Definition: Creamy, Milky, Lactonic, Butyric in Fragrances

What does "creamy" mean to you in relation to fragrance? Is it the rich, sundae vanilla feeling you get while licking a cone, the thick yet refined taste of a bavaroise or is it the beachy tropical scent you get from a lush floral perfume? And what about lactonic? You hear this term brandished a lot, especially in relation to vintage fragrances, but where does it lead you? What does lactonic mean and how do you differentiate between it and "milky"? And, oh gods, where does "butyric scent" come into all of this? Let's try to define some confusing perfume terms on Perfume Shrine once again.

Creamy fragrances are more in reality more straight-forward than you'd expect: The term "creaminess" usually denotes a rich feeling, infused with silky, sensuous and lightly or more heavily sweet notes which may derive from soft vanilla, sandalwood, or coconut and sometimes from rich, lush florals that naturally have nectarous qualities, such as jasmine or honeysuckle. Vanilla in itself is usually described as creamy: Indeed Vanilla tahitensis pods have a complex odour profile, with notes of raisin, musk, cherry, lactones and anisic aldehydes.
Often tropical florals combine with coconut and coconut milk to produce that suntan lotion feel that we describe as "creamy". These would also fall under the umbrella of "exotic", as many people's vision of exotica is tan skin, dark almond shaped eyes and the scents that are exuded in meridians where leis are worn around the neck at all occasions. Delta jasmolactone exhibiting a coconut facet (and a creamy tuberose basenote as well) makes it a natural match for this sort of thing.
Fragrances of this type include Juste un Rêve by Patricia de Nicolai, Datura Noir by Serge Lutens, Champaca Absolute by Tom Ford Private Line, Gai Mattiolo Exotic Paradise LEI (coconut, vanilla and exotic flowers) and Jil Sander Sun Delight (with frangipani and vanilla). Ylang & Vanille in the Guerlain Aqua Allegoria line is a small gem of creamy floralcy: the naturally piercingly sweet scent of ylang is given a meringue treatment via fluffy vanilla and the eau de toilette concentration never allows it to become cloying or suffocating. Even the dicontinued Sensi by Armani was great in this game of uniting flowers with soft, tactile woods.

Almond fragrances when air-spun and given the dessert, gourmand treatment with lots of heliotropin, instead of the more medicinal bitter almond iterations (as in Hypnotic Poison by Dior), can fall under the "creamy, soft" spectrum as well: Try Heliotrope by Etro or the very friendly Cinema by Yves Saint Laurent. A popular choice in the genre is Comptoir Sud Pacifique's Vanille Amande. Their silky veil is soft, enveloping, tactile. When coupled with a lot of vanilla and some musk they can become almost a visible cloud around you, such as in Ava Luxe Love's True Bluish Light. On the same page, Lea by Calypso St.Barth is a cult choice and Sweet Oriental Dream by Montale (with its shades of loukhoum) is among the best in the niche line. Tilt the axis into woody-creamy and you get Sensuous by Lauder; a literal name for once.
An elegant version of this genre, holding the sugar at an optimum medium, is Eau Claire de Merveilles by Hermes; a more mainstream one Omnia by Bulgari. Men are not forgotten in this field: Pi by Givenchy and Rochas Man in the phallically siggestive rocket-bottle are great examples of creamy fragrances for men.

Among modern molecules, Methyl Laitone (patented by Givaudan, from "lait", French for milk) is a powerful aroma-material with a diffusive, milky, coconut-like coumarinic odour character. Its use as a milk note in soap formulae is now a given, but it also aids in providing a creamy scent to perfumes too.

It's detabateable whether creamy and milky are the same, though: The difference isn't just a game for scholars. The condensed milk sweetness and "fattiness" of certain gourmand fragrances, such as the latest caramelic benjoin-rich Candy by Prada, can evoke visions of both clotted cream and milk desserts and rice-puddings, melding the two notions into one. Jo Malone utilizes the cozy, familiar note of condensed milk in black tea in her Tea Collection Sweet Milk. Kenzo Amour goes the way of a rice pudding: it's lighter than a pannacota, and has a steamy rice note in there too. Organza Indencence by Givenchy has a custard-like base, sprinkled with cinnamon, while Saffran Troublant by L'Artisan Parfumeur is like a milk dessert hued a vivid crocus-yellow by saffron served in bowls dressed in sturdy suede. Flora Bella by Lalique hides a milky facet under the soft, clean, fabric-softener violet core, while Etro's Etra is a milky floral as pretty and polite as this genre gets.
Sandalwood from the Mysore region in India in particular is famous for having a rich, satisfying milky scent. But smell a pure sandalwood-focused fragrance, such as Santal Blanc by Serge Lutens and see how a "milky scent" can be subtler, drier, less sugary than "creamy"; more opalescent than fatty glistening. Contrast now with a heavy bad-ass sandalwood perfume (boosted by powerful synthetic Polysantol), such as Samsara by Guerlain, and you are at a crossroads: that one's creamy rather than milky, va va voom sexy and enhanced by the richness of jasmine. Smell a virile, masculine sandalwood, ie. Santal 33 by Le Labo and you're back at square one; not a hint of cream in sight. No single ingredient can sattisfyingly give the full effect, obviously.

Take things too far on the dairy scales and you end up with "butyric". The word comes from the Greek for butter: βούτυρον/butyron. Usually butyric smells are due to either a single molecule (butyric acid) or, in the case of butyric esters, to part of a molecule. Butyric refers to a sharp cheesy scent, reminiscent of parmesan cheese (or even vomit and really stale, stinky socks; take your pick!), but some butyric esters, such as ethyl 2 methyl butyrate which has a fruity facet like pear or apples, are used in perfumery (and in the flavouring industry as well). And yet, and yet... irony has a place in perfumery; it's the buttery taste of tuberose-drama-queen Fracas by Piguet that makes it the unforgettable classic that it is! 

"Lactonic" however is specific perfumery jargon. It's not just a descriptor, hence I differentiate. (Though the feeling can read as "milky" or "creamy" too, as you can see further on!) Picture  lactonic as a subgroup of the greater milky/creamy continent, reached through specific vessels (called lactones).
Lactonic fragrances derive their name from Latin for milk (lac, hence lacto- etc.), and lactones are cyclic esters, a very specific chemical compound group, uniting an alcohol group and a carboxylic acid group in the same molecule. Therefore describing a fragrance as "lactonic" transcedes mere smell evocation and enters the spectre of analytic chemistry.

Why the confusing name, then?

Because they're produced via the dehydration of lactic acid, which occurs in...sour milk (and is found also in some dairy products such as yoghurt and kefir etc). You could begin to see the connection if you get the brilliantly synthetic Rush by Gucci, a lactonic modern chypre rich in a patchouli-vetiver-vanilla base and squint just so; a hint of sourness is its crowning glory. This is also the weird baby-vomit "note" in the iconoclastic Le Feu d'Issey (possibly accounting for the fragrance's commercial flop!).
Far from smelling sour, however, lactonic fragrances fall under 2 main schools, according to which of the most popular lactones they're using: milk lactone/cocolactone (i.e. 5,6-decenoic acid) or peach lactone.

