Mother's Day suggestions

Many wonderful suggestions out there for the one person in our lives who loves us no matter what: our mother. Perfume Shrine presents you with some of them.

From Beautyhabit:

Beautiful solid fragrances encased in antique gold compacts in the In Fiore line. The scent comes in a base of jojoba oil and honey-scented beeswax. They look wonderful and they come in 6 scents:

Bois d'ete (with begamot, neroli and vetiver)

Fleur Orange (with neroli, jasmine sambac and Oman frankincense)

Fleurs blanches (with tuberose, jasmine, rose and orange blossom)

Fumee d'ambre (with incense, patchouli, vetiver and sweet amber)

Night Queen (with jasmine, bergamot peel, rose, oud and patchouli)

Patchouli Royale (with antique patchouli, oud, sandalwood and exotic balsams)

Rose Noir (with saffron absolute, Assam oud, galbanum and damascena rose)

From Hqhair.co.uk:

The Mama Mio Supermama Kit kit is filled with daily essential skincare for you to enjoy. Starting with Mama Mio Moisturising Shower Cream: it is actually a baby cleanser! Mama Mio felt that every mama can use a little babying sometimes. That explains why it is so gentle – it won’t strip your skin like a harsh soap. And of course it is sodium laureth sulfate free – it’s from Mama Mio.

Next is the important exfoliation stage. The Supersmooth Body Buff will gently and effectively remove the dead skin cells that stop nourishment penetrating your skin. The tiny granules are micro-ground natural pumice blended with Sweet Almond Oil to ensure that the Body Buff slides easily all over and isn’t too harsh.

The Super-rich Body Cream is a must for every mama. It’s rich yet quickly absorbed, nourishing but light, and makes skin feel silky and, very importantly, smell gorgeous. So lavish your skin with this super-nourishing cream and glory at the glow and softness.

Mama Mio Wonder-Full Balm really is. Named Wonder-Full Balm because you will find a million different ways to use it. Nine natural oils in a beeswax base, it is really a solid oil that melts in contact with your skin and provides rich intense moisture. Best lip balm ever, fantastic cuticle cream, adios dry elbows, run away rough heels… You will pull it out of your bag five times daily and you will never travel without it.

Mama Mio Supermama Kit contains: Moisturising Shower Creme, 300mlSuper-rich Body Cream, 200mlBody Buff, 200mlWonder-full Balm, 30ml

From Ayala Moriel:

Pamper your Mom on Mother's Day with an all-natural fragrant gift. Nothing can beat a custom scent, especially designed for her. We particulary encourage mothers and daugthers to come together to the studio for a shared Olfactory Journey - an unforgettable experience of essences from around the world, where the exotic meets the familiar in the most magical way. At the end of a journey, your memories and passions will be bottled in an elegant parfum flacon and a pendant.
In addition, a few specials* just for the occasion: - Perfumed Teas are on special for $20 (instead of $30). These organic and wild crafted teas are TO DIE FOR! - Purse size perfume oils, for only $65 - Perfumed Pendants are on sale now for $125 (instead of $150) - Gift Certificates for $100 or for any amount you'd like can be emailed or printed as well. Email us with the amount and message you'd like on the gift certificate and we'll send you a PayPal payment request. - And of course, if you are looking for something different check out Etsy shop for rare collectibles such as poison rings and vintage pillboxes filled with our delicious crème parfums.

* Offers expire May 30th.

From Origins:

From May 1st through May 6th, there is an offer of 25% off your next purchase. And when shopping online, the code 0508FF gets youstandard free shipping.

After my Own Heart by Ineke: fragrance review

"April is the cruellest month, breeding
lilacs out of the dead land"

says the famous line from the Waste Land.

Lilac has always stood for me as the very emblem of April, "stirring dull roots with spring rain". So inextricably has the month been linked to the bloom's Greek name. Πασχαλια/Paschalia (Pa-scha-leeA) means "Easter blossom" simply because lilacs bloom exactly around the time of Orthodox Easter in April. But like the festivities and the spring rain, alas they last all too briefly. The much needed rain is a brief occurrence in our warmer climate.

The hunt for a realistic soliflore that replicates the lush character of this elusive bloom has occupied me for years, ever since I was a child, buying little oils at herbalist shops with my pocket money after school.
Lilac's odour profile is unique in that it incorporates the clean and the dirty rolled into one and is romantic as well as sexualised. When one buries one's face into the large panicles, the smell of intimacy, like worn musky undergarments by a lover scintillates, mingled with the honeyed pollen and the translucent dewiness of soft petals; conspiring into a spring plot to ensnare you into surrendering all thought and yield to its fragrant message to howl "the eternal yes".

