thought I would fly home on wings of incandescent inspirational sillage, fired up on all my jets with all the Things I Sniffed At Last and all the stories I would tell my readers. Wow, was I surprised when I came home and the very idea of wearing any perfume at all made me turn green, and as for writing about it… fuggeddaboutit! I had no other choice but to simply live out a few weeks scent-free to recalibrate my nose and my mind.

Sometimes, by Golly, you just want to enjoy a perfume without any attempts at analysis, storyline or opinion and for no other reason than it smells good to you. It enhances your mood, it floats your boat, it turns you on to other headspaces and mind places. What follows below is a collection of perfumes and adornments that did just that. Many have yet to be reviewed and to be honest only some of them will be, not for lack of will or interest, but simply because it’s just been that kind of year and this one could be worse…

Perfectly Simple and Simply Perfect

Serge Lutens – Encens et Lavande (Serge Lutens/Christopher Sheldrake)

The word ‘linear’ in perfumese is often used in a derogatory way, meaning a scent that doesn’t develop much from the initial spray all the way to the far drydown. But any artist will tell you that  ‘linear’ or ‘perfectly simple’ can be hardest of all to pull off successfully, and ‘simple’ nowhere implies a lack of complexity, meaning or context. When life ground me to a fine powder, when I was about ready to call it a day and a half, Serge Lutens’ haunting interpretation of incense – a thick, delicious fog of it – wrapped around a searing purple heart of lavender always, always made me breathe deeper and easier. It is exactly what it says on the bottle – incense and lavender. No more and no less and that’s already more than I deserve.

April Aromatics – Rose L’Orange (Tanja Bochnig)

April Aromatics’ owner and perfumer Tanja Bochnig took a very bright idea and made it even brighter and better than the sum of its parts. I love rose. I love orange blossom. Put the two together as effortlessly and as artlessly as Tanja did, and this is sunshine, love and laughter in a bottle, the happy, uninhibited belly laugh of a very happy baby, the thrilled giggle of the girl I never outgrew (and never will). It has made me smile more than I can tell this past year and still does today.

The Thinking Woman’s Incense

L’Artisan Parfumeur – Dzongkha (Bertrand Duchaufour)

A very dear friend gifted me a bottle of Dzongkha for my birthday last year – a great whopping 100 ml of it no less – and not exactly being short on perfume, I had the inspired idea to use it as a decadent (decidedly non-Buddhist) room spray, simply for the way it made me slow down and think. Dzongkha was sprayed onto the Tibetan prayer flag, the carpet, the bedding, the lightbulbs, and in an instant, I could just be… and think, contemplate and ponder without dashing madly around the racetracks in my mind. A wanton, wild extravagance, you might think, but oh, so worth it!

Liquid Courage

Neela Vermeire Creations – Trayee (Neela Vermeire/Bertrand Duchaufour)

In my younger days, whenever I needed a little fragrant fortification, I wore chypres to add a little titanium to my backbone. Unless I just gave in and poured Chanel no. 19 all over myself. Not any longer, since I came to discover that Trayee – a transcendent wonder of sandalwood, incense, oud, spice, bhang and fire is all I need to straighten my spine, face the world and take it on.

The Sweetest of Sins

Guerlain – Shalemur (Shalimar Ode à la Vanille Sur La Route de Madagascar/Thierry Wasser)

This is arguably the world’s sexiest lemur. Or the most utterly debauched yet fluffiest of vanilla/iris/lemon/tonka bean cupcakes, I’m not sure which. Whatever else it is, Shalemur has adorned my person quite often this past fall, because all sins should smell as sweet or should that be – all sweets should waft such sins? Sometimes, girls just want to get in trouble…

And speaking of trouble…

From the Swipe ‘Em Sideways Department

I have a separate section in my cabinet for Scents of Seduction. These are the ones that have definite ulterior motives, and they succeeded quite a bit more than I ever expected this past year.

Amouage – Jubilation 25 (Lucas Sieuzac)

My scent twin sent me a sample of Jubilation 25 (now known as Jubilation Woman) some (long) time ago with the ominous words: “If this isn’t you, then I’m a …” (Never, Suzanne!) It was an Amouage, so I set it aside for fear of the consequences, only to rediscover it this past summer and be blown to smithereens by its fruity-chypre glories. I wore it on a day when I sorely needed to feel as fabulous as possible, and succeeded beyond all imagining when a dashing rock-star poet commented on it. I can’t repeat what he said, but let’s just say there were… consequences. Always the best kind!

vero profumo – Rubj extrait (Vero Kern)

Another very dear friend gifted me with a treasure, this a small bottle of Rubj extrait, and somewhere in a peerless paradise, the white floral angels sang as down below a different kind of devil danced a tune or two of hot summer nights on velvet moonlit lawns. That devil was Rubj. I wear her – not wisely, but I suspect that’s the whole idea. I’m certain Vero Kern would approve.

And speaking of seduction…

Wafting Down The Rabbit Hole

The Devilscents

I’m not sure what to tell people when I say I rewrote an entire novel in just over a month. They give me strange looks and step slightly sideways as if they expect me to breathe fire and speak in tongues any second. What I can say is without a certain arsenal of perfumes, I rather doubt I could have. Just as I write everything to a set playlist, when I fell down the rabbit hole of my own story and its strange and eerie places as writers are wont to do, I needed all the help I could get to stay there, and what better help than the perfumes my story inspired? The ouroboros of inspiration goes around and around… I wrote a story, created the Devilscent Project, perfumes were made, sent and reviewed, and when the time came to knock a sorry mess into something fit for publication, I donned Olympic Orchids’ Lil, Dev #2 & 4, Neil Morris’ Dev #3 & Lilith, and House of Cherry Bomb’s Dev and Lil during the course of that month and waded into the verbal fray, metaphorical sword in hand. I’m proud to say I did it, proud to state it is now the book I wanted to write (but was unable to at the time, for which I thank the readers of TAG – you’ve taught me so much!), and ecstatic to know that the perfumes and the dear perfumers who rose so beautifully to that infernal occasion made the book that much better! True story. Ask Dev.