A classic example of the latter is Caron's Fleurs de Rocaille or Mitsouko by Guerlain; Mitsouko's infamous peach-skin heart note in particular is due to undecalactone (referred colloquially as "aldehyde C14"). Peach lactone can sometimes veer into coconut territory smell-wise, thus giving rise to "creamy" descriptors! Indeed gamma-nonalactone is the popular coconut additive in suntan lotion.
On the other hand, demethylmarmelo lactone has a milky, butter cake scent, as does delta decalactone which has facets of coconut.
Milk lactone or cocolactone has a silky, balsamic almost burnt butter odour which pairs exceedingly well with white flowers (jasmine, gardenia), as it is reminiscent of naturally occuring jasmolactones, hence its use in white floral blends. Dis-moi Mirroir, in the more esoteric Mirroir line by Thierry Mugler, is a characteristic example showcasing a white flower top (orange blossom) and a white floral heart (lily) plus peachy lactones (smelling of apricot and peach) flying over a milk lactone base, producing a milky-fruity floral.
Massoia lactone is an individual case, as it produces a note that is poised between woody and coconut; it is what will be featured in the upcoming Santal Massoia by Hermès in the more upmarket Hermessence line.

But not all lactones are created equal: the whole group of octathionolactones has a fungi smell, reminiscent of the refrigerated mushrooms aroma of some white flowers, such as gardenia and tuberose.These flowers also exhibit creamy facets side by side, so the whole issue of describing a fragrance is far more complex than expected; as with most things in life, it all depends on context and proportions!

Related reading on PerfumeShrine:  

If you haven't caught on the Perfumery Definitions series till now, please visit:

• Definition: Indolic vs. Non Indolic
• Definition: Phenolic, Terpenic, Camphorous
• Definition: Powdery & Dry in Fragrances
• Definition: Resinous & Balsamic
• Definition: Soapy in Fragrances
• Definition: Which Material Produces Which Note/Effect?

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Burberry Body Song Tie-in: Rose by The Feeling

“People wear perfume as an attractant – something to make them feel good and enhance interaction with others,” said Jack Burke, president of Sound Marketing Inc., Branson, MO, as an industry expert for Luxury Daily. “Music is much the same. It is one of our strongest memory sense, next to smell.”
This is a propos a bespoke song called “Rosé” for Burberry Body, the British brand's latest scent, recorded by the band The Feeling. The Feeling is a British pop band from Britain’s Essex area, most well-known for its singles “Sewn” and “Fill My Little World".



Chris Bailey, chief creative officer at Burberry is playing all the right notes on this launch, what with the social media and the music connection (except possibly for the reportedly dull smell). With such an invested campaign, the fragrance is set to fly off the shelves. I wonder however just what it means when there's so much emphasis on the peripheral elements, rather than the scent itself.

Below, the Burberry Body campaign commercial directed by Christopher Bailey, featuring British actress Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, and shot by Mario Testino in London.



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Guerlain Le Bolshoi 2011 Limited edition & Les Voyages Olfactifs 04 London: new fragrances

Le Bolshoi 2011 Edition Limitee is the new limited edition perfume (set to circulate in only 400 bottles retailing for $570) to be released on October 27th, a day before the official opening of the historical Main Stage of the Bolshoi theater. As the equally historical house of Guerlain is one of sponsors in the renovating, the Le Bolshoi 2011 fragrance, accredited (surprisingly!) to Jean-Paul Guerlain, will launch to thus celebrate the event. The limited edition bottle bears a label with the front of the Bolshoi theater on it.

Le Bolshoi 2011 by Guerlain comprises the following fragrant notes:
top: bergamot, bitter orange, petitgrain, neroli
heart: jasmine, violet, orange blossom, ylang-ylang
base: musk, tonka bean, vanilla and incense

Le Bolshoi is launching exclusively in Russia (not even Paris is supposed to have bottles, though I doubt there won't be a couple for reference or display or something...) and is rumoured to be a recalibration of Les Secrets de Sophie previous fragrance according to independent sources.

Let's not forget that Guerlain has also just issued the 4th installment in their scented travelogue series: Les Voyages Olfactifs, 04 London.  The fragrance is introduced with the tag line "Guerlain reveals the atmosphere of afternoon tea with the freshness of rhubarbe" and the perfume puts the rose-rhubard-grapefruit accord within a semi-oriental composition. Fragrance notes include bergamot, grapefruit, rhubarb, violet, rose essential oil, rose absolute, and boiled sweets.
The bottles have been redesigned with a cityscape image visible on their glass front, each depicting landmarks of each respective city, as you can see below.

photo via Wim Janssens

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Anya's Garden Royal Lotus: fragrance review of a Brave New Scent & Giveaway

The lotus...floating upon river waters where ancient civilizations flourished and died. Jasmine...the pervader of the night, its piercingly sweet floral aroma the intoxicating scent of carnality.

Alcaloids contained inside the lotus produce a sedative effect, inspiring hypotheses as to its relation to the mythical fruit consumed by the Lotophagi. And the indolic aspects of natural jasmine essence are but an invitation to ponder on our life's primal instincts and how they're sublimated into the poetry of flowers. But in Royal Lotus by Anya's Garden we never quite forget we're dealing with a floral fragrance that though based on modern, cutting-edge sourced materials is always mindful of its pretty, primal nature of aromatics: to smell good!
Indeed, even if it's built on all natural essences, with lots of real jasmine, the less polite aspects of this formidable little night bloom have been smoothed into a silky, gentle canopy that floats in the evening breeze softly promising sweet nothings; thus allowing those curious about jasmine's many fascinating facets to explore into a fragrance that won't scare the horses or prompt anyone to inspect the soles of your shoes!
Royal Lotus is zesty on top with a bursting hesperidic top note that is succulent and fresh, progressing into a soft, floral heart where the sweeter, mating aspects are highlighted rather than the fetid and decaying inherent in white flowers. Lotus essences (uniting absolute and the waxier concrete) bring a light, airated, sivery thread into the mix. The fragrance is very lightly anchored by an equally soft, well-mingled base where no note protrudes above the rest. 

Royal Lotus, part of the Brave New Scents porject, therefore takes modern ingredients into creating what feels like a solid floral: classically topped by an expansive citrus bouquet that reinforces the freshness of the white and acqueous flowers, while a subtle base of woods and coumarin smooth the nectarous essences.
Anya McCoy created Royal Lotus using 21st century materials, referencing only one wildcard from the 20th century, namely clementine essence. Anya after all is no stranger to beautiful citruses and I consider them ~as well as her beautiful floral tinctures~ as the hallmark of her brand: Anyone who likes hesperidia and white flowers would surely find something to appreciate in her all naturals line.

For her inspiration the perfumer states: "My muse was ancient India, brought into the present, once again (remember Kewdra from the Mystery of Musk project)? I chose pink and blue lotus and the extrememly rare night queen absolute (aka Night-blooming jasmine, Cestrum nocturnun) for my heart. Night queen absolute is so rare, this perfume may be, due to lack of any more NQ absolute coming to market, a very limited edition."

