Thierry Mugler Alien Goddess: fragrance review

The Thierry Mugler news announcement for Alien Goddess, the latest fragrance in the Alien collection, was met with more eyebrows raised on the choice of Willow Smith, daughter of Hollywood actors Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith, than the anticipation for the next chapter in the beste-selling Alien saga by Thierry Mugler. The brand admitted they targeted Generation Z — a younger population yet to meet Mugler as a brand — with their choice. She was asked "to embody this new vision of femininity that is strong, powerful, inclusive, and edgy," as reported by the brand. Nevertheless, smelling the new fragrance and seeing the visuals, I see nothing strong (it's much weaker than usual Mugler fare, which are dynamite), nor powerful, nor edgy.

The expectation of a very impressive fragrance is rather lost on us, although the formula smells OK. I'm sure it will gather compliments; unlike Aura, Mugler's previous pillar launch, which is so divisive that people either love it with a passion or hate its oddly green, sweet tentacles. Alien is also met with opinionated detractors and fervent fans alike. 

The composition based on the ever popular "tropical, sunscreen lotion smelling perfume accord" is built on flowers like tiare gardenia (which contains esters giving a fruity nuance) and possibly a bit of frangipani/plumeria, with the crucial bit being a hint of lactonic perfume notes like coconut (γ-decalactone) or better yet, the effect of coconut milk (Guerlain's Coconut Fizz is spectacular in this one). And this whole notion bears as little relation to Mugler as possible. His Amazons do not sunbathe. They're in the desert of an alien planet.

Mugler's  Alien Goddess is faring better in that tropical department, as it's not at all stifling and stuffy, as some of its category are. It's actually pretty delicate, maybe too delicate, fresh like pineapple slices, and balanced in the sugary department, especially for a representative of Thierry's collection of mega-bombs. I suppose L'Oreal has been somewhat diluting the density, adjusting the standards with the rest of the market aimed at kids brought up on their mothers' fruity-florals during the 2000s.

It's really OK for a tropical composition, with a vanilla embrace that is immersed in clean, creamy musk. Soft really, and very inoffensive — airy, never too much, but in a way this negates the brand ethos. So there you have it: A bit not good in a rather predictable mix. If you awaited Lilith, she's not coming to dinner...

Dolce Eau de Parfum by Dolce & Gabbana: fragrance review

One could be excused for getting all dreamy eyed and nostalgic à la Nuovo Cinema Paradiso upon watching the latest commercial by Dolce & Gabbana for their feminine fragrance launch, Dolce eau de parfum. They could be excused for erupting in twirly pirouettes filled with longing at the sight of the super pretty bottle, its flower cap, its grosgrain bow, its retro typeface. But what one can't possibly excuse is getting worked up over the fragrance of Dolce by Dolce & Gabbana itself, because, frankly, it's so programmatically "not"-so-many-things that it gets very hard to describe it.

It's not really floral, despite the ad copy and the images of orange groves in full bloom. Not indolic-smelling, which comes hand in hand with white flower fragrances. Not woody either. Nor citrusy. Not particularly feminine if your notion of femininity is not terribly challenged by a particular philosophic system of which I am not accountable for. Not anything special in the fresh fragrance slot. Not distinctive, not unique by any stretch of the imagination. Not offensive either, but that's damning it with faint praise.

"Neroli leaves" (come again?), papaya flower, white amaryllis, narcissus, white water lily, sandalwood. Where are all these things?

A clean, lightly aqueous neroli scent with a faint musky underpinning that won't get you noticed even if your life depended on it, Dolce eau de parfum projects "meh-shampoo" in a me-too-pool of similar scents for women afraid to use fragrance with any conviction. It could just be the perfect culmination of a product that looks like a perfume but doesn't perform like one for our crazy times. Even if destined to the very young or the very inexperienced, there is nothing in Dolce eau de parfum of the flush of daring and defiance that a truant teenager might indulge into, swiftly exchanging her smart pants and sweater for a cut off blouse and heels in secret at the ante-room of her house to go out with the hip crowd of her school. It's also so faint for an eau de parfum to make one seriously doubt their nose. If this gets released in eau de toilette there will be someone doing a cartoonish, evil laugh all the way to the bank, because they might as well be selling plain water for all the dilution.

So why am I even bothering to review it, you ask?

Simple. It's the first original release by the Italian brand that is not a flanker or re-issue in what feels like eons. I'm susceptible. I love Italian style.

Additionally, I can be excused for feeling a pang of what Swedes call 'smultronställe' , literally a wild strawberry patch, but figuratively a sentimentally laden spot returned to for solace, an escape from sadness.  Sicily is Dolce & Gabbana's spot. My own smultronställe has been orange groves in full bloom from my childhood like the ones shown in the romantic commercial for Dolce eau de parfum. I might be excused for seeking them into a bottle of fragrance advertised with exactly those images in neorealist style and nostalgic color saturation…

A really wasted chance, if you ask me. Bring back Sicily. 

