Cuir de Russie by Chanel: fragrance review and history

Whenever I think of Cuir de Russie by Chanel I think of a particular place and a woman I once saw. She is of Slavic features, quite old and she must have been beautiful at her prime. Now the fallen features speak of a splendour gone by, an existence that was once luxuriously pampered now reduced to wandering the busy, buzzing city sitting at the old derelict café that was Zonar’s up till some years ago. Situated at the city centre, amidst the crowded shopping district and face to face with an uber-luxe jewel shop (which in itself had been a traditional, picturesque ouzeri in a previous incarnation), Zonar’s had been for almost half a century the Mecca meeting point of local and visiting intelligentia.


And then like old civilizations, it withered and almost died…Abandoned, frequented only by the decadent and the nostalgically traditionalists. She was there, all right: mink fur jacket on her back, but almost tattered and yellowing at the edges. Antique gold bracelets that must have been family heirlooms from a Bosporus clan. Her hair coiffed in an old fashioned style that must have gone out of fashion about 30 years ago, her eye pensive and introspective. Her black croc bag, good quality, but showing years’ long wear. To paraphrase Poe, a "woman of the crowd"…

Cuir de Russie has this exact décadence avec élegance vibe that made an impression on me upon setting eyes on that woman.

In the words of Luca Turin:

“sumptuous leather, light and balsamic, forgoing any sugary compromise, Cuir de Russie regains its place at the top of this category, right next to the rather more jovial Tabac Blond. [...]Cuir de Russie is a striking hologram of luxury bygone: its scent like running the hand over the pearl grey banquette of an Isotta Frashini while forests of birch silently pass by”.

Amanda Lacey, famed London facialist, to whom this was gifted by Jacques Polge, put it in simpler terms:

“There's something about it that makes me emotional - it reminds me of Paris and of times gone by when people had an elegant approach to life. I feel I'm wearing a wise grand dame around my neck.”

Chanel's Cuir de Russie came out in 1924, a time at which the impact of Les Ballets Russes (1909-1929) was palpable. Russian émigrés having fled the motherland because of the revolution in 1917 had populated Paris and had lent it their own mark of decadent sophistication. Suddenly the exotic East, in which westerners classified the vast Russias since before the time of Peter the Great, became all the rage and the embodiment of everything forbidden and alluring. The datchas, the orthodox churches, the ballads on balalaikas, the Cossacks.
In the words of a critic of the times:

“nothing is more foreign to our tradition than those violent bursts, those frantic and intense dances, this instinctive frankness, this disproportionate imagination. The discordance is so brutal that one would be astonished by the tenacious favour that those people over there hold on us. The simple truth is that Russians fascinate us because they distrurb us”.

From the Commitée Colbert.


Coco Chanel herself would indulge sartorially into the craze for all things Russian, setting up the atelier Kitmir, which will later create the broderies inspired by Russian folklore for Jean Patou, himself the lover of the Grand Duchess of Russia. Coco also created the costumes for 4 ballets, one of which is Le Train in 1924; coincidentally the year Cuir de Russie is issued.

Inspired by Gabrielle’s own love for the exiled Grand Duke Dimitri Pavlovitch (1891-1942) ~ cousin of Tsar Nicolas II~ and paying homage to Stravinsky, Diaghilev and Serge Lifar, protégé of Diaghilev, with whom she was friends, Cuir de Russie exploited an old theme with a modernist palette.

Legendary nose Ernest Beaux, guided by Chanel’s desires to dare, made women indulge in what is essentially a men’s scent formula, garlanding it though with sparkly, dry aldehydes and the eternal feminine flowers: jasmine (an abundance of it!), rose and ylang ylang; redolent of No.5’s own heart, giving a warm, honeyed aspect that contrasts with an icy element that enters and exits the scene like an aloof, declassé aristocrat ~in perfect accordance to what was previously revealed as being the idea behind it: the leather pouches for jewels.

The inclusion of rectified birch tar, supposedly along with styrax, gave it the brutish animalic touch of 20th century and the intelligent beauty of Constructivism arhictecture. None of the sweet, contemporary niche leather harmonies and further off the smoothness of Diorling {click for review}. Sublime cadenzas of amber and resin provide the warm but never too congenial backdrop hinting at a bygone luxury and perhaps a little smoking fetish, letting off a subtle hint of tobacco. Contrary to Tabac Blond however it weaves smoothness of skin and rounded contours under the dress that cloths the woman. This is supremely manifested in the far superior extrait de parfum concentration which, like all Chanel parfums, exploits the best of raw materials and gives the most luxuriant experience.