The perfumer worked on these notes:

for the top:
wild orange from the Dominican Republic
yuzu from Korea
orange juice essential oil from Brazil
clementine from the USA

for the heart:
blue lotus absolute from Thailand
blue lotus concrete from India
pink lotus concrete from India
Queen of the Night absolute (cestrum nocturnum) from India
Queen of the Night tincture from Anya's garden in Florida
jasmine grandiflorum tincture from Anya's garden in Florida
jasmine sambac Grand Duke of Tuscany tincture from Anya's garden in Florida
orange flower tincture from Anya's garden in Florida

for the base:
sandalwood from Australia
ambergris absolute from Utah
tonka bean absolute from France

The perfumer suggests wearing this fragrance on one's hair, as this would reward the wearer with 24 hours of floral and woody pleasure. Indeed I found that skin application left the more delicate floral elements missing sooner than desired, while a generous blotter application suggests that there is no serious colour staining hazzard for non-silk clothes.

For our readers, a giveaway of a mini 3.5ml of Royal Lotus, courtesy of Anya's Garden. (Perfumer sends prize to the winner). Please state your interest in the comments. Draw is open till Sunday midnight.

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pic via flowerpicturegallery.com

Katy Perry to Introduce Meow: Second Celebrity Fragrance

According to WWD, Kate Perry with launch her second fragrance, exclusively with Nordstoms in November, a companion scent to her first celebrity scent out there, suggestively named "Purr". According to the article on WWD, "created in partnership with Perry’s fragrance licensee, Gigantic Parfums, the scent is intended to be a companion piece to the recording artist’s first fragrance, Purr, which debuted a year ago and is now available in 54 countries.

In the countdown to the launch, like Selena Gomez, Katy is trying to get her fans involved in the process urging her Twitter followers to guess the name of the perfume. Winners will win free bottles of the new perfume as well as meeting up with their idol.  Fickle glory!

EDIT TO ADD: The new name is set to be Meow by Kate Perry, continuing on the kittenish theme started by Purr. According to the singer's twitter account: “My next fragrance & bestie to Purr is MEOW! She’s very sweet & inspired by that magical place, CANDYFORNIA!”

Gustave Alphonse Fragifert: The ill-fated French Perfumer & his Wellington Fragrances

Gustave Alphonse Fragifert was a brilliant but ill-fated French perfumer who lived from 1880 to 1911 and died under mysterious circumstances in South America. He wrote his formulas for four perfumes in code, which have now resurfaced in New Zealand after 100 years.

Sounds intriguing? This is the fictitious tale of a 12-minute-long performance in Wellington, New Zealand, but the fragrances are real*, each of them representing a season and are both art-directed and composed by Francesco van Eerd. Van Erd is Dutch-born and forestry graduate New Zealender, who has also studied perfumery in Grasse and Britain, and who acts with the aid of performing arts student Robbie van Dijk, in this amusing performance. Based at the Wellington Underground Market, Fragrifert (pronounced frah-gree- fair and I'm sure I'm missing some inside linguistic joke that is perched on Dutch, which I don't know) has been delighting visitors with live performances in a theatrette beside the stall (every half hour from 10.30am until 3.30pm) since the 3rd of September. Sounds like a don't miss if you're around!

*The Fragrifert Scents are:
Ete (=summer) has notes of grapefruit, cedar, prune, white musk, oakmoss, vanilla and ambergris. Lilac (for spring) is built on flowers, one of them being lilac: broom, mimosa, heliotrope, rose and violet, laced with tobacco, patchouli and sandalwood, as well as citruses and liquorice. Automne is a soft oriental with cinnamon, tyberose, vanilla and orchirds, while Hiver (=winter) interprets the cool, yet spicy, wintersweet shrub, adding lily of the valley and cyclamen notes.
Each fragrance at 25% concentration (potent!) is 24.50$ or 80$ for the set of four.

news via the dominion post

Hermes by Lord's Jester: fragrance review of a Brave New Scent & giveaway

You might be incredulous to see the moniker referring to Aldous Huxley's novel twisted into a perfume review, but indie perfumer Adam Gottschalk of Lord's Jester participates in a blogathon of indie perfumers which we announced on these pages recently and his scent submission Hermes indeed defies classification.

For Hermes perfume, a vividly green (literally!) perfume, Gottschalk used one of the essences which I have always been fascinated by: green cognac. Produced from the wine precipitate known as "lees", from the plant vitis vinifera, cognac essence is a winey, dry, complex note.
The vividly mossy stain of the fragrance does not bely the scent itself: it's rather mossy and quite animalic all right; musty, tart, very dry and earthy, but with a floral depth opening soon, which allays some of the gloom and animalistic character of Africa stone. (Africa stone/hyraceum for those who don't know it yet is the petrified and rock-like excrement composed of both urine and feces excreted by the Cape Hyrax (Procavia capensis), commonly referred to as the Dassie. The material can be harvested by aroma material producers without harming the animal to render a note that unites some of the facets of castoreum, musk and oud. Quite intense!) Coupling the musty with the more hay-sweetish flouve absolute (rich in coumarin) produces a loaded combo that seems to hit you on the head at first, only to mellow soon after.
Lord Jester's Hermes tricks you into believing it is all about the base notes, but the lighter elements (a very perceptible and very lovely indolic jasmine note, plus citrus essences) are welcome leverage which rounds off the perfume. Too much animal can prove unwearable otherwise!
I have tested the fragrance from a spray vial and feel that it would be better suited to a dabbing from a splash bottle instead, to smoothen the initial blast; the rest of the composition blooms wonderfully without assistance even on a mouillette, usually not the perfect medium for all natural perfumes.

The perfumer used in order from greatest concentration to least these "wild" essences for his fragrance "notes":

for the base:
green cognac
linden blossom absolute in 30% fractionated coconut oil
flouve absolute
ambrette absolute
Africa stone

for the heart:
araucaria
rosa bourbonia
boronia
jasmine auriculatum
jasmine sambac

for the top:
linden blossom essential oil
orange essence
lime essence
tagetes

Pretty rare, huh? Indeed Gottschalk clarifies in a blog post how suddenly two of his chosen essences are becoming rarer and rarer; namely rosa bourbonia and jasmine auriculatum. Harvesting materials which are unavailable to the masses and the Big Boys (big aroma producing companies) however is at the heart of small artisanal perfumers, isn't it? In that regard, you won't be disappointed: There's inherent rarity factor in Hermes and I hope Adam finds a way to procure supply of these two rare aromatics. 
Hermes by Lord's Jester is an 15% concentrated Eau de Parfum and is quite decently lasting for an all naturals perfume.
We have a perfume giveaway for our readers (a 10ml/0.4oz) mini of Hermes, so please post a comment if you want to be eligible!  (NB.Perfumer sends prize directly to winner)

Sample provided by perfumer as part of the project. Photo found via AnyaMcCoy's tweets.