Estee Lauder White Linen: fragrance review & history

Would you appreciate a fragrance that projected around the way knitting needles would stick inside your nostrils, the equivalent of a scent porcupine? The "needles up the nose" characterization has never found a more apt bond than the one spontaneously created in the mind of one perfume lover on the board of Perfume of Life years ago regarding White Linen. The phrase has since entered the online perfume lingo as a casual but evocative definition for the painfully sharp, supremely stinging feeling that certain perfumes heavy in aldehydes (i.e. synthesized molecules with a "bright", soapy and fizzy aspect), such as this particular Lauder perfume, produce in those who smell them.

White Linen is possibly among the most distinctly aldehydic floral fragrances of all time, an honor it shares with Chanel No.22, but whereas No.22 goes for the snuffed out candle waxiness and smokiness (which recalls incense if you glint your head just this way), White Linen, its American counterpart and about 50 years its junior, goes for the steam of an iron pressing on a crisp, starched shirt which has been washed with the harshest lye soap on earth. In short, memorable! (You'd never mistake it for "white noise fragrance")

White Linen was launched alongside Lauder's Celadon and Pavilion in 1978 as part of the makeup and scents collection "New Romantics" (in itself influenced by the music trend that was just emerging). Composed by Sophia Grojsman, White Linen bears her signature style of impressive cleanness projected via loudspeakers fit for a Guns n'Roses concert. For a Russian emigre Grojsman has acquired throughout her career a particularly American ideal of femininity, no doubt thanks to the exigencies of the American giant of aromatics who employs her, International Flavors and Fragrances; well scrubbed, athletic, spick & span, Athenian rather than Venereal.

1993 print ad

Coming on the heels of the sporty leathery Azuree, the bitterish chypre perfume Private Collection and the bright and soapy-smelling aldehydic Estee, it's not difficult to see how White Linen also fits in the canon of Lauder and in the zeitgeist of the late 70s, when women began to make a career of executive positions and started in earnest to 'bring home the bacon, fry it in a pan' as one commercial* of the times claimed.

Although ubiquitous and always in production since its launch, without any detectable changes in its formula, it's one of those fragrances that fly under the radar, so I am archiving White Linen in my Underrated Perfume Day feature. Its monolithic structure (built on huge single blocks of materials, much like later Grojsman oeuvres such as Tresor by Lancome) White Linen packs a punch.
But the aldehydic knock-out comes with an astounding discovery: the aldehydes contribute just 1% to the formula, with equal parts of Galaxolide (synthetic clean musk, garlanded by at least 3 other synth musks) and Vertofix (giving a cedar wood note) accounting for almost half of the ingredients! The secret is that unlike most other aldehydic floral fragrances it lacks the modifying, mollifying caress of bergamot and ylang ylang.

late 1990s print ad

1986 print ad

A fresh rose core, so fresh that it borders on cleaned-up orange blossom, bring a kinship of White Linen to Calandre, while the overall genealogy brings it as a modern classic that derives from Madame Rochas and Chanel No.5. The sheen of squeaky green lily of the valley boosts the sharp cleanness, the sparkle of hedione brings luminosity and vetiver gives its own freshness and subtle woodiness alongside a powerful amber note. The latter two elements give White Linen a touch of sophistication which could tilt it into unisex territory.

White Linen is a powerful, titanic Aurora and although it is removed from what I (and many other people) find comfortable, I can't fail but to admire its guts and its blinding brightness, white-washed like a house directly carved out of white volcanic rock in the Aegean.

*that's actually the slogan for Enjoli. 

The advertising photos are all so charmingly appealing that I decided to include them all. 

1978 print ad

Serge Lutes De Profundis: fragrance review & draw

If Charles Baudelaire or Oscar Wilde (pleading with Lord Alfred Douglas from within his jail) are references both in plain view in the new Serge Lutens fragrance De Profundis, and they themselves relied on this, their posthumus reputation might be rather lacklustre. Whether it is fatigue or overfamiliarisation, the olfactory seraglio at Palais Royal has began showing signs of tiredness, despite the vivid, novel colour of the latest perfume which shines in its beautiful bell jar like a bright amethyst. You can almost hear the cry of the 130th Psalm "De Profundis Clamavi Ad Te, Domine" for all the drama in front of your eyes! Sadly, experiencing the fragrance by one's nose is underwhelming, after such build-up, promising the scent of death, no less.  
De Profundis is a piercing, sharp, dusty and at the same time aldehydic "clean" floral that petters out to woods and a little fruity violet, rather than the dark, dangerously sexy or earthy, medieval scent suggested by its apothecarial look.

Just take a look at the official ad copy (or skip it), composed in the usual cryptic style which reveals less than it suggests:

"When death steals into our midst, its breath flutters through the black crepe of mourning, nips at funeral wreaths and crucifixes, and ripples through the gladiola, chrysanthemums and dahlias.

If they end up in garlands in the Holy Land or the Galapagos Islands or on flower floats at the Annual Nice Carnival, so much the better!

What if the hearse were taking the deceased, surrounded by abundant flourish, to a final resting place in France, and leading altar boys, priest, undertaker, beadle and gravediggers to some sort of celebration where they could indulge gleefully in vice? Now that would be divine!

