Guerlain Chamade (1969) Fragrance Review Series Part 1: An Introduction

‘Now come’, thought Lucile, ‘he’s only holding my hand as we cross the park. It’s spring, no need to worry. I’m not sixteen any more’. But her heart beat wildly. She felt the blood drain from her face and her hands, and rush to her throat, choking her ... Son Coeur bat la chamade.

―Françoise Sagan, “La chamade” (1965), excerpt taken from “Perfume Legends: French Feminine Fragrances” by Michael Edwards (1999)

~By guest writer AlbertCAN

chamade [ʃə’mɑːd]

n

 

(Military) A signal or an army’s surrender during battle, usually by drum or trumpet

―coeur qui bat la chamade: French expression for heart beating wildly due to strong emotions (literally “heart who beats the chamade”)

[from French, from Portuguese chamada, from chamar to call, from Latin clamāre]


The heart perhaps is the most impossible of all. The untamed is virtually untouchable by a sound mind, marching to its drum beat, questing for only its desires. Logics and perspectives may temporarily girdle its mad gallop, only to let it rampant again once passion reigns supreme. Often mankind speaks of progress and civilization, how the likes of smallpox or polio are either eradicated or nearly so from the face of the earth. Yet no modern physician can ever cure a broken heart―and the latest gamut of anti-depressants only address the brain’s chemical balance―nor any vaccine can successfully prevent one from falling in love with the wrong person. Caesars and czars may come and go, inciting awes and fears with the might of the day, but the hardest thing to govern, as shown time after time, is still the heart.

Nowadays one need not to venture far to see the modern casualties of the heart: tabloid newspapers or gossip standards shall be evident of our fascination of its unpredictability, ranging from the latest indiscretion of the Hollywood stars du jour to the myriad of advice columnists dispensing hope to the unrequited. Or the plain crimes of passion, a plead of temporary insanity that allows one to walk away even from murder. The brain may be our largest organ, yet we speak from the heart when feeling amorous; when emotions run rampant we wear out hearts on our sleeves. We make a promise to our love by crossing out heart, and our hearts go out to anyone who loses their significant others. And when we know what we want? We set our hearts on it. Our intelligence may set us apart from a Darwinian point of view, yet it is our heartbeats that set us in motion, navigating through the illogics of it all.

The heart of Paris at the end of the Sixties was certainly beating wildly: a flourish of intellectual and artistic new waves, combined with a sound economic welfare, marked a full turn from the sobriety of the Fifties. Yet that few years of gaiety were "killed" by the 1968 Paris uprising: urban trenches were erected in the heart of Paris as street cobblestones were turned into medieval artilleries. Order, calm, harmony all gave way in that heated moment as everyone’s heart beat la chamade. It’s under this mixture of simultaneous cultural boom and bust, this combination of light and darkness that perfumer Jean-Paul Guerlain put his finishing touches on Chamade (1969), one of Guerlain’s fragrance masterpieces.

That’s the simple version of this story.

True to any Guerlain crown jewels cultural icons endorsing one another in Chamade, drawing upon references of different époques and interlocking them all in the most fascinating ways. Literature, cinema, military history all play part in its development; even a beloved Italian Renaissance masterpiece painting is involved.

In the next episode I shall explore the immediate cultural muses to Guerlain Chamade and answer an all-important question―What exactly does French novelist Françoise Sagan, cinematic icon Catherine Deneuve and Napoleon have in common?

Photo, from left: Guerlain Chamade poster and fragrance editions, via Google

Maria Candida Gentile Exultat: fragrance review

Exultat by Italian perfumer Maria Candida Gentile is touching on both the contrast and the accomodating orifices between citrus and sacerdotal frankincense. The latter naturally possesses citrusy facets on top, making the combination register as an increase in tonality for a few minutes, an effect also explored in Etro's Shaal Nur. The ecclesiastical connotation of resinous frankincense (olibanum) couldn't go amiss: The story goes that signora Gentile was inspired by a visit to the church of Saint Lorence in Lucina during the hour of Vespers.