And yet perfumers have never been able to extract a good and abundant enough essence for use in perfumery, therefore the combination of other natural oils and synthetics such as Apo patchone, Lindenol, Nerol 800/900, Terpineol Extra, Dimethyl Benzyl Carbinol to replicate the scent of the living flower are used. Too often the final product turns out to smell like tin foil and unappealing to anyone who has had the good fortune to have had cut branches of the real thing adorning their homes at spring, emitting their heavenly aroma beneath gauzy curtains gushing in the wind.

Syringa (Lilac) is a genus of 20–25 species of flowering plants in the olive family (Oleaceae) which are usually a light purple (commonly referred to as lilac or lilas in French) or less often light pink or white. Native to Europe and Asia, it is said that Syringa Persica has been brought to Europe at the end of the 16th century, from the Ottoman gardens, while Syringa Vulgaris grew in the Balkans. The Holy Roman Emperor's ambassador, Ogier Ghiselin de Busbecq, is credited with supplying lilac slips to Carolus Clusius, in 1562. Botanists of fame, like the herbalist John Gerard, soon had the rarity in their gardens: he notes lilacs growing “in very great plenty” in 1597. In the American colonies lilacs were introduced in the 18th century.
It is also interesting to note that purple lilacs symbolise first love and white lilacs youthful innocence (see Language of flowers).

In Ineke's After my Own Heart, I found a satisfying lilac interpretation that is innocent, yet not without the throes of first love vibrating its delicate heart strings. Described as "the scent of fresh lilacs floating on the early breeze" it fulfils its promise of a fresh perfume with a romantic inclination. The fragrance opens on a lightly powdery burst of greenery with a slightly bitter background of chilliness, like the rush of wind on a cool evening, bringing up goosebumps on warm skin. Almost instantaneously, however, a warm sweetness like that of pollen is surfacing to mollify and caress, with the delicate touch of a dot of marzipan paste on a plate of berries drizzled with a touch of Alsatian Riesling not short of its goût petrol. The composition is modern, with a more or less linear presence on the skin, meaning there is no distinct development, sustaining the impression of flower and dusty air for a good while.
To compare After my Own Heart with another modern approach on a lilac soliflore, F.Malle's En Passant, by nose Olivia Giacobetti, I would venture to say that the latter is pronouncedly more limpid and aqueous, with a slightly sour note, like sniffing fresh yeasty bread dough. Although both go for the fresh approach they divert ways very soon, as Ineke's rendition is a little dustier and sweeter and probably less dependent on particular skin chemistry. They resemble watercolours for which the artist thought of light green tones and white opalescence of a cool, bracing morning (for En Passant) and of the pinky blue skies of afternoon warmth (for After my Own Heart).
Guerlain's Angelique Lilas in the Aqua Allegoria line is another interpretation, this time with the watery theme veering into the bitter terrain of rained upon angelicas, but the pronounced Calone element in it might seem harsher than Ineke's approach.

Contemplating whether my personal lilac-strewn Eldorado has been reached, I find that like the mythical town it is best to dream and find elements of it in the fragrances on offer. Perhaps the search will never end until technology and analytical chemistry sufficiently unravel the thread of Ariadne. Until then, real stems of lilac in a vase along with pleasant fragrances that echo its sweet message such as After my Own Heart will keep me company.

Notes: bergamot, raspberry, green foliage, lilac, sandalwood, heliotrope and musk.

Info on how to obtain the fragrance and samples at Ineke.com
You can read an appreciation of the whole line from A to E clicking this Ineke article.




Les Atelies du Parfum has posted a lovely lilac poem for those of you who read French.

Clip of Erik Satie's Gymnopédie No.1 uploaded by Kyromaster on Youtube.
Pic originally uploaded by princesshaiku.

Many Wishes

Easter Eve

The Holy Week has slowly and majestically drawn to a close culminating to the midnight mass tonight.

Like last year, when I presented you with our Incense Series, I will be wearing Messe de Minuit, contemplating the secret pagan awakening of spring perpetuated in Christianity, and especially Orthodox tradition, in which Easter coincides with the beginning of the warm season, the fertility of the fields and the ourdoors lifestyle. The candle procession of sharing the holy light, from man to man, will be like a litany of hope for unifying all people, whatever they might believe in, and the sky will be filled with fireworks, pyrotechnics and gunshots spent for joy and festivity and not for warfare.

From our house to yours, may the spirit of hope eternal light up your lives and bring a smile to your lips.

Click to hear the song:

Get this widget Track details eSnips Social DNA

Pic from Xeropotamos monastery in Athos Mountain Monastery Community in Greece, courtesy of Eikastikon.gr
Audio clip of "My Sweet Spring", the traditional hymn of Good Friday sung by Glykeria, courtesy of esnips.com, uploaded by Ειρηνη

Waiting for Tommy: a tragicomedy

“Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody goes, it’s awful.”