In French, the words beauty, war, religion, fear, life and death are all feminine, while challenge, combat, art, love, courage, suicide and vertigo remain within the realm of the masculine.

Clearly, Death is a Woman. Her absence imposes a strange state of widowhood. Yet beauty cannot reach fulfilment without crime. The chrysanthemum is the sole pretext for writing these lines.

Turning grave sites held in perpetuity over to Life – a familiar of these haunts – the chrysanthemum invites Death to leave the cemetery and offer us its flower. De Profundis clamavi." [translation by Fragrantica]

But how did we get to here? L'Eau Serge Lutens seems like a seperate entity in the canon, both in context and in smell, and for that reason was given leniency, even if it alienated much of the fan base; and while Boxeuses conversely recycled the familiar in a most pleasant way, I was rather hesitant into jumping for a full bottle of Serge's last, violent and incongruous release, Vitriol d'Oeillet. This was a first. Not jumping up & down for De Profundis, later on, sounded like sacrilege! But the expectations were set too high: Baudelaire is too much of a decadent aesthete to reference with impunity; Eros & Thanatos has been explored as an idea by scholars for millenia; and a scentscape inspired by death is a risky bet ~ the church has the patent down pat after all. Lutens took the All Saints tradition of taking chrysanthemums (autumnal flowers) to graves and span it into composing a floral that would get inspired by death.

 De Profundis olfactorily resembles a dusty, powdery yet sharp scent of herbal tea and flowers, with a smattering of honeysuckle, lily of the valley and greenish notes (green jasmine, green lily) on top; not melacholic chrysanthemums promised by the ad copy, but rather the aftermath of the funeral, despite the closeness with the autumn blossom.
What is more unexpected is that the bouquet of green floral notes very soon gives way to a "blanched" soapy musk resembling Galaxolide (but not quite! what is it?), and aldehydic nuances, reminiscent of the worst memories of L'Eau Serge Lutens and at the same time like bottled light, ozonic, lifting upwards and upwards...like a soul to the light?
Whereas the soapy concept was thick as thieves with the humorous, ironic allusion to "clean" in L'Eau as a sign of defiance in an era when perfume connoisseurs are embalming themselves in thick resins, stinky florals or bitter pharmaceutical-worthy oud notes to prove their mettle, in De Profundis the trick doesn't quite work again: The synthetic feel of the powdery note is far off the luxurious iris of Bas de Soie (which still denoted a classy sexiness) and at the same time it lacks the nuanced greyness of the majestic and unsurpassable Iris Silver Mist. Amidst it all, a fruity scent surfaces, enhanced by alpha methyl ionone (a recognisable violet note), giving a mildly sweetish, pleasant backdrop which bears a hint of familiarity with the previous Lutens fragrances. Although seemingly a loud perfume upon spraying, in its rather screechy projection upon first spray, De Profundis mellows into a soft woody skin scent which doesn't last as -usually- expected.

Evaluating a Lutens creation in less than stellar terms leaves me with a certain disillusionment, which is painful to experience. For more than 15 years, Lutens used to instantly transport me into imaginary travels atop a magic carpet which seemed to continuously unfold new motifs, to lull me into a reverie that united the mysticism of the East with the classiness and chic of the West. Perched, as I am, between two worlds, from a geographical point of view, this unison spoke deeply to my soul. I'm hoping that the line will find again its axis, but with dearest Serge reaching 70 it looks like it is a precarious, foreshadowing prospect and I find myself sitting on a church pew like a kid, confused with the world and eager to catch at straws...

Official notes for Serge Lutens De Profundis: chrysanthemum, dahlia, lily, violet, earthy notes.

Serge Lutens De Profundis comes in the familiar bell jar bottles of Eau de Parfum available only in Paris at Les Salons de Palais Royal (It's part of the exclusive line), 75ml for 120 euros. This year there will be two limited edition engraved bottles which cost significantly (significantly!) more (We're talking upwards of 1000 euros here): there will be only 7 of each bottle design for sale, reportedly.

For our readers, 2 samples of De Profundis, out of my own stash, will be given. Tell us, what would you like to smell in a "death perfume"?



Movie still of Haley Joel Osment in The Sixth Sense by M.Night Shyamalan, Music set to the psalm 130 Arvo Pärt

L'Artisan Extrait de Songe/L'Ete en Douce: fragrance review

Essence of a dream, that is Extrait de songe, was the very poetic name of a limited edition “clean”perfume for summer 2005 by L’artisan Parfumeur. The latter lost a legal battle over the coveted name with Annick Goutal who had the name Songes (=dreams) copyrighted for her own, completely different, floriental composition. Hence the lovely Extrait de Songe became extinct... Later it was rechristened as L'Eté en Douce (playing on a French idiom, meaning "summer is sneaking up on you") and entered the L'Artisan portfolio as a re-issue.
However many perfume fans say the fragrance in either name smells quite close to another older L’artisan offering, one of the Moodswings coffret, Lazy Mood, developed by the same perfumer, Olivia Giacobetti. This got me thinking.

