Aftelier Cuir de Gardenia: fragrance review

"And at night I love to listen to the stars. It's like five hundred million little bells. [...]"You...you alone will have the stars as no one else has them....only you will have stars that can laugh."
~Antoine de Saint Exypery, Le Petit Prince.

Cuir de Gardenia, gardenia's leather. It is my tendency to focus on names, believing that they carry their own wisdom. So coming across this enigmatic coinage I couldn't help but pause and think, maybe lost a bit into my own lethologica. The leathery facets of gardenia, a flower becoming skin-like, the hide of an animal thrown atop tender skin. Yes, it sounded sexy as hell. Is sexy all there is when it comes to perfumes though?

Working with gardenia for a perfumer presents its own challenges. The flower doesn't yield a sufficient or steadily available extract (though there is one in extremely limited quantities) so an approximation is conducted through the synergy of pliable materials; doubly difficult when sourcing only off the natural palette. Of those, I sense the generous use of jasmine, with its lactonic and green facets highlighted, in Aftelier's Cuir de Gardenia; they produce an at once fresh and creamy variation on the gardenia theme, a sort of Pur Desir de Gardenia meets Hedy Lammar.
The mossy element in the base suggests that this deceptive floral hides a more introspective core beneath its veneer and it's worth waiting for it to surface beyond the delicious flower atop.

Artisanal perfumer Mandy Afteler did use a tiare flower absolute from a small producer (tiare is the Tahitian gardenia), which accounts for the more exotic and, yes, the "creamy smelling" feel you get upon testing this bewitching fragranc. The candied aspects meet the roughness of castoreum (an animalic note traditionally used in leather blends). She also mentions ethyl phenyl acetate, which although is usually rendering a rosy not in perfumes, here she describes it as lending a whiff of sweet peas. The liquid version of Cuir de Gardenia is oily, lending a softer ambience, but it doesn't feel oily, it absorbs quickly and well.

I did not find a huge stonking beat of leathery butchness, nor a dark, dangerous, skanky gardenia that would shriek Norma Desmond like off the vial (for a different take read Gaia's The Non Blonde's review), but then neither did I expect to: Cuir de Gardenia isn't a "cuir" per se, it's an illusion of an animal turned into a flower. If anything, it's more musky than leathery. It's a daydream, a waxy memento of sensuality hidden in a drawer for a rainy day, the feeling of physical happiness. It's a matutine moment stolen, when you can hear the stars laugh.

Aftelier's Cuir de Gardenia is available in liquid extrait de parfum and solid versions, on the official Aftelier eboutique. Although natural perfumes come at an increased cost per ml compared to commercial perfumes (even niche), I find that the options of owning minis and solids are a lovely way to get a feel of the work of artisans in the field.

The Fragranta Man has some interesting info on the sourcing of the materials. 

In the interests of disclosure I was sent a sample by the perfumer. 

Hermes Jour d'Hermes: fragrance review & insights into fragrance creation

Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to each other.
~Euclid

photo by AlberCAN (copyright 2012) for use on PerfumeShrine

By guest writer AlbertCAN

Simple elegance is often the hardest to grasp. The emphasis here, of course, lies in its sophistication: the fusion of ideas being so purposely concised and delicately tailored that the communication becomes deceptively simple. Ideas just float on their own merits, process gone and vanished. For years now, for instance, many have quipped that the great Anna Pavlova probably danced her famous “The Dying Swan” program as party entertainment, but judging by the technical brilliance, intricate grace and athletic poise displayed by prima ballerina Ulyana Lopatkina below I wouldn’t classify it as a simple dance: to even stand on pointe for nearly four minutes while delivering all the nuanced emotions? Not ever for the faint hearted.

I was pondering all these intricacies almost three weeks ago when I was introduced to Jour d'Hermès (2012), the latest feminine fragrance by master perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena, and when I was informed of the project scope I was very surprised by its seemingly effortless premise: a modern soft floral, radiance from dawn to dusk. No emphasis on particular notes. No PR blitz upon the initial launch. Boutique only until Spring 2013. All against the grain.