Oscar de la Renta Live in Love: new fragrance

The new fragrance for women created by a man who adores them. A young themed green floral. Illustrations by David Downton. Apparently, for the print campaign, Oscar wanted to take a different approach to some of the fragrance advertising he was seeing in the market. I think it works.



via oscardelarenta.com

Hermes Santal Massoia: new fragrance in the Hermessence line

Tenth fragrance from the Hermessence collection, Santal Massoïa belongs to one of these famous "poèmes-parfums" of the brand. The bottle, with its piqué sellier leather case, refined as usual, and containing woody scents, will be exclusively available from November 11th in Hermès boutiques.
The new Hermessence, composed by in-house perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena, will reprise a favourite wood essence, sandalwood: the challenge being in exploiting a material that is prized through its Mysore variety inclusion in classic perfume tradition, but now in short order due to shortages in its procurement. Therefore Jean-Claude is going to offer his specific vision, especially since it's allied in name to massoia oil, another prized aroma material: Massoia bark of Cryptocaria massoia gives an alkyl lactone (lactones are milky-smelling substances) which would naturally provide the lactic element of natural sandalwood. Massoia lactone (possessing a coconut-like, green and creamy scent) interestingly can also be found in molasses, cured tobacco and the essential oil of osmanthus fragrans, which presents intriguing hypotheses into how Ellena might weave in floral notes into what would otherwise be a woody composition. After all, he did a similar conjurer's trick with his salicylates & ylang-ylang laced Vanille Galante and also in Iris Ukiyoe with its holographic of the iris flower rather than the rhizome.In Santal Massoia Jean-Claude Ellena is quoted as wanting to evoke "what is beneath the air", and to that end he interweaves an airy fig note amongst the woody ones: fresh, rather more than creamy smelling. 

Even more interestingly, Hermès is also just now offering their own version of the "Monclin" fragrance testing "cup", using a white ceramic device that allows fragrance testing that unlocks some of the hidden aspects of the fragrances that would otherwise need full body testing to evolve.

Related reading on PerfumeShrine: Aroma material: Sandalwood (Mysore & Australian) & synthetic substitutes, Hermessences, Hermes news & reviews

photo via wadmag.com

Nina Ricci L'Air du Temps: Fragrance Review & History of a True Classic

Reflecting on a classic fragrance which has inspired me into delving deeper into perfume history and appreciation, I can’t disregard L’Air du Temps by Nina Ricci, one of the most recognizable perfumes in the world. Even Hannibal Lecter is quoted smelling it on Clarisse Starling in Silence of the Lambs: “You use Evian skin products and sometimes L’Air du Temps… but not today...”.
Despite any foreboding connotations, the perfume's introduction in 1948 under a name halfway between Marivaux and Cocteau (denoting ‘the spirit of the times’) hallmarked a longed-for return to optimism. Much like Miss Dior was ‘tired of letting off bombs and just wanted to let off fireworks’, L’Air du Temps presented the new found hope for peace after the ravages of WWII, as reflected by the original flacon design of a sun with a dove perched on the stopper by Christian Bérard.

 Iconic Design and Symbolism


L'Air du Temps is a triumph of bottle art and symbolism: The intertwining doves affectionately termed ‘Les Colombes’, a romantic theme by Marc Lalique, originates from 1951 and came to denote the virginal quality of the visual aspects of its representation, perpetuated in its advertising ever since. Originally the 1948 design envisioned by Jean Rebull and materialized by crystallier Marc Lalique involved a rising sun surmounted by a single dove. The interwining doves however marked the "kiss and make up" peace mood after WWII.
The "colombes" kissing motif also reflected the ever feminine, always understated and ethereallly romantic Nina Ricci sartorial fashions; nothing vulgar! The perfume became signage for fashions: "The most romantic gift of fragrance a man can give a woman" came to be accompanied by elfish gowns that draped the female form in a slippery, ethereal, 19th-century-aesthete nostalgic way; lacy ivory and white denoting youthful and -a little faded- aristocracy rusticating in the sunny French countryside.The L'Air du temps advertising mostly matched.
In 1999 the L'Air du Temps flacon was named "perfume bottle of the century".

Scent Description
The formula of L'Air du Temps, composed by Francis Fabron, was simple : no more than 30 ingredients which co-exist in harmony, a chaste -but not quite- bouquet of flowers enrobed into the silken sheath of benzyl salicylate; a massive dose of an –at the time- innovative product aiding the blending and linear evaporation of the other molecules. According to perfumer Bernard Chant “‘[benzyl salicylate] produces a diffusing, blooming effect very pleasing to the public”. Coupled with spicy eugenol and isoeugenol, the effect becomes almost carnation-like with its clove tint : the very heart of L’Air du Temps ! The celestial opening of bergamot and rosewood is undermined by the sensuous note, half-lily, half-carnation, suave with the fuzziness of skin-like peach and a green hint of gardenia. Powdery orris, coupled with dusky woods –poised at the intersection of winter falling into spring- and a faint amber note finish off the fragrance. The effect is peachy-carnation-y and very characteristic: a sort of Doris Day, the way she was, rather staunchy actually, active and hard to eradicate, rather than how she appeared to be in those rom-coms of the 1950s, all mock innocence and eyelashes aflutter.

The success of the classic Nina Ricci fragrance seems to be the sassiness of its aerated, distinctive bouquet coupled with its refined classicism, sometimes maxed out to sentimentality : an aspect which prompted critic Luca Turin to joke it was created for romantics “who shed a tear listening to La Sonate au Clair de Lune*”. Maybe not quite that way, considering how the latter might have been an impromptu requiem on someone’s deathbed. At any rate, the trickle-down effect must speak of the need to do just that: the skeleton of the formula has been imitated in various soaps, deodorants and hairsprays for decades, while in itself L’Air du Temps has influenced many other fragrances from Fidji (Guy Laroche) and Madame Rochas to Anaïs Anaïs (Cacharel).

 Comparing Vintage vs. Modern L'Air du Temps Perfume

Nowadays the suaveness of the original formula has been somewhat compromised, due to necessary surgery dictated by allergens concerns… The peach base is mollified into synthetic submission, the carnation is less spicy and rich than before, the whole excellent exercise seems less itself as if it has been Botoxed into a perpetual complacent smile....yet L’Air du Temps is still instantly recognizable in its sillage, the trail left by the many that pass by wearing it : the mark of a true classic !
The bottle design can be a gauge of age: Vintage Eau de Toilette from the 1970s and 1980s circulates in the amphora-like bottle with the gold cap in splash, while spray bottles are long and encased in white bakelite. If the front of the bottle has the doves in relief and the plastic cap is rounded and in relief as well, your specimen comes from the 1990s.

The vintage parfum is in the characteristic Lalique design with the perched doves atop. Old models of diluted concentration can also be in ribbed sprayers with gold overimposed sprayer mechanisms in squarish design. Really old versions can be in a round flask bottle with a boule cap in splash form.
Modern  eau de toilette on the contrary is in the familiar fluted oval-shaped bottle, reprising the dove design on the top in transparent plastic, the cap going over the sprayer mechanism. 

(*) Piano sonata N°14 by L.van Beethoven

This review is based on a text I had previously composed for Osmoz.com

Chanel No.5 Bath Oil: Inspiring the Aspirational & History of No.5 Bath Oils

When the times are tough a little pampering goes a long way. But it also proves to be a wise marketing strategy with a purpose. French fashion house Chanel is enticing online purchasing and emphasizing its exclusivity with a limited-edition Chanel No. 5 Bath Oil and limited-time free shipping on its Web site. Chanel is no stranger to upping the aspirational factor, or even obscuring a few of the less than nice aspects of its history, in order to create buzz. In Tilar Mazeo's book these are plenty evident.

But today's world rolls on word of pixel, rather than just word of mouth ~or even aesthetically glorious advertising. Indeed the new bath product is advertised by just its bottle, with newsletters announcing it in bold typeface of white on black background. Very Chanel!