Laziness, boredom, dullness….all of these words bring to mind the languorous days of a really hot summer, when one isn’t energized enough to actively do anything except sleep. We had a long bout of this in the summer and am afraid we will get it again soon enough.
When I am talking hot, I am not talking Canada “hot”. Nor Germany “hot”. These are euphemisms. These are mere bleeps on the radar of hotness, never managing to register with me. (It’s actually my preferred weather: if only we had 28 degree Celsius half the year long...)
I am talking 39-40 degrees hell hot, all red and fiery; when your own skin is becoming revolting to you and you want to tear it apart with one swift gesture like an overzealous Russian waxer with steroid-enhanced arms; when hair sticks on your forehead inviting you to turn into a travesty of a skinhead; when sticky liquid oozes off your pores just by sitting around doing nothing. Yes, you’ve guessed it: I hate those moments with a passion.
The “noon devil” of the hermits of Egypt, which draws out every speck of physical and mental vitality, is my personal nemesis.

However it is a small comfort that Extrait de songe/L'Eté en Douce exists for providing the illusion of a clean, cool, white cotton sheet that can be wrapped all around one and provide some solace from the scorching sun. Sloth according to Kirkegaard is the source of all evil. Wordsworth described it as “wild dullness”. It is considered one of the seven deadly sins by the Catholic church. Hamlet refers to the world as “tiresome, plain and dull” which probably explains why he never lifts a hand to actually do anything except talk for the better part of the play.
Samuel Butler says that boredom is a kind of spiritual failure, since the person who lets himself to emote it is more despicable than boredom itself.
But is it so bad, really? I wonder…

Billy Collins, the poet, calls boredom paradise itself. “It’s the blessed absence of things that the world offers as interesting such as fashion, media, and other people, whom Sartre –let’s not forget- characterized as hell.”
Anton Chekhov also idealized boredom in many of his plays, like in Uncle Vania and Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot” remains without a doubt the manifesto of dullness, featuring characters that await for that bastard Godot who never makes an appearance and which proves boredom can be pro-active after all, because many had stood up and left the theatre from what I recall :-)) The New York author Richard Greenburg even wrote a book (titled “Take me out”) after a bout of boredom during one especially dull summer, during which he watched baseball matches on TV. Luckily I am not that desperate. Brenda Way, choreographer, likes to sit and think when stuck in a jammed highway: She believes it aids her involuntary voyage to creativity by using her unconscious powers at those precise moments.

Made by nose Olivia Giacobetti, who is famous for her light compositions that are like Winslow Homer paintings, Extrait de Songe/L'Eté en Douce is typically her style and seems very fit for such moments. It's an interpretation of freshness without acidulated, fusing or sparkling notes and it reminds me of the style that Jean Claude Ellena later explored in one of his "cologne" duo, called Eau de Gentiane Blanche. The two fragrances do not smell the same, but they share a similar sensibility and a generous smothering of ambrette seed.
Featuring an airy and totally linear formula, Extrait de Songe/L'Eté en Douce begins with linden and lots of "clean" orange blossom water, like the flower water used to sprinkle Mediterranean cookies with, segueing on to hay- like (coumarin?) and woody notes, it finishes off with a kiss of white musk and the bitterish ambrette like newly washed bed-clothes envelopping your showered body. It's all purity, all light! Uncomplicated, easy, soft, lastingly diaphanous, evoking the dew caressing grass in a field and on wild rose bushes, the freshness of lime trees and the warm scent of freshly cut hay; a fragrance that has no aspirations of creating discussion, but only of making you feel good about yourself! The whole projects at a white radiant frequency which must be as close to seraphic cool places as possible without actually hitting the bucket.

Whatever your camp is (and I suppose you still run a pulse if you're reading right now), Extrait de Songe/L'Eté en Douce manages to smell like it is the best thing to exonerate the bad and amplify the good aspects of boredom.

The original bottle of Extrait de Songe is a beautiful lavender blue degrade cylinder (the colour becomes more saturated on the bottom) with plain, silver sprayer, now a collector's item. The newer bottle under L'Eté en Douce follows the typical L'Artisan packaging with label in lavender blue.

Notes for L'Artisan Extrait de Songe/L'Eté en Douce:mint, rose, orange blossom and white musk

Please note: another fragrance by L'Artisan has just recently changed name, namely Vanille Absolument which used to be Havana Vanille (2009).

Inspired by a euro2day comment. Pic of kitten got sent to me by email, unaccredited. L'Ete en Douce bottle pic via duftarchiv.de

Marc Jacobs Daisy Eau so Fresh: fragrance review

Hearing that Marc Jacobs's latest foray into fragrance, Daisy Eau so Fresh, is directed at a "younger audience", one pauses to wonder if 5-year-olds are in need of a little grooming cologne for when they're going out to the playground to meet their friends. The original Daisy, in the bottle with the white rubber Takashi Murakami daisies, is already the personification of the young & hip bright fruity floral: Nothing earth-shattering, a pleasant smell that stands as the perfect "safe floral" for office wear, casual parties and anytime you just can't be bothered to indulge in the splendor and challenge of niche brands such as Serge Lutens, Amouage or Etat Libre d'Orange. In fact the canon of Marc Jacobs is unchallenging, inoffensive perfumes, with possibly the exception of Bang, an entry reminiscent of more exclusive-niche fragrances. Daisy Eau so Fresh, a flanker fragrance to the original following the success of its antecedant, continues on the same sure path that the rest of the Jacobs bottles are merrily heading with a rather nice twist.