But in Exultat the hesperidic top note soon dissipates to give way to a very detectable and unusual in such a context violet leaf note; silvery, quiet and crepuscular, like linen purified in a wash of ashes and countryside lavender. This technique mollifies the natural smokiness of frankincense, rendering it purer, subtler and very wearable with the soft feel of Grey Flannel. We might have been conditioned to regard frankincense fragrances as reclusive, monastic and intellectualized, but here is proof they can be wordly, human and smiling as well, which is a feat in itself.


Notes for Maria Candida Gentile Exultat:
top: lime, bitter orange, orange and olibanum;
middle: powdery violet and fresh violet leaf;
base: woodsy notes, vetiver and virginia cedar.

photo by Sarah Rose Smiley

Top-20 Best-selling Fragrances for women in the USA (2011)

By popular demand, after the Top-20 Best-selling Fragrances for women in France for 2011, which many readers mailed me to say was an eye-opener, I decided to post what the popular choices (based on bulk of sales) during the year 2011 in the American market are. A sort of two-faces-of Janus project, if you wish.

I had prefaced my French post by saying that people with an interest in perfumes imagine the French to be wildly sophisticated when it comes to fragrances; perhaps it comes with the territory, having so many options, though to be honest the US market is by far more populated. And yet, it's more of a form of branding, a subject on which the French have excelled while Americans have languished. As one of my friends in marketing says "USA branded itself as star& stripes, hamburgers, NBA, Hollywood and big-tit tanned blondes from California". Not exactly premium, you'd argue. And yet, this is exactly why we love to dump down on American culture, even Americans themselves. The USA as an uber-democratic, nascent nation decidedly branded itself as catering to the mass, with their Walmarts and their Costcos and For All Humanity jeans, in constrast to the largely still medieval-farmer/bourgeois mentality of the French with their small boutiques. Both societies have their elites, socio-economic as well as intellectual, but whereas one of them is proud of it, the other is self-effacing, almost embarassed to see it mentioned. See where I'm getting?

Robert Redford & Jane Fonda in Barefoor in the Park (1967) via Mary Lou Cinnamon

The Americans also routinely receive flack from perfumefreaks because they're supposed to like "clean" perfumes, i.e. shampoo & laundry detergent smelling stuff we turn our noses on. (I assure you that that is better than smelling the bad breath of a typical Gitannes-smoking French, but that's fodder for another discussion). And yet, I can't erase from my mind Sarah Jessica Parker's comment, while explaining her layering technique of perfumes and how she envisioned her first perfume in her own name, Lovely. It was in Chandler Burr's The Perfect Scent, where Parker revealed that she loved the smell of body odor, strong sweet musk, and general all-around dirtiness and concluded that "Americans, we love our body odour"; she was already brainstorming for her "B.O scent for everywoman" (which turned out to be the quirky Covet).

To revert to perfumes in the real market perspective, as my reader Victoria commented: "I still think this [French] list is a bit fancier than the top 20 American scents would be. I'd imagine that list would be filled with Britney Spears, JLo, Pink Sugar, and other generic fragrances." But as Mals from Muse in Wooden Shoes says "Chances are, these are the things that your college roommate, your bank teller, your Aunt Becky, and the cashier at your grocery store are wearing, and they don’t smell so bad…"
So come with me, dear readers, to see which 20 perfumes really make America tilt (in no particular order). And if you want to contrast it with what happened an only two short years ago, check this 2009 fragrance best-sellers (US and France) list out.