The name is also deceptively simple, another subtle risk. Jour d'Hermès (pronounced roughly as ‘joor dair-mess’), though perfectly fitting with the brand’s chosen theme for 2012—Gift Of Time, or Le temps devant soi—isn’t the most accessible name for non-francophones and does require a reasonable grasp of the language. The name does, on the other hand, complement the core theme* of Hermès perfectly: the land and the sky. Case in point? The two best-selling scarves: “Brides de Gala” (on the left) on saddlery and “Astrologie” (below right) on the zodiac constellations—of the land and the sky. Olfaction wise, since we already have the masculine Terre d'Hermès (2006) representing the earth, and since Ciel d'Hermès would have been too obvious, here we have Jour d'Hermès representing the other half of the universe—though I should point out that the above-mentioned names are slightly subversive, with la terre being a feminine word in place of a masculine fragrance and le jour being a masculine word in French. One might think little of the seemingly archaic French noun gender categorization, but I should point out that the name “Calèche” was originally chosen in part because it is a feminine word in French—la calèche. Still, I’m ahead of myself: more on that front later.

The fragrance is yet another intricacy in disguise: Jour d'Hermès opens with quite a tart grapefruit element (quelle surprise) followed immediately by a soft verdancy—all against a floral murmur. Long-time readers of Ellena’s olfactive works would also notice a fruity syntax to the mix, though purposely kept non-specific with a soft sensual mango bias as the fragrance wears on. (The master perfumer has mentioned his partiality to the scent of mango in his book “Journal d'un parfumeur”.) Then in comes the radiance and the scent deftly draws out a delicate array of flowers: sweet pea and gardenia most prominently, although I have also observed a quote of the translucence lifted from Vanille Galante (2009), the lilting orange blossom in Iris Ukiyoe (2010). Further, if one can excuse my impertinence: with the help of the IFRA-sanctioned ingredient label—and my humble training in perfumery—I can also deduce the following floral elements: lily of the valley, modern hybrid rose, tuberose, ylang ylang, jasmine—although these elements are utilized in such a quasi-deconstructed manner that Ellena the magician here only shows an whiff of the ideas. It’s a dawn-kissed, dewy garland—not a Floriade by any stretch of the imagination. The overall structure of the fragrance is kept clean and tailored; the diffusion pattern is built with a purpose; sillage modern, sensual and very long-lasting.

The contradiction of this maximizing minimalism is worth pondering here. This is a luminous floral built under and only under the aegis of our time: three decades ago this idea of floral barraging would have been a Maupassant Realism, as testified in “First” (1976) by Van Cleef & Apels, another Ellena creation; a mere decade ago J’Adore (1999) by Christian Dior with its coquettish charm fronted by the saccharine champaca and violet. Jour d'Hermès is unapologetically floral at heart but decidedly anti-FlowerBomb.

Which begs the question: how does Jean-Claude Ellena manage such sustained flurry of floralcy in flight without all the burdensome cliché of heft often associated with the genre? Without the help of gas chromatography (out of the respect of the master perfumer, really) I would offer a possible hypothesis after a careful examination of his interviews and writings.

I have already mentioned the use of sweet pea, which Ellena has devoted a spirited entry in his “Journal d'un parfumeur” (2011). My English translation of the passage in question offers a glimpse to his art.

                                                                                                       Cabris, Wednesday April 14, 2010
Sweet peas, when in bouquet, remind me of ruffled flamenco dresses. The flower has graceful petals and has the appearance of organdie. They do not have a determined smell, but a scent that hesitates between rose, orange blossom and Sweet William, with its touch of vanilla. I threw in seven components that seem necessary to sketch the smell. One, two, three attempts to balance the proportions, to which I added a carnation note to the fourth test to correct myself again. The fifth test seems appropriate. I have a sketch of smell with which I can start a perfume.

SWEET PEA (FIFTH DRAFT)
phenylethyl alcohol               200
Paradisone ®                      180
hydroxycitronellal                 50
Rhodinal                           30
acetyl isoeugenol                  15
orange blossom (abs colorless)     15
cis-3 hexenol                       5
phenylacetic aldehyde 50%           5
______________________________________
                                   500

Diluted at 5% in perfumery alcohol at 85°.

While it’s not certain whether Ellena adopted the exact sweet pea accord above for his latest feminine fragrance the olfactory essay is of interest. The accord is emblematic due to its hologramatic nature: the nuance of the gentle flora is evident, yet within there’s also a radiant magnolia (Paradisone), a splash of lily of the valley (hydroxycitronellal), a boutonnière of carnation (acetyl isoeugenol), a blade of fresh luminous verdancy (cis-3 hexenol) and a whiff of tartness (Rhodinal) for good measure—not to mention the orange blossom absolute and the frilly rosy touch from phenylethyl alcohol. As an avid gardener who has harvested his share of sweet peas I must say Ellena is shockingly spot-on with so few ingredients.