Notes: aldehydes, orange blossom, bergamot, mandarin, clary sage, iris, jasmine, rose, ylang-ylang, cedarwood, balsams, vetiver, styrax, incense, cade, leather, amber and vanilla.

The current eau de toilette version, which had been first re-orchestrated by in-house perfumer Jacques Polge in 1983 (toning a tad down the harsher leather aspect), now circulates in the gigantic sparse bottles of Les Exclusifs range in 200ml, distributed at Chanel boutiques and very select doors. The extrait de parfum concentration is not easy to come by any longer (it used to be available easily on Chanel.usa), regretably, but it is definitely still being made, distibuted to certain boutiques and definitely available in Paris if you travel there.

Translation of quotes from the French, author's own. Pic of young woman in gloves by glovelover 2006/flickr. Pic of Zonar's from Naftemboriki. Pic of ladies in furs by Kchen/flickr. Pic of leather cases for jewels courtesy of wealthwood.com

Optical Scentsibilities: Memento Mori

Dior Poison "memento mori" ad, "all is vanity"

How could the idea of mortality be tied to perfume? There seems to exist a plethora of references to Eros and Thanatos in scented matters. From the ancient practice of accompanying the dead to their resting place with aromatic incense and the fragrant burials in Egypt's pyramids to the annointing of the body for weddings in India with comparable scented essences, fragrance holds a key to matters of mortality. Rituals using it aim either to somehow "defeat" it (marriage and therefore procreation) or to pay their respects to the unavoidable.
But it is rare that a perfume company uses images of death to advertise their products; in this case Poison by Christian Dior.

You don't get what I am talking about? Squint. Now look again with your vampire eyes...The image of a skull is looking back at you through the mirror, the bottles and the torso of the woman sitting in front of her dresser. See?

Images of skulls abound in art and are indeed a premium means of delivering meanings that have to do with the subconcious. From the skull and bones flag of the pirate ship to more sophisticated paradigms, like this one from surrealist Salvador Dali, skulls are there to remind us that nothing lasts forever and the inevetability of death is the only centainty in life.
Of course Dali chose to depict it through naked women forming the parts of the skull, which is an allusion to the other half of the equlibrium of Eros and Thanatos. The regeneristic power of sexual desire and copulation is man's only means of transcedenting death. This of course lies at the root of ancient mysteries and rituals, such as the Orphic or Eleusinian Mysteries in ancient Greece.

During the Middle Ages, at a time when general lack of education swerved the emphasis of ecclesiastical catechy into iconography rather than scripture, images of horrible monstrosity became almost normal in the abodes of the holy. One only has to take a look at the gargoyles of late-Gothic churches across Europe to ascertain this. In this environment the notion of Memento Mori flourished; a typically simple depiction of a skull making an appearence somewhere along a painting, a psalm book, or a tapestry.

The habit persisted through later years and this painting of Jean de Dinteville (depicted at left) by Holbein is testament to it. If you look at it from the left and squint enough, you see that at the bottom of it there is an elongated form of something that does not seem like anything much, but in fact is a symbolic skull.

And how would this culminate in the above Dior Poison advertisement? Simple: the name Poison lends itself to imagery of Thanatos, through its connotations of its meaning and the fairy tale poisoned apple like its bottle shape suggests. Apple, a fruit full of its own connotations of sin and corruption!
Perhaps the advertisers want us to remember that just as their perfume can symbolically be lethal (and in copious amounts I am sure it can be!), it can also put a spin into the other half of the eternal duo: Eros.