What's that twist? Daisy Eau so Fresh is taking a slightly retro route to do so, contrary to the ad copy ~perpetuated via online media, haven't these people smelled the scent?~ which advertises this as "more fruity, more bubbly, more fun". We're obviously dealing with a marketing emphasis on what sells best (which in itself isn't very promising), because this isn't fruitier than the original, nor is it more "bubbly". On the contrary the fragrance's effect is composed in a roundabout way via the distinctive nostalgic note of violets: lots and lots of green violet and violet leaves (via ionones and methyl octyne carbonate /Nonadienal I'm led to believe). Allied to fresh rosy-berry accents and "clean" musks it is a scent on the cusp of "scrubbed" and pear-liquer-like: its sweetness comes via ways that do not recall foodstuff or lush white flowers.
In fact the formula reminds me quite a bit of the re-orchestration of Givenchy's L'Interdit from 2003 in the rounded shoulders rectangular with the small gold cap (there was another reformulation in 2007); same with the violet leaves heavy Balenciaga Paris from last season: the leitmotif is similar and it's a very pretty idea in the realm of "fresh" or "crisp" in a non-citrusy context that should be easy for spring or summer wear. Sillage and tenacity are average for Eau so Fresh.
If pressed to choose between the original Daisy and this one, I would probably pick Eau so Fresh over it, although you'd have to be quite persistent in your persuasion to begin with.

The company certainly used a bit of fanfare during the press launch: Guests were greeted by a horse named Dotty, proceeding to spend their evening sipping cocktails, eating steak, and listening to a DJ set by Daisy Dares You, all the while surrounded by the sweet aromata of raspberry and lychee. Top model Hannah Holman is the face of Marc Jacobs Daisy's latest advertisement, photographed by Juergen Teller.
The bottle, taller and more rectangular than the original Daisy, with a cluster of 6 rubber daisy petal appliques in white, yellow and pink, is simply adorable in its kitsch-cute way, even for a decided aesthetics cynics such as myself.

Notes for Daisy Eau so Fresh by Marc Jacobs:
Top: grapefruit, green notes, raspberry and pear
Heart: jasmine, rose, violet, litchi and apple blossom
Base: musk, virginia cedar and plum.

Daisy Eau so Fresh hits the US market on February 27th at major department stores in 75ml and 125ml of Eau de Toilette.

pic via allurabeauty

L'Eau par Serge Lutens: fragrance review & a draw

I was wondering when next there would be some blogosphere ruffle about a release which creates chasms of opinion, has Turania pan it mercilessly because it doesn't exactly follow the "grand manner"* and creates queues at online decanters to sample it to satisfy the most aimed-at attribute of them all: curiosity! Serge Lutens doesn't miss a beat: With L'Eau Serge Lutens he presents a completely atypical composition ~clean, iron-pressed, steaming like the hot towels infused with citrusy accents presented at luxury hotels for guests to freshen up before diving to the house-warming basket of delicacies.
And he will certainly have everyone wondering how and why he chose this path. Some will put it down to artistic decisions after exhausting the theme of balsams, cedar, cumin and dried fruits, which Serge has indeed culminated into an apotheosis. It could be; great artists are those who abandon la manière (and please note how Gris Clair, Clair de Musc, Iris Silver Mist and Encens et Lavande are essentially none of those things). Some others will venture this is a move to corner the emerging China market. However it is reported that the real turnover on luxury products in China accounts for the household name brands (Cartier, Chanel, Hermès etc). Nah...Others still will put it down to the industry being restricted right and left because of IFRA; if one is only allowed to play with a diminished palette they might as well be insolent and do a 180degree turn!

Whatever it is, Serge Lutens presents L'Eau Serge Lutens, "L'Anti-Parfum": "le savon le plus cher du monde" (i.e.the world's most expensive soap), that is to say a perfumer's idea of "clean", conceived alongside his long-time collaborator Chris Sheldrake. The new fragrance, which I got as a preview and have been testing this past weekend fascinated by its surprising yet familiar feel, is not an eau de cologne version, certainly not an aquatic, nor a light skin-like oriental in the manner of Clair de Musc. L'Eau Serge Lutens is almost mineral-like, in the manner that Eau de Gentiane Blanche is like white volcanic dust on a cool morning, and it would make me feel that the convergence of Mars and the dark side of the Moon ~two diametrically different artists~ has finally happened.
Yet the feel compared to the Hermès cologne is different: a little less bitter in the opening, a hint of bleach even, a little sweeter overall while still a quite bitter "clean". It's like a silvery white book on a shelf, all cool glossy pages, bookended on one side by citrus (the tinge of a little grapefruit, some of the nitrile in Sécrétions Magnifiques too; Quest's Marenil molecule it seems? but good God don't stop reading yet!) and on the other end by musks. There is kinship** with Essence by Narciso Rodriguez as well as Perfect Veil by Creative Scentualisation to give you an idea, but it manages to be neither's replica and to stand on its own feet, more aloof, more Chinese dry-cleaner's white shirt than either.
I bet it will infuriate those who expect opulent baroque from Lutens by default and it will be shunned by neo-bourgeois as well as those who insist on "smelling pretty". L'Eau Serge Lutens is handsome ~and perfectly unisex~ in its austere cleanliness, but pretty it is not. The lasting power is phenomenal, especially on fabric, where the facets of bitter and "nautical" are more evident.