This current strategy has even inspired Luxury Daily to comment that "Chanel may be aiming for younger consumers by connecting with them on a channel where they usually are found. The brand could also be trying to connect with consumers who may not be able to afford luxury products now, but may be able to in the future. The younger aspirational consumer is a market that many luxury brands are trying to hit, most notably through online marketing".

“With the introduction of the No. 5 essential bath oils and all the hype around the product being labeled ‘heavenly’ by fashionistas everywhere, this is a great way to get a younger demographic onto the Chanel ecommerce site,” according to Tania Doub, retail strategy lead for Optaros, Boston, as quoted by the journalist.

For those who are wondering about the new formulation of the iconic Chanel No.5 feedback is positive. Chanel is no stranger to luxurious and silky body products. Indeed it was some years ago at the advent of the millenium when they last issued a specific  bath oil with the tag Chanel No.5 Huiles Essentiels pour Le Bain (Technically not 100% accurate; this was a three-phase product with segments floating on on top of the other which you had to shake in order to mix and pour, as you can see on the picture on the right. It made for fantastic displays on bathroom shelves, I can tell you! Plus it smelled like a softer, still musky, but much less aldehydic version of the scent of No.5, which is enticing enough for both those who can't stomach the aldehydic load and those who just flat out love the classic fragrance).
Chanel also produced a regular Bath Oil in the No.5 line as far back as 1966, advertised with the face and body of Ali MacGraw in memorable ads circulating in the UK.

But that's not just it!

The Bath Oil was produced prior to 1966 (and the subsequent 1971 campaign) still: Older advertisements from 1963 suggest "now bathe in Chanel", with just a sketch of a young agile woman putting her hair up in order to enter a bathtub filled with foamy water containing scented bath oil.

And two years later the formula becomes an After-Bath Oil Spray, thus providing a non-alcoholic version of the iconic perfume for fans to enjoy, at a reduced price and a more practical edition.


The new Chanel No.5 Intense Bath Oil formulation follows into the steps of the older one, providing either a stand-alone fragrancing product (as suggested by its intense moniker or to accompany Eau Premiere (with which it would amorously couple) or alternatively under any of the versions of the classic Chanel No.5 for loyal fans.

vintage ads via http://www.advertisingarchives.co.uk. Click to enlarge.

Brave New Scents

O wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world! That has such people in it!
~ Miranda in Shakespeare's “The Tempest”, Act V, Scene I

I want God, I want poetry,
I want danger, I want freedom,
I want goodness, I want sin.
~Aldous Huxley

The time has come again for a collective project uniting several perfumers and bloggers, who will explore new horizons in their quest for accomplished fragrances through innovative natural means.
In the Brave New Scents project, the Natural Perfumers Guild are likened to the members of Huxley’s novel. Like the starring characters in the novel, these brave new perfumers go against the grain and out of bounds, thwarting the ever-expanding regulatory nanny state in order to showcase aromatic extraction feats and use 21st Century aromatics that are not necessarily condoned in mainstream perfume society. Some of the brave new perfumers throw convention to the wind and blend perfumes that showcase their skill extracting scent from previously non-commercial plants, flowers, and substances. Others use the palette of newly-available essential oils, concretes, absolutes and CO2 aromatics; sometimes blending in their own artisan extractions, be they infusions, tinctures or distillations.

The Guild perfumers were provided with an extensive list of 100+ 21st Century aromatics, which was compiled by Guild President Anya McCoy and Guild Manager Elise Pearlstine. They recognized that before the year 2000, most artisan perfumers purchased their natural aromatics from aromatherapy suppliers. These suppliers did not carry many absolutes, and some aromatics available to the mainstream perfumers were not known, or available, to them. Suppliers for mainstream perfume houses did not carry many, if any, aromatics from India, such as jasmine sambac, lotus, champaca and other tropical scents.
Now a bounty of newly-available delightful absolutes such as aglaia flower, boronia, ambergris and many more are at their disposal. Newly-conceptualized and extracted aromatic wonders such as lilac flower and the amazing world of CO2 and SCO2 extractions are now available to the fragrance industry. Also included are the hand-extracted fragrant bounties from the gardens of the perfumers themselves, such as peony enfleurage, Grand Duke of Tuscany jasmine sambac enfleurage, and a myriad of distillations and tinctures. To make it interesting, the perfumers were allowed only one “wildcard” aromatic from the era preceding the year 2000.

The participating perfumers are:
Anya McCoy of Anya’s Garden Perfumes (Project Coordinator & Natural Perfumers Guild President)
Adam Gottschalk of Lord's Jester
Ambrosia Jones of Perfume By Nature
Charna Ethier of Providence Perfume Company
Christi Meshell of House of Matriarch
Elise Pearlstine of Belly Flowers Botanical Perfumes
Jane Cate of A Wing and a Prayer Perfumes
JoAnne Bassett
Liz Cook of One Seed
Rohanna Goodwin Smith of  Ascent Natural Perfumes

**Please visit Anya’s Garden Perfumes for a chance to win a bottle of Sweet Water or Wild Rose!**

The participating bloggers are:
All I Am – a redhead
Ça Fleure Bon (Several writers)
Donna Hathaway at the Examiner
Feminine Things
The Perfume Critic
Perfume Shrine

Expect to see giveaways and reviews on these pages soon!

Penhaligon's Juniper Sling: fragrance review & draw

Just utter Juniper Sling and find yourself playfully laughing at its jovial, throwback style recalling 1920s London's Bright Young Things consuming gin and recklessly dancing the night away. Indeed "the fragrance that put the ROAR in the 20s" is the new Penhaligon's tag line in their ingenious "mock-umentary" which succeeds their Monty Python-esque previous cartoon film for Sartorial (At this pace, I think we also have an advertising phenomenon on our hands!). Sucker for spicy woodies that I am, I find myself enjoying the trail left by it.

Perfumer Olivier Cresp follows in the steps of Jean-Claude Ellena, who in aromatic Angeliques sous la Pluie (by F.Malle) first gave us a gin & tonic potion that is bracing, cool, delightfully dry and decidedly unsweet; like a soldier's memory of a frosty icecle perched on a thatched roof when away fighting malaria in the tropics. Indeed, tonic water was widely embraced by British soldiers away in the belief that quinine treats malaria. And gin had to be mixed in order to take off the especially bitter tang of quinine, so gin & tonic became a long-held tradition. Penhaligon's drew from that precedent and the advent of "bathtub gin" made during the 1920s and they created Juniper Sling, following the recipe of London Dry Gin. The term ’London Dry’ refers to the way in which the spirit is made, as botanicals must be added during the distillation process instead of after.
There is also another Ellena segment fused in the new fragrance, that peppery-woody facet of Poivre Samarkande, exploiting the properties of Iso E Super so pointedly. Juniper Sling unites the two elements (herbal clarity and low-hum woodiness) into a coherent structure and adds a third pillar; a slight vetiver sweetness plus synth woods. Sweet accents in such a composition might throw the whole off (after all, Ellena's compositions withstand so well and possess such clarity exactly because they're unsweet), but the accomplished Cresp holds his own and balances the act in a likeable, not-too-daring style.

