The winner of the draw...

...for the Aqua di Parma bottle giveaway is Cathy E. Congratulations! Please email me using the contact in About page or Profile with your shipping data, so I can get your prize out to you soon!
Thanks everyone for the enthusiastic participation and till the next one!

Perfume Stories: A Worth Quintet

By popular request, a new feature is launching on Perfume Shrine today: Perfume Stories; tales of fragrant history and exaltation of the senses interweaving snippets of inspiration into popular & less known fragrances' lore, which charm and seduce with their own mystery. For this first instalment, we immerse ourselves in the trail left by the Parisian house of Worth.

The house of Worth is invested in its own illustrious patina: Founded by an Englishman born in Lincolnshire, Charles Frederick Worth, it almost signlehandedly established couture upon opening quarters in Paris in 1858 in collaboration with Otto Bobergh, due to the lucky occasion of impressing Princess de Metternich, the wife of the newly appointed Austrain ambassador in Paris. She in turn impressed ~with her Worth-sewn dress costling only 300 francs!~ Empress Eugénie, the coquette and dazzling wife of Napoleon III at one of the three balls the royal couple gave at the Tuilleries Palace during the winter season of 1859. Thus is the story recounted:

"Eugénie had taken a liking to the young and vivacious Princess Metternich, and on that night when the empress noticed her dress (so the princess recounts in her memoirs) the following conversation took place: "May I ask you, Madam," she enquired, "who made you that dress, so marvellously elegant and simple?"

"An Englishman, Madam, a star who has arisen in the firmament of fashion," the Princess replied.
"And what is his name?"
"Worth."
"Well," concluded the Empress, "please ask him to come and see me at ten o'clock tomorrow morning."
“He was made, and I was lost," wrote Princess Metternich jokingly, "for from that moment there were no more dresses at 300 francs each."

 [ref: Metternich, Princess de, Souvenirs de la Princesse Pauline de Metternich (1859-1871), Paris: Plon, 1922, p. 136]

As is the custom, high society copied the monarchs, when they saw that the couturier was open for business and the birth of modern fashion was afoot. In fact, the house is so much considered a rite of passage for young debutantes and older customers of the haute monde alike, that it is mentioned as a necessary stop-over amidst the protagonists' honeymoon trip to Europe in Edith Wharton's Age of Innocence. Worth eventually branched into London, Biarritz and Cannes, popular resorts for the rich.

But despite perfumery making giant leaps with Guerlain and Houbigant in the throes of the 19th century, it was not until the founder of the Worth company died in 1885 and his grandsons (Jean Charles and Jacques Worth) took over, suceeding his sons, that they hired a high-calibre perfumer named Maurice Blanchet who worked on what would be a bewitching tale of fragrant romance.
Worth, under Jean Charles and Maurice Blanchet, released the five perfumes in a chronological sequence to tell a passionate story: Dans la Nuit (1925), Vers le Jour (1925), Sans Adieu (1929), Je Reviens (1932), Vers Toi (1934): "In the night...towards dawn...without saying goodbye...I return...towards you."

Apart from creating thus a mystical, subtle love confession simply via the names, Worth collaborated with René Lalique into creating memorable bottles for the fragrances: Dans la Nuit was encased in a blue boule bearing the stars of the nightime sky. Vers le Jour was on the contrary in bright, yellowing red glass like the dawn. Sans Adieu was in green, with a cone-head cap with cut-outs which makes an impression even today. 

But what is even more romantic is how Je Reviens in particular became a pop symbol of a landmark in history: At the end of WWII, when American GIs were going back home, after being welcomed into the arms and hearts of European women (women who had known for a brief second -it seemed- a solace from the deprivations of war), this was the perfume they gifted them with; imparting that final goodbye with the promise (and the crushed reality) of an au revoir: "I will return".

The perfumes were relaunched in 1985, and apparently again in 2000 as a "Love Poem" edition of five 0.33oz/10ml sprayers (depicted) crediting the historical perfumer but given a necessary reformulation to comply with modern standards of ingredients control. For instance, Dans la Nuit started its history as a wistful romantic woody oriental, bearing common "signature" traits with the best-known Worth, Je Reviens, and L'Heure Bleue, but recent changes have cheapened the formula by amping the synthetic sandalwood and jasmine constituents giving it a whiff of plastic. Vers le Jour was totally transformed into a modern hissy fruity floral, while Sans Adieu bears the totally anachronistic for a 1920s creation overdosage of Calone (watery melon note) we tend to associate with 1990s scents. Je Reviens was copiously produced, so earlier bottles can still be found rather easily, but apart from the collectable minis, there are two other versions circulating of Je Reviens: The 3.4 oz/100ml Eau de Toilette (bottle with big black cap), which is screechy and weak, and the 1.7oz/50ml Eau de Parfum in the dark blue crennalated bottle which retains parts of the floral aldehydic character of the original.


Still, the new "Love Poem" presentation is worth collecting for the charming story behind it, inspiring us to stack the bottles into confessing that untold passion again and again...
There is currently a 5-pack on sale on Ebay. (NB. Not affiliated).