But if papa Serge maintains cleanliness is the new ideal, is "cleanliness next to godliness" or is that only a Protestant concept?
The avant-garde painter Francis Picabia (1879-1953) had interestingly proclaimed between 1912-1920 that "la propreté est le luxe du pauvre: soyez sale!" (i.e. "cleanliness is the luxury of the poor: be dirty!") Certainly with the increasing commodities in plumbing and indoors water supply, the urban lower classes ~ for centuries destined to live among filth~ suddenly had access to the elements of hugiene, equating them in outer appearence at least to the upper classes. This elitist stance by Picabia was echoing in my ears as I read the new promo material by Lutens in which "cleanliness is the new luxury": Could it be that Serge is having a good laugh on us all? It wouldn't be the first time he employs a healthy dose of humour in his opus (see Fille en Aiguilles, Tubereuse Criminelle, Mandarine Mandarin...) Personally, it's that wry humour which I most appreciate in his work, regardless of whether I wear them all.

*Well, we saw what happens to new releases following the grand manner: they get discontinued!

**One of the ingredients is Tris (tetramethylhydroxypiperidinol) Citrate, a widely used Ph adjuster and "buffer" which extends the life and aroma of deodorants, after shaves and eaux de toilette. I suppose this is part of the familiarity too.

The new L'Eau Serge Lutens is embottled in a longer, even more architectural flacon which reminds me of the first cosmetic preparations by Shiseido and Eudermine, the beautifying lotion-cum-aromatic in the long red bottle. L'Eau Serge Lutens is part of the export line and will be available in Europe from February 1st at the boutiques selling Lutens scents and from February 15th also online. Release for American stores is scheduled for March.

For those of you who simply can't wait, I have a sample for a lucky reader. State your interest in the comments! Draw is now closed, winner announced shortly!

In the interests of full disclosure I got sent a small sample as part of the communication by Les Salons which I am offering for the draw.

Painting Girl in the Bathtub by Everett Shinn (1903). Lutens portrait via press material

Narciso Rodriguez Essence: fragrance review

Narciso For Her by young, hip and understated designer Narciso Rodriguez had me at hello all those years ago with its delicious musky trail that is too sexy for words, yet polished enough to pass off as classy; ever since the brand has me curious as to what they come up with next. Proving to be a mega-trendsetter ever since its launch, Narciso for Her catapulted the market into a gene-pool sharing the same musks and "clean" synthesized patchouli bases shaped into the beautiful but traitorous dress of the "modern chypré"; in moments of truth and Sundays' waking up too late after a night partying next to delicious-looking strangers those scents shed that pretentious dress for the comfortable and more accurate flannel PJs of "woody florals with musks" and that's perfectly all right by me. But I digress... Luckily for all of us, the tremendous success of Narciso For Her didn't wind the Rodriguez brand into mechanically and pacingly launching myriads of "flankers"; with the exception of slight differences between the original range itself (eau de toilette vs eau de parfum vs parful roll-on vs Musk For Her oil) and the masculine counterpart issued one year ago, they have restrained themselves into an elegant rhythm which I respect.

Essence, Rodriguez's newest feminine fragrance, didn't grab me as much as Narciso For Her initially did, but that doesn't mean it is a bad fragrance; on the contrary it has a strangely insidious, undercurrent appeal of being made by very skilled hands who were given a not-too-precise-brief and although I am snobishly trying to write it off as repetitive and trite, I can't really. In Essence Rodriguez collaborated again with Beauté Prestige International, the Paris-based fragrance division of the Shiseido Cosmetics Corporation, aiming to capture a "sensual and luminous fragrance with a modern heart of musc enhanced by radiant notes of rose petals, powder notes of iris and hints of amber resulting in a floral, powdery musc fragrance". It doesn't sound terribly exciting, it utilizes the same well-known notes that Narciso Rodriguez obviously loves and I bet that the Spanish-born perfumer Alberto Morillas of Firmenich ~at once a classicist and a modernist and amazingly prolific in his almost 40-years-long career~ could have provided the formula with both hands tied behind his back and blindfolded at the drop of a hat! A recipient of numerous awards, among them the coveted Prix Francois Coty in 2003, Alberto Morillas is responsible for such bestsellers as Armani's Sensi and Aqua di Gio, Bulgari Blu, Omnia and Thé Blanc, Carolina Herrera Chic and 212, Cartier's Le Baiser du Dragon , M7 for YSL, Marc Jacobs Daisy and of course another huge influence on the market: Flower by Kenzo. The man knows how to attract the audience's loyalty, therefore enough said.