Done In By Splendor

It inevitably happens I have what I call Wayne’s World moments – moments I want to kowtow to the floor in front of the perfumer and yell at the top of my lungs: ‘I’m not worthy!’ Many friends have unwittingly sent me a few of these, and others – one I call Evil Incarnate, and I’m not entirely joking – sent these marvels knowing full well I’d freak. These count among my biggest freak-out instances.

Amouage – Epic Woman Extrait (Christopher Chong/Daniel Maurel)

Ah, Epic… how do I love thee? Let me count the ways. Twelve sprays on a freezing cold night nearly asphyxiated a rock star (plus everyone else in Scandinavia and most of Northern Europe that night) but did I care? No, and he hugged me goodbye anyway. If I thought the eau de parfum was perdition, I wasn’t at all prepared for the extrait. Swoon.

Krigler – Topaze Imperiale 13

The marvelous thing about Krigler’s Topaze Imperiale 13  – a flawless amber – is that it seems by some strange sleight-of-hand to be constructed upside down, beginning with a decadent sandalwood/patchouli/labdanum and then glowing in the dark with rose, oud, vanilla and orange blossom. In other words, it’s many things I love wrapped up in something that smells like a few handy million after taxes and expenses. I really don’t understand why it doesn’t get more love because by Golly, I’d love it to death and beyond.

Oriza L. Legrand – Chypre Mousse

Once a year these past two years, a perfume will alight out of the blue aether into a world that I suspect is not entirely prepared for it. Last year, MDCI’s Chypre Palatin blew all our socks off, and shortly before New Year’s, this apparition really blew my mind. You see, I cut my perfume teeth on chypres, and I never apply the term lightly – chypres oblige. As Chypre Mousse did by being improbably lush, velvety plush, loaded with thickly applied, musty oakmoss to the max (or whatever accords were used to approximate it) and a definite vintage heritage that ensures there is nothing at all like it, and nothing at all you can compare it to. I know my chypres. Trust me on this one.

Best Comeback Moment

Aftelier  – Cuir de Gardenia (Mandy Aftel)

Dear darling Mandy, you have been very much missed. Rumor has it there is a book underway (I don’t know if it’s true, but wouldn’t that be grand?), but then, you gifted the world with this outrageously sensual out-of-body bombshell of a perfume, and my poor heart has fluttered ever since. I will have much more to say about it, but for now, I can certainly say this much: I’m not worthy!

Score for The Memories

A great tip, a finished manuscript and money in my PayPal account is a dangerous combination. Especially when it involves two of my all-time favorite perfumes in a perfectly preserved vintage incarnation. With a few exceptions, I tend to stay away from vintage perfumes, unless I really, truly, absolutely adored them to death back in the day. For no better reason than this – not only do I live in the niche-free Empty Quarter of Northern Europe, it’s also vintage free, at least where I live. Surely kismet played its fragrant hand on the day I encountered two absolute (vintage) loves. And bought them.

Grès – Cabochard (Bernard Chant)

My mother had a thing for pulpy 70s paperbacks, which was how I first learned about Cabochard in an Irving Stone novel called ‘The Fan Club’ at an impressionable age. Not that many years later, I came across Cabochard in a Copenhagen department store, remembered the book, and bought it. It took me a while to come around to this sexy, slinky leathery green chypre, but come around I did – I was never without a bottle of it again for almost twenty years. When it was gone, I missed it sorely– for the memories, for its slinky-sexy Kim Novak-in-Vertigo vibe, for everything I felt I was when I wore it. So the day I found a vintage version, I bought it pronto and found it to be everything I remembered and loved. In other words, perfect for all the Hitchcock moments I anticipate.

Dior – Dioressence (Guy Robert)

My first Dior was the original Miss Dior, but no Dior quite grabbed me as the louche, bohemian and more than a little risqué Dioressence. Part green, part dirty, part dark and all feline, it wafted behind a short, busty punk in a blue Mohawk through several years of thrills and spills and can now work its green, feline magic on a short, busty blonde all over again. One can never be too louche past a certain age…

The Devil In The Details

I loathe narcissism, but I approve of vanity. (Diana Vreeland)

Sequestered behind my screen, I can pretend all I like I am everything I ever was, but as events no doubt will prove in the year to come, I can’t hide there any longer. This past year, the Genie ventured into beauty products, and although my main focus here will always be perfume, beauty is as beauty does and leopard print pjs will never do for public appearances. I was never more grateful for upgrading my image than when two spectacularly talented perfumers also ventured into skin and haircare…

 aroma M Camellia Oils

Perfumer Maria McElroy of aroma M ventured into haircare and skincare this past year with her Camellia oils (for hair, for the face and a delicious bath and body oil). I have this to say about them all – they are heavenly fragrant, highly effective and utter bliss to use. I’ll take ten of each to go, please.

Aftelier Ancient Resins Body Oil & Jasmine Facial Oil

With Aftelier, you know it will be good. Actually, it will be so good, you’ll be doomed – or spoiled for life – to revel in these wonders and know your face, your skin, your nose and your very soul will thank you for them forever.