Pics from moiillusions.com and nationalgallery.org.uk. Thanks to Sillage for bringing the initial Poison ad to my attention

Leather Series 8: The Garçonne Leathers of the 1920s (part 2)

by guest writer Denyse Beaulieu

Tabac Blond was the opening salve of the garçonnes’ raid on gentlemen’s dressing tables. Its name evokes the “blonde” tobacco women had just started smoking in public (interestingly, Marlboros were launched as a women’s brand in 1924 with a red filter to mask lipstick traces). The fragrance was purportedly meant to blend with, and cover up, the still-shocking smell of cigarettes: smoking was still thought to be a sign of loose morals.
Despite its name, Tabac Blond is predominantly a leather scent, the first of its family to be composed for women and as such, a small but significant revolution. Though perfumery had recently started to stray from the floral bouquets thought to be the only fragrances suitable for ladies (Coty Chypre was launched in 1917), it had never ventured so far into the non-floral. Granted, there are floral notes, but apart from ylang-ylang, the clove-y piquancy of carnation and the cool powdery metallic note of iris don’t stray much from masculine territory. Amber and musk smooth down the bitter smokiness of the leather/tobacco leaf duet, providing the opulent “roundness” characteristic of classic Carons. And it is this ambery-powdery base – redolent of powdered faces and lipstick traces on perfumed cigarettes – that pulls the gender-crossing Tabac Blond back into feminine territory to the contemporary nose, despite Luca Turin’s calling it “dykey and angular and dark and totally unpresentable” in Chandler Burr’s Emperor of Scent. Like its younger sister Habanita (1921), Tabac Blond’s rich, golden-honeyed, slightly louche sillage speaks of late, smoke-laden nights at the Bal Nègre in the arms of Cuban aristocrats or déclassé Russian émigrés, rather than exhilarating rides in fast cars driven by the new Eves…

Not so Knize Ten, the 1924 fragrance composed by Vincent Roubert (who worked with Coty on L’Or and L’Aimant) for the Viennese tailor Knize. The Knize boutique was famously designed in 1913 by architect Adolf Loos, whose anti-Art Nouveau essay, Ornament and Crime, helped define Modernist aesthetics with its smooth surfaces and pure play on volume. The scent itself was introduced to complement the clothier’s first ready-to-wear men’s line and in its opening notes, it clearly speaks in a masculine tone. The leather, paired with bergamot, petitgrain, orange, lemon and the slightly medicinal rosemary, is as dryly authoritative as a sharply-cut gabardine suit. As it eases into wear, rose, orris and carnation throw in a gender-bending curve ~Marlene Dietrich (herself a Knize patron) may have well slipped into that suit… The leather itself is of that of the wrist-watchband or fine shoe rather than the pungent “cuir de russie” boot. But despite the richly animalic base – musk, amber and castoreum – hinting at bridled desires, Knize Ten retains the buffered, well-bred smoothness of gentleman who never felt the need to set foot in the cigar-smoke laden cabinet of Herr Doktor Freud…

His twin sister Chanel Cuir de Russie (also 1924) clearly departs from the butch Cossack boot and its birch-tar roughness. In fact, in an anecdote told by the composer Ernest Beaux to Chanel’s second perfumer Henri Robert, and transmitted to the third perfumer of the house, Jacques Polge, this particular “cuir” was meant to reproduce the delicate smell of the fine leather pouches wrapping precious jewel – another type of loot, as it were, than what the Cossack bore away on their horses. Cuir de Russie is a tribute to the impact of the Russian émigrés on the intellectual and aesthetic life of 1920s Paris -- Beaux himself, of course, was a Russian exile of French descent and Mademoiselle’s fashion house was peopled with elegant Russian aristocrats hired as sales assistants and models – as well as a radically modernist reworking of a by-then decades-old theme.

But more later in Helg’s review…



Photo by Irving Penn courtesy of ArtPhotoGallery.com, painting by Jack Vettriano Fetish, courtesy of angelarthouse

Leather Series 7: The Garçonne Leathers of the 1920s

by guest writer Denyse Beaulieu

“She is a strong woman. Excuse – strength is not the word I am after. Women, pretty women at least, are never ‘strong”. I need a word that expresses energy, the quality that makes a man who speaks of ‘frail Eve’ – referring to the female sex – look like a fool!
Her neck is arched and tense. Tense also her features, her whole carriage indeed! Her demeanour is that of a duellist awaiting the attack!
Attack from whom!
From you, sir, and from me… from man, in general.”

