The Nose is Never Wrong: Doubting One's Sense of Smell & Interpreting Fact into Words

The nose is never wrong. You read this right, the nose, any nose, is never wrong! Like the eye or the ear, the nose is a means to an end, a cluster of neurons transmitting factual information to the brain, where a complex
procedure is taking place into interpretating reality. We all see tiles in blue, but how many of us will describe them as cerulean, glaucous, Yale blue or azulejo? It all depends on our cultural and personal associations, our language's sophistication and our sensitivity to slight nuances. The same applies with smells. We've all heard of the limbic system, scent & pheromones, smell triggers memories, blah blah blah. How come if you take a hundred people in a room and ask them to smell the same thing you will have at least 20 different descriptors?

Because the fragrance industry has been cryptic for so long; because perfume writing and press material has been resting on familiar "structures" into communicating perfume a certain way; because sales associates have been instructed to just give out "notes" without furthering a dialogue with the potential consumer. For all these reasons, more often than not, a perfume lover is left doubting their own nose rather than contradict received knowledge. Let's illustrate our point with examples.

A common occurence is hair-tearing despair at the perfume counter when the sales assistant swears blind that the banana note you're smelling in a given perfume just isn't there. Who's right? (Probably your nose, banana is a natural facet of both jasmine sambac and ylang-ylang flowers, common ingredients in many fragrances). Another, a bit more elevated in the sophistication stakes, is arguing on the classification of a well-known perfume. Perfume enthusiasts know Dioressence by Dior is a revered classic. Some consider it an oriental; others classify it as a chypre. The same happens with Lancome's Magie Noire. What's the deal?
Oriental and chypre are two very distinct fragrance families with a different character and perceived effect: how can so many people err so much? Again, everyone's nose is on the right place, so to speak. The people who smell Dioressence and Magie Noire as oriental perfumes are smelling an older batch (or are going by received knowledge by perfume writing in books and blogs). The people who smell them as chypres are not wrong; they're smelling the leaned out, altered form of a newer reformulation, which gave a push to the direction of mossier, woodier (reminiscent correctly of chypre)! The industry is toying with us, hiding the years of reformulations unlike with wines which bear vintage year on their label, confusing us and making us doubt ourselves.

Chypre in particular is a tortured term: You see it brandished for every sophisticated blend in existence. It's perfumy, it's elegant, it's uncommon and smells like a million bucks? It must be a chypre! Not so, necessarily. There are quite a few wonderfully sophisticated and a bit green floral aldehydics, green florals and orientals with green elements out there which aren't technically chypres. Plus "nouveau chypres" (i.e. chypres technically enginered to avoid the obstacle of restricked oakmoss) are a bit different in smell anyway.
Chypre is a technical classification denoting a very specific structure and using the term is a very deliberate move on a speaker's/writer's part. We can't blanket-term using perfumery jargon! We can't use objective terms to convey subjective impressions or personal opinions. It's like bad journalism: "A fierce dog has bitten on an innocent citizen", jumbling opinion and fact, to reference Umberto Eco.

But the thing is what most people lack isn't a good grasp of scent (unless of course some medical peculiarity is present, but that's rare), but the best possible interpretative methodology into translating what they smell into a clear, coherent message. This can be down to education ~or more specifically the lack of simple & concise educational tools pertaining to olfaction. This is why we have insisted on Perfume Shrine on providing such tools through our Perfume Vocabulary posts and our Definition and Raw Materials articles, so as to facilitate the dialogue between people who wear and enjoy perfume.

Because ultimately, sharing the joy of perfume involves talking about it as well.

pic via americantransman.com

Frederic Malle is on Facebook: Hints, Tips & Insiders' Info

Sounds good? Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle has been operating an official Facebook page for some time now (since last autumn actually). What makes it follow-worthy and news-worthy is how it's set to provide insights into the inspiration behind the Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle collection, including Les Fleurs du Malle, a look at key floral notes integrated in Editions de Parfums fragrances, the F.Malle home collection, and weekly tips on fragrance.

However, most recently on the Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle Facebook page the team has been sharing quotes and passages that derive from Frédéric Malle’s new book “Frédéric Malle: On Perfume Making” (De l'Art du Parfum in French) which we had reported on Perfume Shrine first, like this one:
On the language of scent, Frédéric Malle says, “Many people believe that our work is quite intellectual and that we make endless references to other arts to feed our research. This is rarely the case.” The reasons for this can be found in “Frédéric Malle: On Perfume Making,” illustrated by Konstantin Kakanias, which launched exclusively at Barney’s in December and is set for wider availability this March.

