Haydria Perfumery Tainted Love & Harem Girl: fragrance reviews

The Haydria Perfumery is one of those small artisanal brands you probably won't hear of unless you frequent perfume fora and read actual people's views; consequently the perfumers of those brands often twist their inspiration to fit both their own and their customers' base vision, a good thing. A good thing because this is a market segment with pretty sure footing into how perfume used to be before it was put into a compulsory Jenny Craig regime and often very much into what's affectionately termed "hippy stuff" from ma & pa shops (unfortunately more prominent in the USA than in Europe where I am residing). Haydria Perfumery seems to me to unite these two worlds: a vintage-focused pin-up inspired, retro perfumery with glittering, girly stuff reminiscent of the 1950s & 1960s, but also an independent, earthy, oils & musks approach (that's very 60s as well).

Fragrances of the Haydria Perfumery are composed by Hadria Douglas, based in West Hertford CT, USA, customarily presented in liquid perfume (in glass bottles with Swarovski embellishments), solid perfume & compacts and oil form. I tested the oils, which by their own nature present a smoother, softer ambience on skin and therefore sometimes present a lack of structure, but I know many people are mad for oils so it makes sense to offer this concentration. Both fragrances were nice and wearable, if not mind-blowing, just the right thing for that lady you know who appreciates all things soft and purring and sparkling with boudoir promises.

Tainted Love  is said to be "Reminiscent of innocent 50’s love…with a secret! A flirtatious and feminine bouquet of violets, berries and light amber drizzled with honey. The scent to take you back to simpler times".
I was quite taken with this retro, romantic pairing of violet and powder in this perfume oil, I have to admit. The violet is very there, but not your grandma's violet pastilles. There's a clean (white musk) and at the same time lightly salty aspect about the violet, making it subtly woody and not really sweet; just so. I can imagine this delicate and pretty scent on anyone who romanticizes the big balls of the 1950s and fancies themselves in a pink dress with a big corsage and their long hair in luscious curls on naked shoulders. Seamed stockings would be really good too.

Notes for Haydria Perfumery Tainted Love: violets, berries, honey and light amber.

Harem Girl is the most musky and traditionally "erotic" perfume in the Haydria line: "A forbidden, seductive and fiercely feminine fragrance with refined, powdery notes of iris, musk and opoponax veiled with incense. Truly for those with a taste for the exotic!"
Teasingly dabbing this scent on the wrist to entice sounds like what you'd expect from a seductive fragrance, but Harem Girl isn't neither heady nor too musky in that "get down & dirty" way we associate with, well, you know what... It might be because the oil formula opens up the soft aspects of the opoponax and the warm musk and turns it into a lightly sweet, lightly bitterish composite that would be pretty great in enhancing a lovers' play time. The musks used in Haydria's line are tempered, not especially "animalic" and therefore fit for actually wearing on a number of occasions, not just boudoir action, so you could get maximum mileage out of this one. Harem Girl hides a floral element in its oriental core to couple with a light incense veil, a tiny bit smoky, a tiny bit "dusty". Although iris is listed, I didn't especially smell that component; it's sort of powdery, but it's a resinous powdery from the opoponax (and some milky wood note replicating sandalwood?) that is dominant. It actually reminds me more of l'entre deux guerres and its love of Frenchified orientalia than of later pin-ups of the 1940s.

Notes for Haydria Perfumery Harem Girl: powdery iris, musk, opoponax, incense.

Haydria's Etsy Shop is on this link where you can buy the lot at very affordable prices.

The rest of the Haydria line includes:

• Bernie! : gardenia, jasmine and sandalwood accented with soft exotic notes 
• Burlesque Blue has notes of myrrh, sandalwood and plum cascaded over a cool undercurrent of exotic Eastern flowers
• My Geisha has notes of green tea, orange blossom, white flowers and musk
• Gypsy Queen with lush florals and rich spices smoldering with deep wood notes
• L'Eau Exotique features aquatic notes, Asian champa flowers and sandalwood
• Pure Sin has passion fruit, champagne, dark chocolate and white musk.

In the interests of disclosure, I was sent samples directly from the perfumer.