Underrated Gratitude

Everything, so claimed James Burke once upon a time, is connected. Nowhere was this truer than when I encountered an issue  – vanity or narcissism, take your pick – and asked one of my Beauty Swamis about concealer. If I have a day I look better than usual, I can thank Gaia the Non Blonde, because she has never steered me wrong, starting with…

Ellis Faas – Concealer & Hot Lips

There are few things cooler than finding a perfect product that does exactly what it says it will, performs impeccably, and makes you feel well, perfect. Thanks to the Non Blonde, I bought a concealer to start, followed by two shades of Hot Lips – a lip stain of a different kind – and wow, what a difference! I’ll never need an excuse not to act my shoe size ever again.

Nars – Pressed Light Reflecting Setting Powder

It was a Nightmare Scenario. My first professional photo shoot at a time in my life I looked (and felt) about thirty years older than my already advanced age. I was mid-deadline (and nearly dead on my feet) and terrified I’d look like microwaved death soup on my dust jacket. A bit of research and a long Skype conversation with my awesome publisher (who knows these things matter!) landed this indispensible item in my mailbox the day before the shoot. It impressed the makeup artist and the photographer impressed me (and quite a few other people) no end with the results.

Dear Non Blonde. Thank you. Signed, a Blonde.

And as I look through my notes for these Best Of posts, somewhere in the borderlands between beauty and vanity, between fragrance and fragrant, connections and people, I think that in my own evolution as a perfume writer, as a writer and perhaps most of all as a woman these past three-plus years, maybe this is the greatest of all year-end wrap-ups and the greatest of all gifts – to know that somewhere out there on the other side of your screen, is a frothing, seething lot of truly inspiring people who believe as you do in the importance of capturing beauty – or the Muse – as she flies. And above all else,  in passing its wisdom on.

Here’s to the thrills and spills that lie ahead in 2014!

With profound thanks to Ida, Lucy, Ruth, Gaia, Tami, Tamsin, Claudia, Maria, Ellen, Neil, Alexis, Mandy and all those friends I feel so blessed to have in my life. 

The Very Best of 2013 – Part One

C4crown

–  the Genie’s slightly belated guide to the perfumes that defined 2013

I’m a bit surprised – to put it mildly – at just how quickly 2013 sped by, and such a year it was! A year of an unprecedented amount of releases, an unprecedented amount of hype and blather, and most of all, an unprecedented claim to olfactory epiphanies that were anything but.

To my own personal dismay, I wasn’t able to write or review nearly as much as I wanted to. This does nothing for my review backlog or my hugely guilty conscience, but I had a rather good explanation – 2013 was the year I became a published novelist, and naturally, that took priority. It also goes a long way towards explaining why October and November seemed to vanish in thin air. As a writer, I doubt I’ve ever worked harder in my life. This holds true even as 2014 begins, because ahead looms events like book launches and Getting The Word Out and dealing with other things that strike terror in my heart.

Yet 2013 was also a high water mark in other ways. Thanks to my fantabulous readers, I was able to purchase an upgraded computer, attend Pitti Fragranze (and what an experience that was!), and more than anything else feel the connection I have with my readers more than I ever have before.

And then, of course, there were the perfumes. One of the last perfume-related statistics I remember reading was this: as of the autumn of 2013, more than 1440 new perfumes were released. Which was more than the year before, and the year before, and the year… etc.

It’s getting to where I read about new brands being launched and I clutch my head in despair. With so many brands competing for shelf space, customers and their own slice of the ever-expanding perfume slice of the beauty industry, inevitably, corners are cut and shortcuts taken, and we end up with what I saw and sniffed at Pitti Fragranze – Eau de High-End Niche, which smells expensive (and all too often is), recycles themes from other, more daring/creative/inspired perfume houses and is in its own aspirational marketing way just as generic and soulless (if far more prohibitively priced) as any ‘mainstream’ brand.

For 2013, which was a year I’m not likely to forget any time soon, I’ve decided to do things a little differently than before. I sniffed more things in 2013 than at any other time in my life, so my own personal favorites in the year gone by will be in part 2 of my Best Of list. Meanwhile, you want to know what really rocked my planet in 2013…

Best Correspondence Between Brand and Perfume:

Donato Style – Glam Monster (Donato Crowley/Kedra Hart of Opus Oils)

Donato Crowley, the LA-based stylist, photographer, artist and all-round Renaissance man, really knocked my socks off with Glam Monster, a glorious, sultry, super-unisexy take on all the very best parts of California and all the naughty bits, too. If ever a perfume somehow managed to wrap up an entire artistic statement in a bottle, it’s this one. My sample is all gone. That bottle can’t be far behind. I need glamour, too.

Best Novella In A Bottle:

Amouage – Opus VII (Christopher Chong/Alberto Morillas/Pierre Negrin)

In the Just Kill Me Now department, Opus VII wins by default by a) showing just how wrong even a perfume writer can parse/interpret ingredients and b) then humiliating herself in full public view by publishing the first review of it. I said iris. Opus VII contains no such thing. What it does contain is a swirling, whirling, spectacularly moody heart of Gothic darkness I haven’t had enough of yet, and I doubt I ever will. This is Edgar Allan Poe, bottled.