Chanel Coco Mademoiselle (this tops the list, predictably as it was the US Chanel headquarters who insisted on its creation and is topping the list for some years now)
Burberry Body
Calvin Klein Euphoria
Chanel No.5
Chanel Chance 
Chanel Chance Eau Fraiche
Christian Dior J'Adore 
Clinique Aromatics Elixir
Clinique Happy
D&G Light Blue
Donna Karan Cashmere Mist
Estee Lauder Beautiful
Estee Lauder Knowing
Estee Lauder Sensuous Nude
Estee Lauder Pleasures 
Fendi Fan di Fendi
Justin Bieber Someday
Prada Candy
Taylor Swift Wonderstruck
Thierry Mugler Angel

thanks to Laure Philips for info

What we consider that should be popular in the USA presents its own interest, nevertheless. In that spirit, if you hadn't caught it when I first posted it back in 2009, please read Stars & Stripes: 10 Quintessentially American Fragrances.

But more importantly and I'm interested in opinions, rather than hard facts:  
What do YOU consider American-smelling? And why?

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Top 20 Best-selling Fragrances for women in France for 2011, Top Selling Fragrances for Men 2011 (USA), Top 10 Best-selling Masculine Fragrances in France , Past ascribed gender: Best masculine fragrances for women, best feminine fragrances for men

Les Nez Turtle Vetiver Front: fragrance review & draw

An anarchic perfume? Why not?

an outlaw perfume
that doesn't recognize any rules or regulations
it hasn't been tested on animals
but one Turtle with his kind consent

Matthew Stoned for Dazed & Confused Oct.2011

Thus is Turtle Vetiver Front, the second installment in the limited edition series that began in 2009 with Turtle Vetiver Exercise No. 1, being introduced to us by Swiss niche line Les Nez, uncompromising in its catering for individuality and art-concepts. The new fragrance is part of the Turtle Salon (if you don't know about it, here's your chance to discover), hence the Turtle referenced, and was composed by ISIPCA teacher and perfumer Isabelle Doyen.

According to the blurb "For Turtle Vetiver Front, the smoky and flinty facets of vetiver are brought to the fore, with carbon paper and freshly printed newspaper effects; an unexpected coconut note softens this austere blend and makes this iteration more easily wearable than the first, while preserving its raw power".

Indeed the new Les Nez fragrance opens intensely, with the swamp-like qualities of vetiver grass oil, which recall vast expanses of muddy waters where crocodiles might lurk, rather than techno-age associations; Creature of the Swamp more than 9 to 5 with its carbon papers, even though there is a hint of inkiness possibly due to quite a bit of oakmoss in the formula and a 3D quality thanks to a drop of natural ambergris. Les Nez doesn't really have to be IFRA compliant, nor is it cost-effective bound. The effect is overall flinty, inky, swampy, even phenolic from a certain angle when sprayed. Almost immediately Turtle Vetiver Front takes on a very discernible fig leaf facet with cedar wood, sweetened with the milky note that is inherent in the fruit's sack: the whiteish, coconutty-laced note we have come to get introduced to from Premier Figuier and really now find in Santal Massoia (Hermès) and Santal Blush by Tom Ford  (as well as in a woody butch iteration in Santal 33 by Le Labo). Coconut has a reputation to scare the horses, as it's been played to death by aroma-care companies that churn it out in devilish cones lurking at the back of Ukranian-driven taxis and overdoses that can turn rotten-sweet in suntan lotions and Pina Colada cocktails, but if those are your associations you need not worry: This is a new development in the industry we will be seeing more of, using coconut lactone to soften woody compositions and with the usual refinement of both Les Nez and Doyen the coconut facet is both subtle and delightful, merely giving a caress. If you liked that element in Santal Massoia, you will most definitely like it here too.

Compared to Turtle Vetiver Exercise 1 (the first edition), the original was rawer, more robust, with a pronounced salty true aspect to the vetiver, iodine-like and sea-reminiscent, with that "briny/marine" tonality in Goutal's Vetiver, also composed by Doyen; unique, delightfully bracing, for hard-core vetiver fans! In Turtle Vetiver Front, the greener and milky elements are that of the shore which solaces the wounded under the shadow of the fig trees, providing a softer turn which would make it very wearable for men and women alike.The inky top notes reminiscent of Lalique's Encre Noire swirl back and forth between rawness and the softness of fig/coconut, producing a lasting vetiver fragrance that will get discussed (and which I personally liked a lot). NB. When stocks run out, the third iteration, Turtle Vetiver Back will challenge us more with an edgier interpretation!