The overall effect of Narciso Rodriguez Essence is a clean unctuous almost soapy/aldehydic scent with classical mementos of White Linen minus some of the sharpness and Chanel No.5 minus the sweet florals or the skanky sexiness of lacy panties underneath prim suits, yet with an eerily reminiscent warm-skin-feel that the original Narciso for Her possessed as well. The clean musks featured, with their lathery bubbliness, have their lineage in Morillas's 212 and Daisy, while the powdery segment takes a page off Flower. Little development happens from the initial dryer-sheet sharply aliphatic and abstractly floral opening to the polite muskiness skin-like effect of probably Ambroxan*, (wishful-thinking) Muscenone** and Habanolide**. For what is worth the current modern white musk accord was first created by Alberto Morillas himself in Emporio Armani White for Her (combining Habanolide to Helvetolide**) and he used Muscenone in both Flower and Vanille 44 for niche brand Le Labo. The whole pared-down approach reminds me of the Escentric Molecules line. Although the powdery hazy effect is often attributed to iris, I do not detect any of its melancholic earthiness in the composition, same as with Infusion d'Iris by Prada which utilized a similar approach to the upscale-shampoo-latheriness vibe which seems to be all the rage now (judging by even such offerings as Chanel's Beige from Les Exclusifs). Luckily for the anosmiacs to Narciso For Her it seems to be rather different, enough to maybe give a jolt to their hypothalamus and be discernable to them.

Rodriguez wanted Essence to represent duality: "the intense and the ethereal, the simple and the complex" with an emphasis on "sun's purity" which reminds me of the "solar musks" accord of his first feminine perfume. I guess it's shorthand for "clean and warm" which Essence most certainly is. Lovers of that unperfume-y aspect as well as adventurers of all things delicately musky should flock to at least try it, the rest might find it non remarkable or even unpleasant in its screechy soapy tonalities which overstay their welcome impressively. It's pleasant enough for people into that genre, quite unisex and rather fun (for the price asked) to wear when that Sunday in flannels comes around once in a while, although not as enjoyably fulfilling as the original Narciso for Her is.

The bottle glows from within its mirrored core, round in its glass curvaceousness, created by noted industrial designer Ross Lovegrove (recipient of the prize Royal Designer for Industry in 2004 and art-exhibitor at MOMA and Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Centre Pompidou in Paris as well as the Design Museum in London). The eye-catching design is almost a futuristic, rounded interpretation of the original solid and austere Narciso For Her flacon.
The advertising campaign shot by the lens of Inez van Lamsweerde and Vinoodh Matadin
features supermodel Catherine MacNeil to whom Narciso "was drawn to instinctively".

Notes for Narciso Rodriguez Essence:
iris, rose, benzoin, modern musks


Narciso Rodriguez Essence is available in Eau de Parfum 50ml/1.7oz and 100ml/3.4oz exclusively at Saks Fifth Avenue from March and globally in April.
Ancilary products include a body lotion, a bath and shower cream and a deodorant spray.

Ad pic via fibre2fashion.com , soap courtesy of sassylicious.com.au

*Abroxan is a synthetic aromachemical mimicking the ambergris sensuous note.
**Muscenone, Habanolide, Helvetolide are gtrademark names for different varieties of synthetic musks.

Fahrenheit 32 by Dior: fragrance review

Why was this new men's scent baptised with this weird name? Well, for starters, there was the classic fragrance Fahrenheit by Dior that erupted into the scene in 1988 with all the gusto of an iconoclast along with its female counterpart Dune.
And then, it is exactly 32 degress Fahrenheit that water freezes: equivalent of 0 degrees in the Celsius scale.

This scaling system is quite fascinating if one takes into account another classic of sorts, of a more profound level perhaps: that of the printed word. The dystopian science fiction by Ray Bradbury called "Fahrenheit 451", in which the author describes a future american society that wrapped up in sybaritic living and anti-intellectual tendencies abhors books and goes on to burn them.

The protagonist, Ray Montag, is the very witty antithesis of His Girl Friday of the famous classic era movie, especially since in true german spirit (physicist Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit was German) "Mondag" means "Monday". And yes, this novel has also been filmed.
Fahrenheit 451 on the other hand is the point of auto-ignition of paper...Semantics, semantics.
For some dark, pessimistic reason I am quite convinced that the state of affairs in the world currently do not distance us too much from this nightmarish Orwellian vision. But perhaps I am digressing.

To revert to the "frozen" aspect of this quite cooler Fahrenheit, mes amis, as you might have surmissed by now, this new offering is what is affectionately called a "flanker": a perfume that follows up the successful anion bearing a variation of the name; yet usually either having nothing whatsoever in common with the genetic pool of the former or alternatively featuring a very slight variation of it, questioning the purpose of its existence apart from the boost that it would bring to the sales of both.
Fahrenheit 32 places itself in the first category. It bears little similarity to the classic fragrance and is intended as a tribute to the synthesized orange blossom that has been explored in men's scent recently also by the wonderful Fleur dy Mâle by Gaultier, reviewed just a little while ago. (click here for full review)
Designed by now former artistic director Heidi Slimane with the collaboration François Demachy it has been concocted by nose Louise Turner of Quest.