Two perfume lovers, let’s call them Vladimir & Estragon (together they sound like a Russian contraceptive!), are waiting for the revelation of the sublime through a bottle of Tommy Girl. Tommy Masterpiece is rather late to their appointment and they pass the time waiting, testing the fragrance.

Estragon struggles to extricate some substance out of the white box. He peers inside it, feels about, turns it upside down, shakes it, looks on the ground to see if anything has fallen out, finds nothing, feels inside it again, staring sightlessly before him.

ESTRAGON: Oh, there it is! Finally. Shall I spray it on?
VLADIMIR: (musingly). The last moment . . . (He meditates.) Hope deferred maketh the something sick, who said that?
ESTRAGON: Will you help me?

They spritz and sniff. Blank stare to the great unknown. They sniff some more.

VLADIMIR: Do you remember the Gospels?
ESTRAGON: I remember the maps of the Holy Land. Coloured they were. Very pretty. The Dead Sea was pale blue. The very look of it made me thirsty. That's where we'll go, I used to say, that's where we'll go for our honeymoon. We'll swim. We'll be happy.
VLADIMIR: You should have been a poet.
ESTRAGON: I was. (Gesture towards his rags.) I was writing honest perfume reviews. Isn't that obvious?
VLADIMIR: Well? What do we do?
ESTRAGON: Don't let's do anything. It's safer. Let’s place all our faith on experts.
VLADIMIR: Let's wait and see what she says.
ESTRAGON: Who?
VLADIMIR: Tommy Girl.
ESTRAGON: Good idea. Does she say anything to your nose?
VLADIMIR: No. But let's wait till we know exactly how we stand.
ESTRAGON: On the other hand it might be better to strike the iron before it freezes.
VLADIMIR: I'm curious to hear what Tommy Girl has to offer. Then we'll take it or leave it.
ESTRAGON: What exactly did we ask her for?
VLADIMIR: Were you not there?
ESTRAGON: I can't have been listening.
VLADIMIR: Oh . . . Nothing very definite. Just to be a masterpiece, five-star caliber creation.
ESTRAGON: A kind of prayer to be the perfect department store fragrance at an affordable price. The composition coincidentally happened to fall neatly into several blocks, each typical of a native American botanical.
VLADIMIR: Precisely.
ESTRAGON: A vague supplication.
VLADIMIR: Exactly.

Silence as they contemplate.

ESTRAGON: And what did she reply?
VLADIMIR: That she'd see. It’s not that she could be definite. She has been formulated 1100 times to arrive at this result with the tea accord inspired by sniffing the inside of Mariage Freres shop in Paris, no less.
ESTRAGON: She said that she couldn't promise anything.
VLADIMIR: That she'd have to think it over and get back to us.
ESTRAGON: In the quiet of her home.
VLADIMIR: Consult her family.
ESTRAGON: Her friends.
VLADIMIR: Her agents.
ESTRAGON: Her correspondents.
VLADIMIR: Her books.
ESTRAGON: Her bank account.
VLADIMIR: Before taking a decision to be an at least decent fragrance.
VLADIMIR: Say, do you smell anything of interest?
ESTRAGON: Other than belcher, fartov and testew?
It's the normal thing. To try to be an at least decent smell.
VLADIMIR: Is it not?
ESTRAGON: I think it is not.
VLADIMIR: I don’t think so either.
ESTRAGON: (anxious). And we?
VLADIMIR: I beg your pardon?
ESTRAGON: I said, And we?
VLADIMIR: I don't understand.
ESTRAGON: Where do we come in?
VLADIMIR: Come in?
ESTRAGON: Take your time.

VLADIMIR: Come in? On our hands and knees. Begging for the revelation to come on us lowly ones who cannot see the miracle behind the masterpiece.
ESTRAGON: As bad as that?
VLADIMIR: Your Worship wishes to assert his prerogatives?
ESTRAGON: We've no rights any more?
Laugh of Vladimir, stifled as before, less the smile.
VLADIMIR: You'd make me laugh if it wasn't prohibited.
ESTRAGON: We've lost our rights?
VLADIMIR: (distinctly). We got rid of them. The day we relinquished our faith for the one placed on experts.


*Tommy Girl is the ultimate McGuffin, as Hitchcock used to say: a plot device about which the characters care desperately, but the audience isn’t meant to give a damn.

With loving admiration of Samuel.



For other interesting takes on Tommy Girl, please check out Scent Signals and Perfume Posse.

Pics courtesy of hrc.utexas.edu and samuel-beckett.net