And speaking of iris, only this time, it’s very much there…

Best Iris of 2013:

DSH Perfumes – Iridum (Dawn Spencer Hurwitz)

Iris perfumes – a definite love of mine since I first fell hard for Chanel no. 19 – tend to run towards the chilly end of the olfactory spectrum. Not so Iridum, which is a feisty, spicy, incense-laden iris revelation that was love at first sniff and holds its own next to that greatest of all irises  – Iris Silver Mist. For a dedicated iris lover, that says everything.

Best Unexpected Hit:

Chanel – Les Exclusifs Chanel 1932 (Jacques Polge)

Having only ever tried 28 La Pausa from Chanel’s Les Exclusifs collection at the time, I was not quite prepared for how much I liked this twinkling, sparkling little marvel of aldehydes, iris, jasmine and all things grand and glorious. It is always classy, never inappropriate (I’ve worn it to job interviews), and perfectly epitomizes the very best of Chanel in all the very best of ways. Unlike 28 La Pausa, it also lasts.

Best “Slay ‘em, baby” perfume:

Opus Oils – Babylon Noir (Kedra Hart)

I’ll be the first to admit it – I’m biased. Babylon Noir was originally created by Kedra Hart for the Devilscent Project, but it launched to the general public on Valentine’s Day last year, and likely has been slaying scores of hearts and swollen heads ever since. I know for a fact that my bottle is often loaned to Ms. Hare for nefarious purposes with a 100% success rate, because that’s what best friends do – support each others’ nefarious purposes…

Best New Brands I discovered at Pitti Fragranze:

This was a hard decision, since I sniffed many, many things from many, many brands (don’t get me started on those bags of Pitti samples I haven’t dared touch yet) in Florence, but two dedicated perfume brands in particular stood out from the rest: Bruno Acampora and Parfums de Marly. I’ve worn several of Bruno Acampora’s oils (Iranzol was an instant love) and even a lethal dose of Parfums de Marly’s Herod over the course of this past autumn, and although I haven’t had enough time to do them the verbal justice they certainly deserve, they have taken my breath away.

Best Applied Epiphany:

Tauer Perfumes’ Noontide Petals (Andy Tauer)

One of my favorite moments at Pitti Fragranze was finally being able to say hello to Andy Tauer – and sniff ALL the Tauers, which I never had before. Andy will be another expensive person to know. I was also very curious to try Noontide Petals, which was getting a lot of press at the time. So after politely enquiring whether I was sure – Tauers are known for having the perfume half life of plutonium – Andy then proceeded to sweep me off my feet with Noontide Petals by spraying my arm. My nose was glued to my wrist the rest of the evening. It really IS… all that in a blinding burst of sunshine.

Best Perfume Reformulations:

vero profumo’s Voiles de Parfum (Vero Kern) & Neela Vermeire Creations Mohur Extrait (Neela Vermeire/Bertrand Duchaufour)

Interesting things happen when a perfume concentration is amped up. Facets only partly apparent in an eau de parfum can take on whole new multiverses of context and significance. Nowhere was this more evident that in vero profumo’s Voiles de Parfums line of Rubj, Kiki, Onda and Mito, because Vero Kern does not simply add more jus – she redefines and reconstructs her own work to breathtaking effect – as she did. Likewise, Mohur, Neela Vermeire’s no less beautiful perfume was redefined in extrait, and an already bone-chilling glorious creation was painted new in ever richer and more opulent hues. I thought it would be impossible to improve on the peerless Mohur. I was dead wrong.

Speaking of dead wrong…

Worst Perfume Idea, Ever:

O’Driu’s Peety (Angelo Pregoni)

Call me old-fashioned, call me a prude, call me whatever you like. Sometimes, I can admire the concept behind a perfume even if I can’t wear it. Sometimes, I love the perfume and ignore the concept completely. So let me just state that I truly admire the degree of chutzpah/audacity behind Angelo Pregoni of O’Driu’s Peety. It appeals no end to my inner post-punk iconoclast. That’s the idea. The reality of Peety, however, is just about the vilest thing I sniffed this year, mainstream launches included. Your mileage may vary. But this one turned me chartreuse in the worst way, and not just because it was sprayed upon a feather.

From The Bad Idea Department:

One word – oud. Enough of the oud already. Yes, it is a marvel of a raw material. Yes, incredible, astonishing perfumes contain oud. Yes, it has many facets and aspects that can all be shown in many revelatory ways. But dear Creative Directors and perfumers – who are you kidding here? Real oud is now a very rare commodity. Apparently, so is creativity. Which I frankly find hard to believe considering the number of new launches in 2013. Wait a minute…

How To Kill A Storied Fragrant Heritage, Part One:

Dior.

How to Kill A Storied Fragrant Heritage, Part Two:

Yves Saint Laurent. Belle de Opium. Manifesto. I rest my case, because once upon a fabled time, a fashion genius truly cared about his perfumes. Alas, they no longer do at either Dior or YSL.

Worst Aspirational Marketing:

I suppose it’s one thing to flat-out declare your indifference to 99% of Planet Perfume and set your price point accordingly. But since I suspect that 99% of perfume aficionados buy way more niche/indie perfume than the one percent (I could be wrong), I think Roja Dove is doing us 99% a serious disservice by creating something so flawless as Diaghilev in extrait and then pricing it in the exosphere of attainability, splits or no. If that marketing tactic doesn’t prove that life isn’t fair, I don’t know what does.