Juniper Sling is characteristically laced with angelica and juniper, the herbal qualities allying with spicy notes of a somewhat warmer character (a pepper & pomander accord). The effect is crisp, groomed-clean. Lots of terpenic linalool in the scent exhibits a light floralcy that is spiced up.
This is contrasted with sensuality coming from the skin-like effect of a suede accord and from the cardamom; indeed cardamom has amongst spices a most sensuous, skin-like, warm aroma. Essentially traversing a low, soft develpment arc, Juniper Sling retains a low-hum vibrancy on skin, very woody and quite musky (clean musk), that verges on sweeter, more gourmand nuances as time passes; there is a pleasant licorice note surfacing, coming from vetiver. This is not the cold stones & musty roots note in hardcore niche vetivers (see Turtle Vetiver or Vetiver Extraordinaire), but rather the warmish, intimate drydown of Guerlain's Vetiver.

My fragrance testing came from a splash on vial, so the hum was low indeed, therefore I would suggest that in order to capture its full effect and much of the spicy top notes as well, you should opt to test with a spray.
Although technically perfectly unisex, the fragrance might appear more spicy-woody masculine than usual for women who embrace warmer notes (or ultra femme fragrances like Penhaligon's Amaranthine). I for one find it a quietly enjoyable tipple that won't get me drunk, but I would have liked it to be more daring and polished.

Not unintentionally, the launch party given featured a menu consisting of food inspired by the notes of the perfume itself: Kicking off with juniper smoked sea trout (spritzed at the table with an edible Juniper essence!), then onto peppered lamb rump with roasted courgettes (roasted on a BBQ on the roof of the car park!) and finished with black cherry and brown sugar ice cream. (A menu created by Chefs Jon Rotheram, Robin Holmgren, Dave and Shaun).

Two deluxe samples for our readers, answering these questions: 1) What is it that makes you cross/not cross the sex divide in fragrances? 2)Do you have a favourite opposite sex marketed fragrance to wear for yourself? Draw remains open till Tuesday 4th midnight.

Notes for Penhaligon's Juniper Sling:
Top: angelica, cinnamon, orange and juniper berries;
Heart: cardamom, orris root, leather and pepper;
Base: vetiver, cherry and sugar.



Juniper Sling is an Eau de Toilette and is now available to buy online and in all Penhaligon's stores.

photo of Bill Murray and Theresa Russell in the 1984 remake of The Razor's Edge film via photobucket 
In the interests of disclosure, I sampled the new scent via a promo

Parfumerie Generale Praline de Santal: fragrance review

Home-toasted cashews and hazelnuts, enrobed with a mixture of dulche de leche that contained salt and tahini paste, is part of the treats that my Kappadokian grandmother used to prepare on cool autumn evenings for us kids to consume while doing our homework and it is this memory which was jogged upon first smelling Parfumerie Générale's Praliné de Santal.

Parfumerie Générale Praliné de Santal follows a parallel life with Jeux de Peau by Serge Lutens in its caramelised overtone due to pyrazines, aroma materials with sugared maple and phenolic nuances, and its étude on sandalwood. Whereas Lutens went with his childhood memories of toasted bread and the yeast of kneading, Pierre Guillaume went with toasted nuts with a coating of caramel & salt.
Both focus on the "creaminess" (i.e.the sweet, milk-ish quality) of natural sandalwood, though one puts it in a buttered context, the other in a nuts context.
It all depends on the kind of tooth you harbor!

On this occasion, the effect rendered is extremely nutty at first (if Bois Farine by L'Artisan Parfumeur instantly reminds you of peanuts you know full well what I mean); but it mellows into a richly satisfying woody accord on drydown. I'm not sure whether I would be more impressed with the originality of the scent, had I not came into contact with the idea in the Lutens fragrance first. It certainly has an elective affinity.
Roasted hazelnuts & peanuts greet us on the opening of Praliné de Santal (lasting for a good 10 minutes on my skin), a combination of savoury and sweet, before the scent falls into an unctuous billowy note of powdery, rich woods and the soothing, smooth silkiness of Cashmeran (an aromachemical which gives an intimate, close to the skin scent, between worn clothes and suede). In the interim there are soft, powdery hints emerging (referenced as heliotrope in the press material, but really more like powdered white chocolate and fluffy, airy vanilla), without diverging from the main gourmand-woody-oriental character of the perfume. In this regard it recalls Etat Libre d'Orange Archives 69, with its easily approachable ambience of spicy woods and distantly (but in the same mood) the satisfying tobacco-softness of Guerlain's Tonka Imperiale.

Pierre Guillaume, perfumer and founder of the niche brand of fragrances, is consistent in his exploration of soft, gourmand orientals; his are refined desserts that withhold some of the sugar expected from the genre, exploring the more resinous or woodier aspects for backing up the respective central theme. Praliné de Santal lacks a certain dynamic after the initial fall into the creamy woods, belying its sharp development of the first few minutes. It's actually sandalwood and Cashmeran which are the remaining notes on the skin after Praliné de Santal has completely "dried down" at the 2-hour wear application mark; a skin scent of delicious aftertaste; sensuous, delectable, maybe having you hankering for going beyond.

Notes for Parfumerie Générale Praliné de Santal:

Sandalwood, Heliotrope, Hazelnut, Virginian Cedar, & Casmeran

Parfumerie Générale Praliné de Santal is a limited availability scent within the line, available in 50ml/1.7oz for 88euros and 100ml/3.3oz for 120 euros on the PG site.

Butternut Squash, Sage, and Goat Cheese Ravioli with Hazlenut-Brown Butter Sauce via gourmetproject.ca

Chanel Les Exclusifs Jersey: Now Available for Purchase

One of the anticipated launches of the season, the newest Chanel exclusive fragrance (part of Les Exclusifs), Jersey, the news of whose launch we broke on these pages, is now available for purchase in time for the lead-up to Christmas shopping: The fragrance is named after one of Coco Chanel's favourite fabrics: jersey, a fabric she prized for its ease and fluidity, which fred women from the constraints of the previous era.

The fragrance follows this concept, "an inspired composition, [...] evocative of a meadow lush with lavender — an essence previously worn only by men.
A tender trail of Vanilla and Musk brings femininity to the forefront, and a rare, sophisticated new scent is born".
Credited to in-house perfumer Jacques Polge, responsible for safekeeping the Chanel tradition, the newest Chanel perfume is available for ordering on the official Chanel website.

The winners of the draw...

...for the EnVoyage fragrances are Mimi Gardenia and Undina. Congratulations! Please email me with your shipping data (using the contact on Profile or About page) so I can forward them to the perfumer who will have your prizes in the mail for you.

Thanks everyone for the enthusiastic participation and till the next one!

Juliette Has a Gun Romantina: new fragrance

Rome and romance are at the heart of the latest, upcoming fragrance by Romano Ricci for his "niche" brand Juliette has a Gun, Romantina. As evidenced by the name, it's about the story of a woman who falls in love in Rome. Sounds utterly gorgeous, doesn't it? But, here's the catch...She leaves as soon as she realizes, so as to keep it forever unmolested by time and convention. Maybe she throws a coin in the Fontana di Trevi, maybe she doesn't. Who knows!

The new Juliette Has a Gun fragrance, Romantina, is the first fragrance in the line to display a truly floral character and it features notes of white flowers such as orange blossom, jasmine and lily of the valley, together with rose, iris and osmathus, warmed by Bourbon vanilla. Patchouli and vetiver form the base of a modern floral chypre.