“The Flapper – A New Type”, by Alfredo Panzini, Vanity Fair, September 1921
(from oldmagazinearticles.com)

As the “lost generation” returned from the trenches of World War I to civilian life, they faced a new kind of war: the war of the sexes.
It’s hard to realize nowadays the utter shock it must’ve been, for men who grew up alongside women in corsets and bustles, with huge flowered hats teetering on their long upswept tresses, to see them mutating into the cocktail-swigging, cigarette-smoking, car-driving, bob-haired, short-skirted breed Americans called “flappers” and the French, “garçonnes”. This second, much more telling designation (a feminization of the word for “boy” in French, “garcon”), was popularized by the eponymous 1922 best-seller (700 000 copies) by the French author Victor Margueritte. With its liberated heroine’s sexual escapades (including a lesbian affair), La Garçonne was deemed so scandalous that Margueritte was stripped of his Légion d’Honneur…

The Bohemian classes of the Belle Époque had already engaged in some gender-bending ~ the term “garçonne” was actually coined by the decadent late 19th century novelist Huysmans ~ but what occurred in the 1920s was an out-an-out, highly symbolic raid on masculine closets. Led on by Gabrielle Chanel, garçonnes shed the corset to adopt the more strict, practical and streamlined menswear styles, including the white shirt, suit and boater. Jean Patou provided them with sportswear to ski and play tennis; Dunhill and Hermès offered them leather motoring gear to match the luxurious interiors of their new, leather-upholstered cars; Hermès even produced flight suits for the fashion-conscious aviatrix.

And, of course, they began filching men’s eau de colognes – interestingly, Jean Patou’s 1929 Le Sien (“Hers”), shown at the Paris museum of fashion Palais Galliéra in the current “Années Folles” exhibition, is explicitly marketed as a fragrance men could wear, but produced for women. The same exhibition commissioned a (non-commercialized) perfume to embody the spirit of the Jazz Age, composed by IFF’s Antoine Maisondieu. It is, of course, a leather scent (for a review, click here).

The Cuir de Russie, as we’ve seen previously, had been around since the last quarter of the 19th century. But the 1920s and 30s would be the heyday of leathers from the spectacular 1924 double feature of Ernest Beaux’s Chanel Cuir de Russie and Vincent Roubert’s Knize Ten and Jacques Guerlain’s odd Djedi in 1927 to later renditions: Caron En Avion (1929), Lanvin Scandal by André Fraysse (1932), Lancôme Révolte by Armand Petitjean (1936) and Creed Cuir de Russie (1939), initially Errol Flynn’s bespoke fragrance, and LT Piver’s Cuir de Russie the same year. At least thirty houses launched their own versions of the Cuir de Russie from the late 19th century to the late 30s (the trend continued into the 50s), which bears witness to the enduring attraction of the note.

But the real turning point came about in 1919 with Ernest Daltroff’s epoch-making Caron Tabac Blond, the first leather scent to be directly marketed to women. Is it just by chance that the first perfumer to cross the gender boundaries of the “cuir de Russie” was himself a Russian?


To be continued.....


Pic of Marie Bell in Jean de Limur’s 1936 La Garçonne, courtesy of encyclocine.com

Shining Sunny Scents

Artisanal perfumer Laurie Erickson is the mind and soul behind Sonoma Scent Studio, a small but vibrant brand from Healdsburg, northern California, founded in 2004, which aims to cater for the customer who has become jaded with department store perfumes and is eager to explore a more natural approach. Although not strictly a line of natural perfumes (as she allows a small amount of synthetics, notably musks) Laurie does use a higher percentage of natural essential oils and absolutes than most without veering into the path of aromatherapy blends, but retaining the character of proper “perfume”: a scent that constitutes a whole; not just strings of voices that sound from in and out of a room, but rather a conversation of loving friends over a homemade dinner with good Napa Valley wine.

Laurie’s line is quite extensive comprising scents from different olfactory families, from warm Orientals to musk blends through dry woods and floral compositions. She first got inspired by the paysage of the Sonoma County with its oaks and redwoods, but also by her family’s beloved garden full of jasmine and roses. It was those blossoms that prompted her to source the best essential oils so she could enjoy floral scents year round and not just when the flowers are in bloom. Laurie however didn’t delve into perfume right away: she first earned a Bachelor of Sciences in Environmental Earth Science and a Master of Sciences in Geomechanics in Stanford University pursuing a career of technical writer. It is fortunate that her perfume business proved so successful that she decided to occupy herself with it exclusively.

In the 5 scents I tried I detected a common theme running through them, a resinous base of predominent labdanum and myrrh that gives them a deep resonance and a sensuous, slightly “dirty” character. The overall feel was that of scents that source natural essences; there is that familiar feel of non-perfumey ambience which I have come to recognise and appreciate. The onomastics somehow do not predispose one for a Californian meditative line, which is the only incosistency.