Best Witnessed Out-of-Body Moments:

I have a friend – tall, good-looking, young, green-eyed, a Scorpio (which figures), who recently stated he was in need of an image upgrade which also necessitated… perfume. His former staple Fleur du Male notwithstanding. So one evening chez Genie, I sat him down with some of the stellar contents of the Red Ikea Cabinet of Doom. And then, I experienced something most passing strange. He sniffed a perfume (Olympic Orchids’ Dev no. 2) and jumped off the floor in a flash. “Holy “#!”§€%!?. What IS that? That should be… illegal!!!” His doom was sealed with Amouage’s Fate Man. He’ll never touch anything mainstream again. Mission accomplished.

Most Extravagant Habit of 2013:

By this time, to my own surprise not least, I have acquired a LOT of perfumes. So it follows that I should use them in whatever ways I can. Mostly, I simply wear them, but in the past year, whether testing for review or simply my own decadent pleasure, I’ve taken to spray my bedding, my Tibetan prayer flag, my carpet and sometimes, the radiator of my living room. This was how I discovered that Janice Divacat is a definite Amouage fangal, whereas Hairy Krishna prefers Serge Lutens.

Greatest Vicarious Pleasure:

A friend I made in Florence took me to an English apothecary in a Centro Storico side street that also sold Frédéric Malle’s Editions de Parfums and Serge Lutens’ export line. I thought she deserved the very best and introduced her to Carnal Flower. She floated, she told me later, the rest of the afternoon on a cloud of tuberose bliss. I was so proud of her. And when I can, I’ll buy it for her in every incarnation. Because that much bliss to follow is so worth it.

Best Vicarious Pleasure, Part Two:

Furthering pleasure to a dear friend and fellow blogger, Caro of Té des Violetas, by sending her a decant of Fate Woman when Argentine customs impounded her own press sample. This made me happier than I can say, and Argentine customs be damned!

Best Fragrant Export Ever:

The ‘Mysore’/Santalum Album sandalwood plantations of Australia. This is the sort of thing that gives me hope for humankind – that we will never be without this most beautiful of perfumery materials. So long as we have sandalwood, we can endure anything. And now, we will!

Best WTF moment:

Kinski by e-scentric molecules (Geza Schoen)

My sister and I have vastly differing tastes in perfume. For one, she can wear no. 5 and I can’t at all, for another, she used to exude radioactive clouds of patchouli bombs and Obsession for Men. But when she bought Kinski to celebrate her own publication as an author, we both flipped over it. Impossibly louche, impossibly wrong, improbably sexy and possibly the greatest thing two 21st-century thoroughly twisted Sisters Brontë of dark, depraved literature could ever agree upon.

You have been so patient, dear readers, so forbearing. Thank you. You have read through my wrap-up of 2013 blather and are dying to know what skyrocketed to my very top in the past year.

Just as it happened last year, I couldn’t decide between three perfumes I had already reviewed (my criterion for making the list), so I could either roast over a slow fire as I decided which one would win or I could just wimp out and award the Genie’s Best Of 2013 awards equally to all three. They are equally great, equally grand, equally the stratospheric best that perfumery can offer. So without further ado…

Best of 2013, Part One:

Envoyage Perfumes – Zelda. (Shelley Waddington)

Are you familiar with experiencing an artform – a movie, a book, a painting, a perfume – and you have that immediate rush of recognition and revelation? Not only is it good, not only is it something your intellect can appreciate, but your emotions chime in, your heart begins to flutter, and you get it in your bone marrow? You feel it, you think about it, dream about it, want to bathe in a vat of it. It won’t let you go. One of those out-of-body moments – they don’t happen often any more – for me this past year was Envoyage Perfumes’ Zelda. If there is a Heaven, they’ll have Zelda the perfume there too (the firebrand by that same name is already there), because it makes the angels (and yours truly) sing.

Best of 2013, Part Two:

Neela Vermeire Creations – Ashoka (Neela Vermeire/Bertrand Duchaufour)

I am privileged to live in a world that has such dedicated perfume lovers such as Neela Vermeire in it. For her fourth launch, she took her time and no shortcuts at all when she created Ashoka with Bertrand Duchaufour. It is a) one of the most evocative, numinous perfumes I’ve ever sniffed b) has one of the most unusual developments I’ve ever come across and c) is arguably the greatest figgy, floral, leathery enlightenment in eau de parfum ever made. Yes, I said that.

Best of 2013, Part Three:

Amouage – Fate Woman (Christopher Chong/Dorothée Piot)

On the day Fate Woman (and Man) arrived, I remember my surprise. Amouage, who delivers epiphanies, decadent olfactory symphonies and full-blown Wagnerian oeuvres, had gone… did I dare think such a heretical thought? – a tad… mainstream? Well, almost/not quite/not exactly, but this is still very much an Amouage and very much an Oriental with no compromises or shortcuts of any kind. If this is the last chapter of the first epos Christopher Chong has to tell, I can’t wait to see what he’ll put into Volume 2.  But the biggest surprise was this: Everyone in my immediate vicinity – and I do mean everyone: Ms. Hare, my sister, my daughter, lovers and friends, complete strangers on the street, a makeup artist in Copenhagen on the day of my photo shoot – everyone loved it instantly without question or quarter. This has never happened before. So I gave small decants to them all from my press sample, and now have to hide the rest of it away in a secret location, or else it will be abducted/stolen by Ms. Hare and I’ll never, ever see it again. But one thing I came to discover for myself – the most incredible things have happened when I wore it. Such is Fate…

Best Perfumer of 2013:

Envoyage Perfumes – Shelley Waddington

Here lies a dilemma – one of my top three favorites was nominated Perfumer of the Year last year, so my apologies, M. Duchaufour. Ms. Piot – I suspect you have marvels and wonders ahead of you. If Fate Woman is any indication, you’ll very soon be exuding greatness of your own.