This is also where Catherine Deneuve's tips on her own fragrance wearing come from, as she writes the foreword on the Malle book, showing her preference for Malle fragrances alongside her firm favourite L'Heure Bleue by Guerlain (and the rest of her fascinating perfume collection here). The soignée Iris Poudré was inspired by the classic film Belle de Jour after all, as Pierre Bourdon was intrigued by the introverted, shy yet passionately sensual personality of Séverine. And as to La Deneuve wearing Lipstick Rose, what can be more feminine than that?
We also learn many other small delights, such as that Christian Louboutin plies his best girlfriends with the gorgeous and fresh lily of Malle's Lys Méditerranée.

Looking ahead, the Facebook team looks into providing Facebook fans exclusive access to Editions de Parfums Frédéric Malle perfumers, so as to give fragrance lovers an insider’s look at the driving forces behind the collection.

Visit the official F.Malle Facebook page here

Illustration by Robert Beck via AnOther Mag

Seker Pare & Halva: Semolina Recipes to Usher the Cold in with Glee

The Arabian word ḥalwà is mellifluous enough, rolling off the tongue, to induce fantasies of a Sarayı drenched in moonlight. But learn that the Turkish Şekerpare means "the dancer's bellybutton" and let the imagination roll...Seker Pare are mouth-watering "cookies" if you will, made with fine semolina, baked until golden and then soaked in sweet syrup. The rounded curves of the pastry recall the plump and inviting belly of a belly dancer, the almond in the middle is...the belly button. But no, the pedestrian reality is that Şeker means sugar in Turkish and Pare is the Persian word for "piece". The fantasy version is so much more creative though, isn't it?

Devouring the popular Greek food magazine "Gastronomos" (literally arbitrer of the belly) I happened upon Ketty Koufonikola, owner of Cafe Avissinia (tfuno  navigate site!) in Athens' Monastiraki district, who presented a recipe for Şekerpare; here slightly adapted for home preparation. Kaiti's cooking combines the distinct cuisines of Constantinople/Istanbul and Northern Greece and this recipe is no exception.

As to halva (a popular dessert in both the Middle East, the Balkans and India) I need to point that in Greece we tend to eat both types of halva: the sticky semolina type and the crumbly sesame paste type (made with tahini), what the Jewish call "halvah", though made without the soapwort. But only one of these is made at home, the former, which accounts for the use of "grocer's halvah" appelation that the latter type still retains among the elders; a small quantity bought for the days of Lent ensured ample nutrition for the family. Interestingly, it's the sesame paste type that has been handed down through classical times, a no doubt proof of the fact that adiposity is the path to an ethnos's spiritual ruin. But I digress.
It is the semolina type halva, in various orchestrations/twists, which has marked many wintry afternoons of my childhood, as we stirred with big wooden spatulae, me and my mother, on pots with olive oil and golden dust, to make a yummy dessert which aromatized the whole house with its spicy bouquet. Its super-easy recipe to remember, short-handed into "1:2:3:4", as it calls for one unit of oil, two of semolina, three of sugar and four of water, is etched in my memory.

Recipe for Greek Semolina Halva

1 cup of extra virgin olive oil
2 cups of wheat semolina, rough grind
3 cups of white granulated sugar
4 cups of water
2-3 cinnamon sticks
5-10 cloves
1/3 cup raisins
1/3 cup pine nuts

Put the oil and semolina in a big pot under slow fire on the stove and stir slowly until golden. Then add the raisins and pine nuts and keep on the stove for a little longer, till the pine nuts are golden too.

In the meantime, get the water to boil with the sugar and the aromatics in another pot. When it's bubbling vigorously, pour slowly into the pot with the semolina, stirring quickly (and carefully, it will bubble and might sprinkle you with hot material!) until thoroughly mixed.

Stir, stir and stir some more over the stove, until it doesn't stick to the pot and most water has seemingly evaporated. Pour over a deep bowl and let it sit covered with a thin napkin (it will still steam a bit and you want as much water evaporated as possible, as this will make it lighter on the stomach). You can then decorate with blanched almonds, shredded walnuts or raisins, sprinkle with grounded cinnamon and serve when cool.

Καλή όρεξη!

Recipe for Turkish Şekerpare

2 sticks butter at room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs

2 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 cup fine semolina

1/3 cup whole blanched almonds

for the syrup:

2 cups water

2 cups sugar

orange blossom water/hydrosol
lemon peel
2 vanilla pods

Pre-heat the oven to 190C/375F degrees. Whisk together the flour and baking powder in a bowl and set aside. Cream the butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add the eggs stirring carefully. Stir in the semolina and mix lightly. Add the flour and mix until the dough no longer sticks to the sides of the bowl (use a bit more flour if necessary).