Within the same book Ellena’s thoughts on gardenia is even more sparse. Again my English translation:

Gardénia

aldehyde C-18 prunolide
styrallyl acetate
methyl anthranilate

For the scent of gardenia I prefer that of Chanel because it does not smell like the flower but happiness. The odour of gardenia is a drama between jasmine and tuberose.

Compared to the natural scent the gardenia accord above does not have the notorious mushroom lilt simply because of the absence of the tiglates. (The stryrallyl acetate, itself smelling like tart rhubarb, may have also given Jour d'Hermès the verdant tinge.) Yet what does the master perfumer meant when referring to “a drama between jasmine and tuberose”? Let’s break down the individual accords from the master perfumer:

Jasmine
benzyl acetate
Hedione
clove bud oil
indole
methyl anthranilate

Tuberose
aldehyde C-18 prunolide
methyl anthranilate
phenylethyl alcohol
benzyl salicylate

Thus elements from both are appearing in the gardenia accord, although our Elena Vosnaki has also made the following observation: "Methyl anthranilate (orange flower and ylang-ylang in low concentration, grape in high concentration) also produces very popular Schiff's Bases for a variety of floral effects, when added to aldehydes. No surprise in its being featured so much!"

Based on the info above I can deduce that Jour d'Hermès doesn't have the notes listed in part because the ‘notes’ are all connected together: sweet pea into magnolia, magnolia helping the orange blossom, orange blossom into tuberose, tuberose into gardenia. And certainly the Paradisone is known to create a radiant effect, as per both perfumer Arcadi Boix Camps and master perfumer Alberto Morillas. Under this manner Ellena, though clasping onto his aesthetics firmly, is to me also taking a page out of the notebook from old master perfumers of the 20th century such as Francis Fabron, despite obviously going after vastly different olfactory effects: very short but self-contained formulas with each 'note' sharing a set of chemicals so the elements are tightly woven as possible.

After all, what’s the point of naming all the notes in Jour d'Hermès when all the ingredients are synced to perform as one, in calibrated harmony?

I have mentioned that Jour d'Hermès is quite long-lasting, and much to my intrigue it works very well as a unisex fragrance. The use of the pricey muscone, itself a creamy modern musk, does help coaxing flowers to a more prolonged bloom...

(Hidden in the drydown I do very much suspect the use of honey absolute in conjunction with the musk, since the diffusion is such positively radiant. Oakmoss extract is also used, not at the forefront of the story by any stretch of the imagination but enough for me to see maybe classified by others as a modern chypre floral.)

...To test my hypothesis I ended up wearing Jour d'Hermès for two days straight, and on my skin it’s becomes a soft unisex fragrance. And given that Terre d'Hermès can work on the right woman perhaps the gender confusion among the two French nouns (le jour, la terre) isn’t so random after all: Ellena does believe the freedom in fragrance categorization among genders—perhaps the names are a reflection of that belief as well, that fragrance shouldn’t be gender assigned but completely up to the taste of the individual. And given the marketing scope of the latest offering I have good reasons to believe that the ray of light is being granted in the name of personal freedom, freedom in the name of simple elegance.

Hermès Jour d’Hermès is available in 50 and 85 ml Eau de Parfum, and in a 125 ml refill. It’s available now exclusively in Hermès boutiques and will go into wider distribution early next year.

*Editor (Elena's) Note: Jour d’Hermès was presented to the world in late November 2012 in Delphi, Greece (as seen here), the default spot of LIGHT worship. The god of the oracle, Apollo, has  no doubt shed a ray of sunshine on the perfumer and his works. It remains to be seen whether -to borrow a Nietzsche reference- the next fragrance, tackling the Dionysian this time, will be Nuit d’Hermès and presented in Arcadia. I'm throwing this to the mix as an idea to the Hellenophile people at  Hermès!

Photo, from top: Jour d'Hermès and “Journal d'un parfumeur”, photo taken/copyright by AlbertCAN; Uliana Lopatkina in “The Dying Swan”, photo via Tumblr; “Brides de Gala” scarf by Hermès; “Astrologie” scarf by Hermès; cover of “Journal d'un parfumeur” by Jean-Claude Ellena; Jour d'Hermès illustration via Hermes.com