My nominee for Perfumer of 2013 goes to…Shelley Waddington, for creating Zelda and then, having the hugely flattering idea to send it to me to review. I sniffed it with an open mind and some expectations – I know she’s an exceptionally talented indie perfumer – but Zelda sideswiped me, stole my heart and never gave it back!

Stay tuned for Part Two, which was all I wore and (also) loved…

Spring Flings!

spring-flowers

 – the Genie’s favorite Scents of Spring

After a long, dismal and dismally cold winter that seemed as if it would never end, Spring has finally…sprung. Even here in the North, even now as I wriggle my sockless painted toes in the glow of the sunlight through my window, and the cats show off their bellies in the warmth.

It’s finally Spring! Time to throw open those windows, time for those deep breaths of sunshine you can feel from the roots of your hair to the tips of your toes, time to wake up, smell the flowers and feel utterly, totally alive in a way the dreary depths of January just can’t muster.

When all of nature is bursting at the seams and exploding right before your eyes, those thick, plush ambers and Orientals seem a bit, well…obvious. Time to pack away those olfactory cashmere and lambswool sweaters and bring out the silks, chiffons and Egyptian cottons of the fragrant world, time to waft a little springtime of your own in your wake, for who knows what can happen when everything you breathe and all that you see exudes hope, new beginnings and promises that may – or may not – be kept?

Because you never know where a spring day may take you, or the glimpse of a flower may surprise you, so long as you carry the spring where you go.

Here, you’ll find the Genie’s own favorite Spring flings, the ones that put the spring in my step and the smile on my face, in an April shower or the depths of a May flower, so long as it’s Spring, my very favorite time of year.

Spring perfumes veer toward either the green, floral or green and floral, and this personal list is no exception. Perhaps one of the most famous of spring perfumes, Dior’s Diorissimo, embodies spring best of all, but since I haven’t had the privilege of trying it since sometime in the Eighties when we were both very different creatures of Faërie, I’ve had to omit it from my list. Some of them you might recognize from this blog or elsewhere, but all of them are loved and adored, and never so much as in the merry month of May, when all of Nature beckons us all to come out and play.

– The Greens of Spring

If ever a color sums up a season, surely it would be green? That scorching chartreuse that burns away all horrid memories of dun and brown, gray and white and lets in the sunshine for our souls.

If you love those great, glorious greens of old, if you could once be encapsulated in all the phrase ‘green/floral chypre’ contains, these are the ones to look for and breathe for.

April Aromatics Unter den Linden

Although linden blossoms in high summer in my part of the world, is there anything quite so honeyed or verdant as the perfume lurking within those fragrant yellow blooms? I think not, since Unter den Linden comes as close to my own inner vision of an exemplary linden blossom perfume as any I’ve ever tried.

Balmain – Ivoire

Ivoire has been with us since 1980, and last year was reworked and redone for a new and hopefully just as appreciative audience. Ivoire – I own the vintage EdT – is a green floral chypre that is consistently surprising, perpetually beautiful and perfectly seamless.

DSH Perfumes’ Vert pour Madame

Lots of potions lay claim to that hackneyed phrase ‘hope in a bottle’. Dawn Spencer Hurwitz’ tribute to those green wonders of our misspent youth doesn’t have to, simply because it is – hope in a bottle. Soft, elegantly restrained and effervescent as all the best greens are, this is suitable for both Mesdames and Messieurs.

Jacomo Silences

This underrated classic (if not by perfumistas), a close cousin to the rosier Chanel no. 19, is unique in that it manages in the space of its evolution to bloom through both spring and summer. From that lovely lemony lily-of-the-valley opening to the almost austere, dark, mossy depths of the drydown some very long time later, you’ve wafted a May morning, a flaming June noon and a hint of July thunderstorm, too.

Puredistance Antonia

I must have heard it not a few times before I ever tried it, but sometimes, the hype over a new perfume doesn’t do it justice in the slightest. Annie Bezantian’s Antonia for Puredistance is nothing more and never less than the flawless spring of your most fevered January dreams. Totally modern and totally timeless.

Green With A Twist

Spring reminds us workaholic writers of the sweet joys of dolce far niente, of sitting in the sunshine with a pastis enjoying the passagiata of a spring afternoon, entirely present in the moment and entirely content to be nowhere else but there watching the world go by. The perfumes below somehow wrap up the whole experience in several happy ways, and whether you prefer a pastis or the more subversive pleasures of La Fée Verte is entirely up to you…

Aroma M Geisha Green

Geisha Green is without a doubt one of the best and most bracing of absinthe perfumes I know, bright with that bittersweet twist of Artemisia, sweet with the promises of violet flower and leaf and herbal with a fabulous thick licorice facet that almost makes me want to drink it if I could over a sugar cube. As it is, I get to wear it, and dream of those passagiatas under sunny spring skies.

Opus Oils Absinthia

Another sweeter and more floral take on the fabled absinthe is Opus Oils’ Absinthia, which somehow manages to pair glorious wisteria, a sinfully sweet vanilla and that decadent wormwood and turn it into a green fairy with a positively wicked gleam in her eye. Et in Absinthia ego…

Parfums Lalun Phènomene Vert

If you prefer your greens strictly that – a bracing herbal kick in the winter doldrums to shake you awake and aware that yes, indeed, it’s time to come alive again, Phènomene Vert will deliver. Glorious on a guy, gorgeous on a gal, with a deft touch of jasmine to hint of the wonders of summer to come.