Line a cookie sheet with parchment. Form the dough into balls the size of a chestnut and place on the parchment. Place a whole almond in the center of each ball, pushing it halfway in. Bake until light golden. 

In the meantime, heat 2 cups of water with 2 cups of sugar, add  and bring to a boil. Add a 3-inch piece of lemon peel and two vanilla pods, opened & scraped, and let it simmer.

Remove the cookies from the oven, and immediately pour thehot syrup with a spoon on each and every one of them, allowing them to absorb the syrup. They should be spongy but not soggy.
Eat at room temperature and keep in an air-tight tin box.

pic of sekerpare via otikatsi-soula.blogspot.com, pic of halva via cretaolympias.gr

Agent Provocateur by Agent Provocateur: fragrance review

When the first Agent Provocateur perfume first launched in 2000 in its ostrich-egg-sized pink bottle, little did one expect that the scent within would be atavitistic to the lineage of impressionable floral chypres of yore. Chypres, a perfumy and mossy family of fragrances, had been effectively extinguished from a whole generation's memory by then (relegated to mothers and grandmothers who continued to wear their signature scents discovered decades ago) and were incomprehensible things to another: surely this was a doomed project? Who in their trendy minds remembered or wore Shiseido Inoui, Balenciaga Cialenga, K de Krizia, never mind Mitsouko or Miss Dior?

But curiously enough, it caught on!

Why it Worked
Agent Provocateur is a lingerie brand teetering on the edge of campy and they made ample use of that element to promote their fragrant wares. To quote Adentures of a Barbarella: "They aspire to be kinky, elegant, sophisticated, and somewhere along the line it goes wrong. Their clientele is stuck up, their models are either socialites or Russian escorts (it's a fine line), and they sold out last year. The depraved tone of the campaigns can be hilarious". But after all, what's the point of racy lingerie if you take yourself too seriously, right?

But the thing is their first fragrance is sexy as hell, a bit retro, a bit modern, and all around brave and great, considering they launched at the end of the aquatic/ozonic brigade of the 1990s and the advent of cupcakes-from-hell of the 00s. It's deservedly something of a cult favourite, if only for the fact that it was so very different.


Scent Description
The big Moroccan rose in Agent Provocateur's heart, much like in classic Jean Couturier's Coriandre from the 1970s, is complimented by a paper-y woody note of amber and vetiver combined with warm musks, but it is the saffron along with the upbeat coriander that bring a rather animalic and weirdly "dirty" quality to the fragrance making it the olfactory equivalent of an aged Hollywood star the morning after she has had a rampant night in bed with a nostalgizing fan half her years.

This is a perfume to wear sparingly (it can be big), but it won't change much during the day and after the initial impression it dries down to an erotic and  skin-friendly, skin-compatible nuzzling buzz.
Agent Provocateur original EDP is in hindsight similar to many fragrances which followed, so if you like any of them you should give the great-aunt a try: Gres Cabaret, Lady Vengeance by Juliette has a Gun, Narciso Rodriguez Narciso for Her EDT.

Available as Eau de Parfum from major department stores.

Flankers & Stuff
The brand has brought out variations on the theme with:  Agent Provocateur Eau Emotionelle (EDT from 2006), Agent Provocateur L'Eau Provocateur (new, lighter interpetation for spring 2012), Agent Provocateur L'Agent (2011) and Agent Provocateur L'Agent L'Eau Provocateur (spring 2012) in similar pink-ostrich-egg bottles. They can differ quite a bit with L'Agent being a woody floral musk.
Nota bene that the quite different fragrance by the same brand called Maitresse is also having a lighter flanker edition for spring 2012, called -you guessed it- Agent Provocateur Maitresse L'Eau Provocateur.

Diptyque Scented Soothing Lip Balm: new for Valentine's Day

New Soothing Lip Balm by Diptyque belongs in the Art of Body Care line of the niche brand's portfolio and is inspired by the women of Fes, the ancient city-state of Morocco, who used the pigment of the poppy for its colour and protecting virtues.

This new addition to the Art of Body Care blends cotton oil and mango butter to repair, regenerate and prevent aging, but it's the promised delicately perfumed aspect wich has me interested!
Sounds like the perfect little indulgence for the upcoming Valentine's Day celebrations.

Available for 35$ online.

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Diptyque new Rosa Mundi and Eau de Rose scents, Diptyque news & reviews