Baruti Nooud: fragrance review

 Nooud started with the spermatic idea by Spyros Drosopoulos, creative force behind the Dutch-based Baruti niche brand, of getting inside the construction of oud bases, used widely in the perfume industry these days, and searching for his own formula, his own truth. In this journey he stumbled upon the notion of nude, of skin, of bareness; and so from oud and nude evolved...Nooud!

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If it also suggests there is no actual oud in it, it's because there isn't. Hence the magic of the illusion.

The Nooud fragrance remains the brand's best-seller, which is understandable, due to the wide demand for sensuous oriental scents for niche audiences all over the world nowadays. It feels like it's full of ambrette, or the musky odorants in its core at least, and it's truly compelling, poised between attractively bitterish botanical and skin-warm indulgent like the finest suede. 

Although aimed at those who would be welcoming the idea of an oudh, burning Bakhour, I can definitely recommend it to people who love unsweetened musks. I can very well see how it's the best-seller!

Guerlain Apres L'Ondee: fragrance review

What's in a name? What's in a material? Shakespeare's immortal line has a lot to account for. Lots of scents with heliotrope pose as "almond" or "marzipan" or "powder with tonka". These are all scents with a kinship that runs deeper than initially thought of. The synthesized material that is dosed into compositions that take heliotrope as a starting point is quite strong and can be an overwhelming molecule to work with if one isn't careful and discreet. One of the first major fragrances to make judicious use of it, in a light enough composition, so as to wear it inconspicuously, was Après l'Ondée by Guerlain, "after the spring shower" as the name implies.  

"Ça se porte léger" (this wears lightly) is the motto behind the concept of these Guerlain creations that aim to offer gouaches rather than oil paintings. It's more akin to the pale, hazy colorations on a Monet sky than the almost fauve brushwork and vivid color palette on a Van Gogh, to bring an art analogue. If one were to look for a fauve heliotrope, one would rather turn to Cacharel's Loulou.

Zaira Alfaro on Flickr via

I personally find Après l'Ondée a rather quiet fragrance indeed, almost timid, with a sweetish air that is not immediately thought of as feminine (quite different than the airs that current feminines exhibit!), with lots of heliotropin to stand for cassie, which is the predominant element. Some heliotrope scents also recall cherry pie, or lilac and powder, but not Après l'Ondée. Even the almond is not particularly identified as almond, it's a haze of lightly warmed, blurred, hazy notes, a cloud of a distant scent.

The violets, like you might have heard, are quite fleeting in this Guerlain perfume, especially in more recent incarnations which are warmer and cuddlier than the older ones, notably the extrait de parfum in the Louis XV style bottle. The anisic note on the top note is also a brilliant addition (created through the use of benzylaldehyde, it would be recreated more forcibly in L'heure Bleue some years later), since it brings a chill cooling off the first spray and balances the warmer, almond paste flavor of the heliotrope in the heart.

Après l'Ondée is also rather less known than L'Heure Bleue, so even Guerlain wearers on the street might not identify it right off, which is always a good thing in my books; it would also obliterate your qualms about it being perceived as solely feminine.

Fendi Theorema: fragrance review

Now that perfumer Christine Nagel is at the helm of Hermès, looking back on her work for various brands reveals her core aesthetics; at once saturated and filled with light, like a Joseph M.W. Turner painting that foreshadows what's to come, namely Impressionism. Judging by her newest Eau de Rhubarbe Ecarlate and Galop, this heftiness-shot-with-brightness continues the sun path to its natural apex.

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With Fendi's Theorema, Italian for theorem, a proposition that has been proven to be true based on previously established statements, Nagel has taken a theme and brought it into its culmination. Namely the "Oriental perfume" that feels as comforting as nibbling chocolate by the fire, while at the same time retaining the plush luxury and sophistication that a proper womanly perfume fit for the salon should exude.

Fendi's Theorema, inexplicably discontinued much too soon (at least before the brand discontinued its entire line in order to bring out the newest project on the shelves) and at least as clamored for a resurrection as Laura Biagotti's Venezia, opens with the delectable alliance of orange and chocolate. The effect of the former is apparently accounted by two unusual citruses: tangelos and thai samuti. The chocolate is folded with sweet spices, amber and warm milky woods, such as sandalwood and rosewood; there's none of the austerity that woody notes usually provide. A touch of a classic, orientalized bouquet of flowers (orange blossom, ylang ylang, jasmine) gives just a tinge of ladylike proclivities. But Theorema is too good to stay on the ladies alone...and is extremely ripe for a resurrection as well.