Vero Profumo Mito

One of the wonders of 2012 was Vero Kern’s spectacular Mito, an unusual green-floral take on all things marvelous, magnolia and green as a breath of fresh air in a beautiful Roman garden on a May afternoon. Wear Mito and write your own springtime myth any way and in any shade of green you please.

Burning blooms

In the story of Ferdinand the Bull, one magnificent bull had no intentions of moving from his flowery meadow just to fight in the bullring, and so he wouldn’t have, if not for a bee in those flowers…

There are no bees in these flowers, just all the fragrant wonders of the blooms themselves, so sit back, breathe in and live for a moment and a flawless, odiferous flower. This bouquet of wonders counts all my own favorite blossoms, and not a few of my own favorite florals, too.

La Vie En Rose

Spring arrived so late in my part of the world that I can’t expect to see the roses bloom until well toward Midsummer, but whoever needed an excuse to wear the Queen of Flowers on a gorgeous spring day? Not I!

Olympic Orchids Ballets Rouges

If it were somehow possible to drown within the depths of a rose, a rose so perfectly rendered people have turned to see the bouquet that wasn’t, Ballets Rouges would surely be it. I’ll happily dance a pas de deux with this rose on any spring – or summer – day.

Parfums Lalun Qajar Rose

This rosy wonder is a magic Persian carpet ride through the roses, with all the twist and turns of Sheherezade’s fairy tales, with its leaps and bounds and flourishes woven in to the weft and warp of pomegranate, rose, a tiny dab of oud and coffee too, just to color you surprised.

Serge Lutens La Fille de Berlin

So it’s not Her Majesty the Rose, it’s the Girl From Berlin, and such a lovely, soft rose she is – or so you’d think before she surprises you with that chypre-like bite. This is a rose that is as young as heart as you wish you were on a May afternoon, and who is to say wishes can’t come true?

Think Pink!

Caron Bellodgia

It wouldn’t be a proper spring list without at least one classic. Caron’s sunny, spicy Bellodgia is pure olfactory sunshine from its peppery opening kick to its spicy sunlit carnation heart, and whenever I wear it, I can’t help but laugh – that May skies can be so blue, that life can feel so effortless and carnations made so perfect.

Ringing all the Bells

Aroma M Geisha Marron

Lily of the valley is not a note I’ve usually sought out, since the ones I’ve tried have made me feel I wasn’t frilly – or girly – enough to wear them. The exception to that rule is another aroma M creation, Geisha Marron, which pairs a lily-of-the-valley with chestnut blossom and other wonders, and in an instant, I’m taken away to a spring day in Paris long ago when the chestnuts bloomed and a young girl’s life was changed forever on the day she truly discovered the art…of perfume. For some, it reminds them of autumn and roasting chestnuts, but on me, it’s a spring day in Paris a very long time ago when the chestnuts and the muguet bloomed and a perfumista was born.

Consider the Lily

Editions de Parfums Lys Mediterranée

Nothing turns me to absolute putty faster than a big, bold, odiferous bouquet of Easter lilies. (Now you know!) And although many, many perfumes claim to be lily perfumes, only one other I’ve tried is as beautifully rendered as Lys Mediterranée. It passes for spring and summer both, but surely, angels wear this one? If they don’t, then maybe they should?

All the flowers!

Aftelier Secret Garden

If like Ferdinand you think there is no such thing as too many flowers to sniff in the sunshine, then Secret Garden is a bottled bouquet of marvels from its fruity, herbal start to a delirious floral heart and a dizzyingly sexy drydown. Just so you’re reminded that not only sap rises in the spring, and there’s more than one way to bloom…

So tell me – what makes you bloom in spring?

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Note: I was reminded that I had forgotten to link to the perfumes previously reviewed here on TAG. This has now been amended, and where I’ve reviewed a perfume earlier, the title/name now links to my review. 🙂

A Mischievous Muse

lavenderkiki

 – a review and a tale of vero profumo Kiki

Today was one of those breathless summer days in Paris with the metallic taste of impending thunderstorms in the air, a hot tetchy, moody afternoon where the dark gray clouds that loomed so ominous to the south had somehow worked their humid, moody, tetchy ways into the very paint and canvas, and even Foujita had to give up and shrug that Gallic shrug he worked so well, to say…

“Pas plus aujourd’hui, ma chèrie. The paint…it sweats even more than I!” At that, he mopped his brow and polished his glasses, shrugged again, and laughed that laugh an artist laughs when he knows the moment may be lost for now, but the time will come again, as time always does.

And even though I lay on the chaise as naked as the day I was born under the dappled shade of the plane tree in the courtyard, finally cool after a long, sudsy soak in his bathtub, I could only agree, and we said our amiable goodbyes as I dressed, tweaked his nose with a laugh as I left, and made my way down the Rue Delambre.

What could happen on such a hot afternoon, what to do and who to see? I felt the summer work its way beneath my dress, felt my stockings rustle against my skin. Even they seemed too much, too thick for such a summer day, where all the windows down the street were open to the still air, when all of Montparnasse and therefore all of Paris groaned beneath that leaden sky, and so I turned the corner and came to La Rotonde, which was nearly empty at this hour, most of the clientele sleeping off the wine of dejeuner in their studios with their loves and muses.

“Gaspard!” I called to the waiter as I walked in. So much cooler in here, out of that merciless heat. “A pastis today, I think, cigarettes of course and perhaps a citron pressé as well. Make sure the water is very cold!”

“Kiki! Foujita paid your tab this morning, Said you were posing for him this afternoon. So how is l’art moderne on this hot afternoon?” he laughed back as he wiped the counter down with a rag.