Encens Tranquille (quiet incense) is described as a meditative woody fragrance centered on incense, including notes of labdanum, frankincense, myrrh, cedar, sandalwood, ambergris, patchouli, oakmoss and musk. Deep incense, dense and dark, sobriety incarnate. There is the unusual tone of ocean and fish, if only for a moment as if a temple is situated on the seafront and you enter barefoot, with your hair still wet from a dip. And then a resinous explosion, murky, smoky. For those who are serious about their incense!

Champagne de Bois (forest champagne) is described as an effarvescent scent with aldehydic top notes, a heart of jasmine grandiflorum and carnation and a warm woodsy base of labdanum, sandalwood, cedar and musk. The opening is indeed sparkly, waxy, with a hint of flower which surfaces later. However the base of labdanum and cedar especially overshadow the blossoms rather too soon, suspending them in a mirage. It lasted incredibly long and seemed to grow more deep and dark with every passing moment.

Fireside Intense encompasses woods and resins along with a touch of leather and agarwood, evocing an evening sitting by a campfire. The scent truly captures the aroma of burnt coniferous wood, emanating from the mountains, embers glowing softly in the cool misty morning when the memory of the night has not yet been formed. Very dry and intensely smoky, it is a figurative painting of an American scene out of a Western film. It’s not the easiest to wear if you are working in an office with people who complain about fragrance wearing, but who cares? Fireside Intense has the rare gift of transporting the wearer to a more adventurous, quixotic existence where the men are ruggedly handsome, roasting salted meat and drinking inky black tea from a hip flask, gazing pensively over the horizon for new frontiers. I’m so there!

Ambre Noir (black amber) is the latest addition in the line. A dark amber with notes of labdanum, cardamom, red rose, woody notes, a touch of agarwood, myrrh, vetiver, moss and mitti. My contrapuntal impression of dry and sweet notes that come to the fore and then subside to the background, leaving a smooth impression on the skin after a while and lasting for hours, was unusual for me. I am not an amber person per se, I admit. And yet I love oriental perfumes, in which amber often forms the base! However, amber-centered scents are either too heavy, too thick to my sensibilities or too surupy for their own good. When I put Ambre Noir on the skin I feared that it would fall to the former category, on a sour whiff. But then I was surprised to see that it lightened up and a sweeter note emerged. A slightly powdery note that managed not to become cloying, which is an accomplishment in this category of scents, as previously mentioned. I am not completely certain that I would personally fit this scent, but lovers of ambers will find a balanced composition in Ambre Noir.

Laurie divulged to me that her bases, notably amber, are self-made and purposely drier than commercial perfumers’ supplies. Essences are diluted in pure perfumer’s alcohol for the eau de parfum concentration and natural fractionated coconut oil for the parfum oil base.

Jour ensoileillé (sunny day) is a floral jubilation, rich, warm and golden like a ray of sunshine on a lush countryside garden. Orange blossom, a little ruberose and jasmine marry their white synergy over a soft base of labdanum, sandalwood, ambergris, oakmoss and musk. The joy of the fragrance is contagious, as if a smile could be bottled and opened when the mood is grey and weary. The memento of summer into the heart of winter. A beautiful, feminine and exuberant fragrance with very good sillage and easily the prettiest of the bunch.

The rest of the line includes Voile de Violette (a violet and iris accord over a woody bottom), Rose Musc (a feminine blend of rose and musk on an ambergris base), Opal (a soft, vanillic clean skin musc I am personally very curious to try), Bois Epicés and Bois Epicés Legère (warm and cosy scents) and Cameo (a powdery feminine floral with rose and violet).

All the scents I tried reviewed above came in Eau de Parfum concentration, which is incredibly dense and lasting; much closer to parfum actually than most lines I have tried and therefore excellent value for money. A parfum version is available as well for people who want a closer to the skin experience that projects less. Additionally, body creams made with 20% moisturising shea butter and all natural oils (scented to the fragrance of your choice or unscented) are available.
Sonoma Scent Studio also takes requests for custom scents or all natural scents with prices varying according to ingredients used.
See details and contact on Sonoma Scent Studio site.


Leather Series will continue next week with iconic representations! Stay tuned.

Pic from film "Sideways" courtesy of athinorama.gr and Ambre Noir ad from Sonoma Scent Studio site