Available in Eau de Parfum in 50ml/1.7oz and 100ml/3.4oz.

Magical Fragrances

"Un bon son brut pour les truands" by IAM greets the viewer upon setting eyes on this amazing, impossing commercial for a classic fragrance of the late 1970s.



In the process we get a sense of how "black magic" transforms via an elixir of scented alchemy ...like Magie Noire by Lancome.

So, on the subject of "magical" fragrances, those which have the power to transform things around you, people's reactions, people's perceptions and ultimately your thoughts, which are your favourites?

EnVoyage Perfumes Giveaway

EnVoyage Perfumes has just launched a new all natural collection, the Rubicon Collection, featuring L’Emblem Rouge eau de parfum and L’eau de Emblem Rouge matching perfumed water. We have one roll-on of the former and one mini-spray of the latter for 2 lucky readers. Please state your interest in the comments.
Prizes are free for US residents, but winner should shoulder postage costs if outside the US (sent directly by the company). Draw will remain open till Monday 26th midnight.

The first fragrance of the series,  l’Emblem Rouge,  and it’s accompanying perfumed water (hydrosol),  l’Eau de Emblem Rouge,  are a collaboration by EnVoyage perfumer Shelley Waddington and master distiller Dabney Rose.   L’Emblem Rouge, composed by  perfumer Shelley Waddington, is a lush rose soliflore based on organic Iranian rose otto.

Top Notes:  Cassie, Mace, Cinnamon, Bitter Orange, Juicy Grapefruit, Green Pepper, Iranian galbanum, Violet, and Cistus
Heart Notes:   Iranian Rose Otto, Ylang-Ylang, Heliotrope,  French Jasmine sambac, Violet, and Honey
Base Notes:  Guaiacwood, Sandalwood, Copaiba, Vetiver, Cedarwood Virginia, Tolu Balsam, Benzoin Siam,   Tonka, Vanilla and Ambergris.


Designed to pair with the perfume is  L’Eau de Emblem Rouge.  Distilled from the perfume and additional rose petals by Master Distiller Dabney Rose, this perfumed water is a light and lovely fragrance to spritz on bed linen and lingerie.   L’Eau de Emblem Rouge also fulfills the famed function of traditional rose water that is greatly nourishing for the face and hair.  It additionally acts to refresh the perfume.

Emily Blunt: New Face for YSL Opium

British actress Emily Blunt's new addiction has a loaded name: Opium. The iconic fragrance, that is. Emily Blunt will be the new face of Opium for Yves Saint Laurent, following in the footsteps of Jerry Hall, Linda Evangelista, Sophie Dahl, and numerous less well-known models. I don't know...there's something about miss Blunt, which I find petulant, despite her acting credentials. Is that the character she embodied on Devil Wears Prada was so and that image has stuck? Is that that I expect someone fiery and determined, apart from just hip and likeable, for Opium? A bit of both, perhaps. Though now that Opium has been surgically given a facelift (and given a flanker/ sister) to make it more "eternally likeable" things are just not the same anymore.

"Opium embraces the whole history and values of our house", said Renaud de Lesquen, president of YSL & Designer Brands. The new campaign will apparently "unveil a fiery, almost reckless woman with magnetic seduction, that nobody or nothing can resist". Blunt worked with photographers Romain Gavras and Patrick Demarchelier on the campaign, which airs in October. According to her statement: "I am very honoured to have been chosen to be the face of Opium. It is really exciting to embody a fragrance which has stood the test of time without its allure ever being diminished".

At any rate, I can't pronounce a judgment like usual until the official advertisements come forth. We will keep you updated!

Here is a teaser:


What do YOU think?

Back from the Dead: A Creamy Floral Many Loved

It's always a bummer having a favourite getting discontinued, be it a make-up item or a particular accessory (or even foodstuff you used to munch on) but when it comes to fragrances, people get peeved even more. Maybe because the bond with perfume is an intimate one and one's signature scent can be precious.

For all those who had lamented the demise of Stila's fragrance Crème Bouquet, the definition of a creamy, sweet & fluffy floral, rejoice: The 1.7oz/50ml bottle is back again on the official website of Stila for 40$US.

Roxana Illuminated Perfume: To Bee or not to Bee?

The resounding answer to above question is to Bee, all the more so since bees are a reminder of the endless circle of existence and renewal in nature. Because To Bee is that unusual thing in our days: a holistic fragrance inspired by the perfumer's own apiology experiences. When was the last time you heard that? Vaguely referenced in Moss Breches by Tom Ford, but I doubt very much mr.Ford has ever ventured really close to a bee hive, let alone tended his own pet bees. Yet this is exactly what Roxana has been doing, chronicling her efforts on her journal.

To Bee is emblematic of the warm, musky scent of the hive. Indeed, few animalic scents are naturally available these days, due to ethical concerns on the treatment of animals (see Musk deer) and increasing concerns on the sustainability of those which come from cruelty-free sources (ambergris is truly scarce).
Lusty basenotes have been crafted into a series of accords with spice and clover. The result is a delicious inviting aroma at once sweetly impassioned and steadfast.



Smelling To Bee I find myself lulled into a childhood reverie of sipping honey-laced smoky tea in the evenings, on the cusp of summer entering into autumn, when the gardens were getting duskier and duskier by the day and the approaching chill of the night made its appearence like an owl fluffing its feathers upon awakening. The dark colour of the liquid in To Bee somehow cements this impression; boozy, nuanced sweetness creeps underneath the smoky muskiness (coming from mimosa absolute, an intimate and at the same time staggeringly beautiful aroma) creating a mysterious, resinous trail which is not entirely about honey, but so much more. Those who are averse to plainly sweet, foody fragrances will find a nuanced scent to transition them into the harvest delights of autumn.

The synergy for the perfume is made with: essential oils, c02 extracts and absolutes (Resins, Wood, Spice, Mimosa, Sweet Clover Absolute and Beeswax Absolute) with many of the perfumer's own unique accords in a base of tinctured and infused honey comb from local bee rescues in Los Angeles.The best surprise is probably that unlike many other natural perfumes, this one, thanks to the resinous basenotes and the beeswax, lasts quite well.

To Bee is available both as a liquid and solid perfume. Find samples, perfume lockets, compacts and flacons at Roxana's E-shop


imagery ©RoxanaVilla, used by permission
In the interests of disclosure, a sample was sent directly from the perfumer.

How to Wear Fragrance: On Perfume Etiquette

It might not come from a French-authored source, but in Karen Homer's adorable little book Things a Woman Should Know about Style, a whole chapter is devoted to fragrance use. The cover, sporting the famous opening shot of the movie Breakfast at Tiffany's (based on Truman Capote's story) with an Audrey Hepburn in shades & pearls, hair on a high bun, is predisposing for classical, glamour tips for wearing your clothes with confindence and panache.

Leafing through the book's pages, I come upon such seemingly wise, but ultimately ill-gotten advice as "A bottle of perfume once opened will not last more than 6 months. At least not to a nose that knows".  And I find myself smirking a bit on behalf of all the perfume community's hunt for vintage treasures. But still, there are other nuggets of wisdom, which are charming and harmless, as well as the sound practical tips on opting for classics when in doubt ("Chanel No.5 or anything created by Guerlain before 1930 are your safest bets") or buying the fragrance you like at outlets at a discount.