“Très moderne and très artistique, Gaspard, always!” I pointed to a banquette table beyond the bar, unoccupied except for a dark man with an interesting face who sat at the other end and eyed me with a great deal of interest, but then again, they always did at La Rotonde.

I headed for the Ladies room to wash off a dark green splotch of paint on my hands I must have received when I tweaked Foujita’s nose and to take off those beastly hot stockings and the garters that held them much too close and far too tight to my skin. Even silk was too torrid for such a day.

Madame Lenois, who normally tended the Ladies’ powder room, snored away in her chair behind her counter full of face powders, feminine sundries and eaux de toilettes, overcome by the July afternoon, but someone had left a pink felt pochette tied with a silk string behind on the sink since she slept, or it should not be here…

I glanced to the door, but it remained closed.

I removed the garters and rolled my stockings off with a sigh of relief as I felt the air on my legs. After washing the paint off my hands with Madame’s excellent Marseilles soap, I opened up the pochette and discovered two small vials. Perfume? The elixir of youth? Divine madness?

Only one way to find out!

Perfume! Alors! Oh…and such a one…

As I dabbed a few drops of one on my left hand and down my décolletage, a few sprays of the other on my right, I was transported in a heartbeat, far, far away from Montparnasse to Bourgogne and grand-mère so long ago, to M. Simon’s lavender field beyond the village church, blooming such a burning shade of purple amid the endless vineyards it seemed to dance beneath the summer sun, when simply to breathe in became its own singular happiness, that happiness I kept so close in spite of all the hard lessons and sharper secrets Paris taught me. There was no hard and no sharp in these two little vials, no secrets I couldn’t sing in any cabaret with all the conviction of my almost twenty years, just the eternal green, herbal, floral dance of lavender itself repainted sweet as crème brûlée and more daring, reinvented as new and as artless as a limitless blue sky.

On my right, that lavender bloomed as just as purple but perhaps not so sweet. It wore its mischief cut a little lower and a not a little fruitier, and danced a measure of its own around and around its lavender heart, no less grand and no less burning.

I had to sit down a moment on the setee in front of the mirror, overcome by the memory, as Madame Lenois snored her siesta away and all of Paris groaned beneath a heatwave outside, as Gaspard prepared my pastis and my citron pressé, as the dark man with the burning eyes in the corner no doubt waited to watch me again.

These two little perfume vials were like nothing I had ever encountered before. I was so surprised, surprised at how lavender could dance not just in the wind but in a perfume, overtaken by a memory of long-forgotten Bourgogne and grand-mère and the Alice Prin of long ago, astonished most of all that a memory of my childhood and the scintillating life of my present had somehow come together all in a rush, all in a moment, all of it entirely contained in these two perfumes that now defined me, Kiki. Fresh from Foujita’s chaiselongue and canvas in a Rue Delambre courtyard in search of new adventures and new mischief and …

Wearing this, I could well end up anywhere – on a wall, caught in a sculpture, capturing that concealed thread all those artists needed me to pull out and call forth inside them with a laugh, a bawdy joke, an impromptu dance among the pastels and tubes of paint on a dusty studio floor, or another kind of dance…

Wasn’t that what muses did?

Somehow, these two little vials had found a way to define me as deftly, as brilliantly and as assuredly as Soutine, as Foujita, as Derain had ever done.

I breathed in their promises, breathed in that dusky purple laughter and delicious crème brûlée, and then I checked my hair, reapplied my lipstick, pulled my neckline a little lower, and walked out to introduce myself to that dark man, his own eyes burning with the fires of any artist in any era, a cool tendril of the thunderstorm – or was it that lavender? – twining itself up my legs in the heat of the afternoon, chill with future possibilities.

I slid into the banquette with a sideways glance. That dark man was still there, looking toward the end by the bar where I sat down, and even at the other end, I could recognize another kind of mischief when I saw it, a mischief not unlike my own.

“Monsieur? We have not yet introduced ourselves, you and I.” I lifted up my glass of pastis, mercifully cool and wet on such a hot summer’s day.

“I am Kiki. No more, nothing less.”

“The Queen of Montparnasse!” shouted Gaspard from behind the bar. “Nothing less than that!”

“Ah.” I saw him hesitate for a moment as he wrestled with his words.

Un Americain? They were everywhere in Paris these days.

The next instant, he rose and slid in beside me on the banquette.

Indeed an artist with indeed a vision, I could see it so clearly in the fires behind his eyes, tell in the way he held his glass of pastis, the way his shoulders shifted towards me as he spoke.

“Pleased to meet you, Mademoiselle Kiki. I call myself Man Ray.”

For a long moment, we simply sat and watched each other over the edge of our pastis, breathed in the purple promises of lavender and the sweeter pledges of crème brûlée beneath it.

And in that moment, life and even art was reinvented and made anew, wrapped up in all its burning purple promises, on a July day on Montparnasse.

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Notes for Kiki extrait: Bergamot, citron, blackcurrant, lavender, geranium, musk, patchouli, opoponax, amber, caramel

Notes for Kiki eau de parfum: Bergamot, citron, passionfruit, blackcurrant, lavender, geranium, musk, patchouli, opoponax, amber, caramel 

With a thank you to the beyond wonderful and hugely inspiring Vero Kern.

vero profumo perfumes are available from Luckyscent and First in Fragrance.

My samples were sent by Campomarzio70 as part of a promotional Facebook draw.

Original photo of Kiki de Montparnasse (Alice Prin) by Man Ray.