Photo of bottles in boxes taken & copyrighted by RosieJane/MUA, used with permission. Vintage ad via adclassix.com, periodpaper.com & vintageadbrowser.com

Frequent Questions: How to Extend the Life of your Scented Candles

Sometimes scented candles can bite hard on a budget: It's not the initial outlay, it's that they get burned too much or lose their throw over time. So when you're buying a luxurious scented candle from the likes of Diptyque, Cire Trudon or Slatkin or put your favourite luxe brand here), what can you do to make that candle last and perform as indulgently as it should?

Here's advice from the expert, NEST Fragrances founder Laura Slatkin (via boston.com):
"Luxury scented candles are much more complex than non-luxury scented candles, so they must be taken care of in order to fully enjoy them. When lighting one for the first time, always make sure to burn it for at least three-to-four hours to achieve a fully melted pool of wax that reaches the perimeter of the glass. Wax has a memory and if this is not done, the candle will tunnel upon subsequent lightings.
Also, when burning a candle, black soot accumulates on the tip of the wick. It’s very important to remove that soot and trim the wick to one-quarter of an inch before you light it again, because it can cause the candle to smoke, or it can fall into the wax, which will adversely affect the fine fragrance oils used in luxury candles."

Move Over Clive Christian, Golden Delicious gets Blinged!

Clive Christian and his diamond encrusted bottles of haute scents might want to do a rethinking regarding their "costliest perfume in the world" ad routine: DKNY Golden Delicious by US-basedd clothes brand Donna Karan gets totally blinged, with a bottle that is so full of diamonds that it fetches the hefty price of a cool 1 million dollars!

The juice remains the same, but the bottle of DKNY Golden Delicious gets the luxe treatment with tiny skyscrapers ~recalling the urban landscape of New York, the city which served as an inspiration for the DKNY brand in the first place~ encrusted with small diamonds. This luxurious edition will only be available at the Facebook page DKNY Fragrance and the profits will go to Action Against Hunger.

Aqua di Parma Gelsomino Nobile: fragrance review & bottle giveaway

First things first: I have a brand new bottle of the to-be-launched Gelsomino Nobile for a lucky reader, from which only a 5ml decant is missing for reviewing purposes. To be eligible, all you have to do is answer to these questions: 1)What do you find pleasurable/helpful in a frag review? 2)What are the subjects on our pages you would like to read more of? Now on to reviewing this upcoming Aqua di Parma fragrance focused on jasmine...

Gelsomino Nobile (Noble Jasmine) by Aqua di Parma belongs to the Le Nobili sub-collection: 3 women’s fragrances, all in eau de parfum concentration, with a secondary Eau de Toilette for Iris Nobile. The “Nobili” are therefore Iris Nobile, Magnolia Nobile, and the new Gelsomino Nobile. Much in tune with its sister scents, Gelsomino Nobile is also an ethereal, refined, greenish rhapsody in melodious Italian, which could be worn by lovers of all things airy and romantic who want to remain chic and effortless at all times.

The scent of Gelsomino Nobile starts on exhilarating citrusy accents with a peppery bite, much like natural bergamot and the more green neroli distillation from the orange blossom (although neither is listed in the notes), soon accompanied by sweeter elements. The vista opens into a grove of fragrant white vines, dewy jasmine (non indolic), a smidge of the greener parts of tuberose (and none of the danger), and what seems like a clean freesia accord. Although freesia accords can project as screechy and sterile sometimes, the rendering here is subdued: One gets the (illusory) waft of a budding flower, rather than the intense pong of profuse aromachemicals. It's elegant, if predictable.
This stage remains poised for the rest of the duration on the skin, gaining polished nuances of clean, skin-compatible, expensive-feeling musks from one angle; a tad more austere green woodiness from another. I had written on Magnolia Nobile that "the woody musky base is also echoing in my ears like speakers in the car left on some news-relating channel in a sub-human frequency that can be felt more than heard" and I can sense the continuation here as well. Lovers of the Nobili line by Aqua di Parma should be pleased. It's not exactly my speed, but then you know I'm a die-hard indolic jasmine lover, don't you.
The overall effect is recognisably a jasmine fragrance without, at the same time, appearing as suffocating floral or intensely projecting even though Gelsomino Nobile possesses both good lasting power and pleasurable sillage. For that reason jasminophobes or those who do not want to offend may have just found their perfect green floral for all occasions where intermingling might make a more voluptuous, more combustible white floral a bit de trop.

According to the ad copy, as announced on Perfume Shrine a while ago: "Centered around an exclusive and highly unique species of Jasmine grown only in the Calabria region of Italy, this new Floral Green-Musk style of eau de parfum creates the sensation of walking through lush Italian gardens, in bloom with Jasmine, while the breeze brings in the soft, salty air from the Mediterranean.

Notes for Aqua di Parma Gelsomino Nobile: mandarin, pink pepper, orange blossom, tuberose, Calabrian jasmine, cedar wood, and musk.

The fragrance has just debuted at Neiman Marcus and will be available worlwide in September. Available in Eau de Parfum 50ml ($108) and 100ml ($170) ml and matching body cream ($80 for 150 g).

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Jasmine Series

Painting: Eugene de Blaas, Young Italian Beauty

In the interests of full disclosure, the perfume was sampled through a promotion.