A few of those hints of perfume etiquette sound like wise precautions in the battlefield of love & romance; even if a little less self-assured or defying as the standard perfumista is accustomed to: The author advises to stop wearing a fragrance if one's significant other doesn't like it. And cautions an even faster elimination of fragrance if it happens to be the same as your significant other's ex. Particularly if said partner is responding positively to its scent! Furthermore a partner's conscious move to gift a current love interest with an ex's fragrance is to be viewed with grave suspicion. For reasons of fairness, one's partner should be met with the same courtesy when choosing a gift for them.

If you're really romantic and happen to be travelling away from your loved one, it's a very poetic gesture to scent a card with your beloved's fragrance and tuck it away in your luggage. Opening up your suitcase upon arrival, a wave of nostalia will tangle its poigant fingers around your heart...

Moving into the realm of choosing fragrance for public wearing, Homer advises caution in the face of unisex fragrances (or masculine scents for women): "When you dress up for an evening, you want to smell feminine and not the same as the maitre d'. That said, for daywear, the classic unisex cologne Aqua di Parma has a fresh, lemony charm perfect for lunching in Tuscan gardens." And where would one be most likely to find a decent substitute for Aqua di Parma cologne, should one want to bypass the sameness factor? The author confirms my own experience that small off the beaten-track toiletries stores in France (and along some of the Mediterranean countries) can provide their local take of toilet water which is often exceptionally good and looks positively "exotic" to most people not native. Homer quips that the trick of "exclusivity" with local toilet waters however is not possible with quite the same subtleness in Spain or Italy, given the predeliction of male patrons for stronger, expansive fragrances:  Therefore, use extreme caution, "unless you want to smell like a teenafer boy's bathroom the night he thinks he's going to lose his virginity".

But perhaps the most controversial and ripe for discussion snippet is the tip on choosing toilet waters: "Rosewater smells of the faded grandeur of old actresses; lavender smells of your granny". Perhaps it's all a game of perfume associations...Or perhaps the greatest tip of them all is to just have confidence in yourself and good manners when applying perfume: less can be so much more.

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: How French Women Wear Perfume

The winners of the draw....

....for the newest Lutens samples are Beth G. and Marialena. Congratulations and please e-mail me with your shipping data, using the contact on Profile or About page, so I can have your prizes in the mail soon.

Thanks everyone for the enthusiastic participation and till the next one!

What Constitutes Luxury & How is it Marketed Right Now?

L' Association des Professionnels du Luxe is today debating the question of luxe and premium as pertaining to terms used to communicate products to consumers at the Westin hotel (with the participation of Michel Teychène, marketing director at Air France and a trio off Added Value comprising Cécile Gorgeon-Pompéi, director, Leslie Pascaud, marketing director et Mark Whiting, director.) This gives us an excellent opportunity to question the theme for our own purposes regarding luxury brands and lessons learned from them.

News surrounding the luxury segment devising new techniques to capture the attention of consumers amidst an economy that is still not recuperating from the recession (and in fact might be in for another bout) have been landing on news sites thickly recently. Witness the mega-news that Gucci devotes an entire blog-site to the China market: Gucci China. The question of whether China is an applicable market for luxury brands or not is rather an over-discussed point. Obviously it is, otherwise so many brands with huge marketing offices standing behind them wouldn't try to infiltrate it so passionately. To point, the Hermes offspring specifically for it, as announced on these pages over a year ago, has been doing amazingly well according to reports. What makes Gucci stand out in this piece of news is that they dedicate a blog site, rather than just a part of their site, thus personalizing the platform for users and importing content that can be peripheral. The marked similarities with the Sartorialist in the layout of street fashion photography is also intriguing to watch. Could it mean, to make this a broader discussion, that one successful amateur might pose as an exemplar to the professionals? To bring this to perfumes, could it mean that specific elements of presentation offered by amateur/indie authors (be it producers of aromatic compositions or troubadours of perfume prose) can slowly become the expected way in which certain aspects of the trade will be communicated from now on?

The Missoni Target collection which sold out within the first day is another example of a new spin to the techniques of making luxe products stand out. “The combination of the excellent marketing strategy, a large number of resellers looking to profit off of the limited availability of the line and Target vastly underestimating the popularity of the collaboration are what led to such a successful, sold-out first day of the Missoni for Target launch,” said Emily Connor, conversation manager at Media Logic, Albany, NY. It's also a lesson in how social media could be of tremendous help when mobile Web problems and in-store fights erupted due to over-demand (Web crash happened on Sept.13th 9am.Eastern time).

On what constitutes the targeted market segments, two interesting facts emerge: Male consumers with an aspirational streak consume more luxe goods and the affluent family is becoming a new target within brands.

Aspiration male consumers increase their spending "dramatically", according to American Express. “As consumers grow more confident coming out of the recession, many are returning to their luxury fashion shopping behaviors from years past,” said Ed Jay, senior vice president at American Express Business Insights, New York. "[...]online and discount and flash-sale spending has provided another platform for buying favorite brands, all contributing to increases in luxury retail spend across the board". (According to numbers, that's a staggering 126% increase on premium luxe brands for non-enthusiast males in the USA). Maybe some of the Missoni-Target audience consisted of those? Compare and contrast with male fashion enthusiasts, who spent 11% less on premium luxury overall, while affluent female consumers did not change their spending habits.
Cuing in this data with the rise in masculine fragrances released by mainstream luxury and niche perfumery brands makes sense: indeed the tsunami of releases presents fragrance addressed to men like never before seen in the history of mankind. There's definitely something here. Could it also mean that the (traditional) role of women buying perfume has finally shifted?

But it's the affluent family which might be the emerging target of the luxury world: According to the Ipsos Mandelsohn 2011 Annual Affluent Survey families buy products in mass (that pertains to the digital and electronic goods especially, but a concept store that caters to each and every member of the family can also see this materialized in higher sales). The reason behind it is suggested to be one of being in control and effecting changes in an are that the consumers feel they can make a difference. Children and teenagers are increasingly monitoring purchases for families. A fact that is well known by the perfume industry as well, which has been catapulting us with releases that address the under-teens (see Justin Bieber celebrity fragrance) or slightly above.

“Additionally, it’s undeniable that the line is successful in the fact that it was truly able to keep the traditional Missoni elements, yet design a much less-expensive group of products, ranging from clothing to luggage to kitchenware to electronic accessories, that was accepted by this key demographic,” she said.

Quotes & data provided by Rachel Lamb and Kayla Hutzler. Photo via thelocal.de

Bertrand Duchaufour Unveils Mon Numero 6 by L'Artisan Parfumeur & press for Batucada

"An unusual, lucid harmony between green, fruity, watery, floral and woody notes". This is what L'Artisan Parfumeur says of their latest, Mon Numéro 6, city-exclusive scent, inspired by their travels:

Evoking sensations of rebirth in which the first drops of rain give life back to the earth. A dreamy, leafy mood, imagine yourself barefoot on the ground in the midst of a monsoon. The official notes are lychee, magnolia flower and sandalwood.
Its perfumer, Bertrand Duchaufour, has a bit to say:



And a bit more on Batucada, which we had announced a little while ago, a collaboration between two perfumers, Karine Vinchon in Grasse and Elisabeth Maier in São Paulo.