Notes for Les Nez Turtle Vetiver Front: vetiver, coconut lactone (synthetic coconut note), moss and ambergris.

LesNez Turtle Vetiver Front is available in Eau de Parfum, 50ml/1.7oz for $120 on the official Les Nez site. Profits are given to Turtle and there are only 90 splash bottles available. There are also samples available for purchase.

I have a deluxe sample atomiser for one lucky reader.
Please say what you like or not like in vetiver & coconut fragrances in the comments to enter. Draw remains open till Sunday midnight.

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Vetiver Series, Les Nez fragrances.

In the interests of disclosure, I was sent 2 samples in the mail. 

Electron Rants: Niche Perfumes Quantum Mechanics

Not a day goes by that I don't get an offer of some sampling opportunity in the mail and in all fairness most don't create any bleep on the pond, audible, visible or otherwise. I suppose you're guessing that anyway. Considering that so much effort goes into producing a perfume in this industry, with months ahead of brain storming into how to present it, how to market it, and of course how to compose it -and I should know because I worked in launching a couple of things myself- it's perhaps no surprise that people come up with things more surprising than they truly are. I sympathise. You don't come across genius every day. But from genius to lackluster down to b-o-r-i-n-g, now there's a huge leap. And I'm surprised that perfume releases with no business being in the running in the first place are getting released at all, just because the fragrance market in niche and prestige is cannonballing along something fierce. To use a physics analogy, it's a sort of "Dirac sea", an infinite sea of particles with negative energy.

Read the NPD Group's findings, an acclaimed market monitoring tool:

"For prestige fragrances, the segment experienced the strongest dollar and unit performance in 15 years, coming in at $2.8 billion, which marked growth of 11%, while units grew 7%. Juices grew 14% for both women and men, driving overall fragrance performance of 11% growth for women and 12% for men. Fragrance juices priced at a premium of $100 and above helped to propel growth for the category with unit gains of 45% versus a year ago, and fragrance launches were up 21% percent overall, driven by women’s launches, which grew by 33%. Celebrity brands, specifically women’s, were the winners in 2011 with gains of 57%".

In short, don't expect fragrance prices to lower any time soon; as long as people buy these things at those exorbitant prices, upstarts and more established players will continue to think that we're just buying an aspirational thing; even if it has to do with the aspiration of connoisseurship and snob appeal.

A brand that has released other fragrances in elaborate, niche, graphic designed packaging with claims of novel effects and dubfounding results, and which will remain unnamed for reasons of courtesy (the Poirot types amongst you will deduce with accuracy I'm sure), has released the most generic clean rose fragrance possible, only it doesn't even contain one trace of rose essence in it I'm sure. Not only the real thing in terms of absolute, attar, pomade or essential oil is missing entirely, a fairly trained nose can't detect more than just a screechingly synthetic freesia accord that stands for "floral" and that dreaded aqueous/green tea/empty air perfumer's base that passes as "clean" or "fresh" whenever you hear about fragrant releases for spring and summer wear. This "electrically-charged" rose is cropping up with an alarming frequency: I recall Givenchy issuing one for their Very Irresistible franchise, so who knows what else might include it in the not too distant future.

The fact that this brand has been sitting on a table display at some exhibition alongside Serge Lutens and By Kilian is probably an infuriating testament to the reality that you can claim anything and then get treated as such, even by professionals in the field! (Are those professionals so jaded they don't give a sniff anymore, just nod their heads and grant royal rights? Are they so anxious to please everyone they feature just about anything? Are they just paid to act how they act? Who knows.).

My senses aren't shocked by this random new release. My intellect is. Houston, we've got a problem.

painting Woman with Claws by Paul Outerbridge via tumblr