The general direction is one of a fresh oriental-woody that intermingles piquant aldehydic touches with orange blossom, light smooth vanilla, and what smells to my nose as delicate synthetic musks. The earthiness and slighty dirty appeal of vetiver does not come to the fore, despite its graceful way of making fragrances cool in every sense of the word.
The description goes like this: fresh top notes, orange blossom and vetiver for the hear nnotes, vanilla and solar notes for the base.
Indeed the freshness is akin to a cooling spray, which is implied by the white bottle that takes the classic one of original Fahrenheit to a new techno trip under strobo lights. It's opalescence and smooth milky texture reminded me a lot of the woman's Pure Poison, which I think is not coincidental, as that too is also based on the same synthesized orange blossom note and delivers itself with a freshness that pierces the nostrils for a while.

Compared to Fleur du Mâle it is not much further apart, yet in a way that one captured me more and retained my interest more avidly. Fahrenheit 32 is very likeable and on the scent strip lingers nicely making one to sniff and resniff to consolidate the memory, but a classical masculine fragrance it can never pose to be. It's again a little too feminine for its own good, which makes it fodder for either adventurous guys or the girlfriends who I am sure will fall under its charms.


Top pic In search of the unicorn by bigbird3/flickr
Pic of fahrenheit 451 by Wikipedia

Orange blossom week: part 4 - abstract brushstrokes

What is abstract and how it pertains to olfaction? Let's question ourselves. If we're talking about abstraction as the thought process wherein ideas are distanced from objects then there is a whole school of offerings that evoke some distant memory of something through the use of non-representational means, just like in art; especially in Lyrical Abstraction (a term originally coined by Larry Aldrich in 1969 to describe what he saw in the studios of artists at that time)or even Abstract expressionism, of which Pollock is a representative example, on to the geometrical stylisation of Yiannis Moralis.

In such a context it is not hard to see that the rendition of an aromatic note, even such a familiar one as orange blossom, can be sublimated in a way that exalts its effect without featuring its true characteristics. In fact without featuring the actual thing at all!
Aromachemical engineers have the additional ability to use a note that naturally is only a top or heart or even base accent and manipulate it in order to make it last longer or for a lesser amount of time. Therefore orange blossom, a note that in its form of "absolute" is a heart to bottom note may appear out of the vial as soon as we open to smell or indeed neroli (the essential oil from orange blossom) might be discernible throughout a fragrance's development.
It is also possible to use aromachemicals that evoke the essence of orange blossoms like the ghost of someone near and dear appearing out of a desire to see them much like Hamlet's father, in a composition that is centered around them yet contains none. Ingredients that could be used include Aurantiol, Methyl Anthranilate, and Oranger Crystals.
Primary examples of this technique would be amply illustrated by Fleur du Mâle the new fragrance by Gaultier, Narciso For Her by Narciso Rodriguez and Castile by Penhaligon's. Indeed those are fragrances that fine though they are feature such an abstract orange blossom that it is spectral in its appearence rather than physical and tangible, like in examples previously mentioned.

Fleur du Mâle by Galtier has already had a full review at Perfumeshrine. Suffice to say that it is the essence of a fluffy cloud, all hay-coumarin and ersatz orange blossom through the eyes of a master of abstraction and could be worn by women just as easily as men.

Castile by Penhaligon's on the other hand is in another vein. Technically also a masculine fragrance, yet highly asexual in its soapy nature, it soars on notes of clean neroli and bergamot at first to warm up just a bit later on with hazy orange blossom, all the while retaining a clean atmosphere of minimalism.
I have a confession to make at this point. When staying at european hotels -the luxurious kind; I avoid the cheap ones after one horrible experience not due to my choosing which however left me probably scarred for life- I love to enter the bathroom first. Gaze at the white clean towels, all pressed and folded, the bath acroutments, lined up for my using, little soaps on the sink, inhale the aroma of cleanliness and proceed to the pulverised sheets on the bed that are starchy and unlined like big sheets of paper on the desk of a writer longing to be filled with ink recounting thoughts and memories of ambiguous value.
This is what Castile evokes in me: staying in a luxury hotel, posing as some person more important than the prosaic historian that I am, halo of far away distance from mundanity fimly placed on my head and not a care in the world behind my aviator sunglasses. "Clean" in a minimal, austere, yet also friendly way without featuring one sharp or musky note.

Narciso by Narciso Rodriguez on the other hand goes into the other direction of "clean". It has been such an influential, seething discovery in my relatively recent perfume past that I have real trouble talking about it. This might sound like a hyperbole and an unsuccessful one at that, yet I assure you that the way it has sneaked its way into my heart with its wiles is astounding. The concentration in the admittedly confusing range that I am focusing on at the moment is the Eau de toilette, with its sexy ambience of clean musks at the background and the inclusion of an abstract orange blossom touch on the foreground.
Nary does a day go by when wearing it that the passing stranger (and a loved one) does not turn to sniff a little longer, lean a little closer, sometimes even comment on it in complimentary terms. Nary does a day go by when wearing it that I am not trasported in a place of contentment, of confidence, of feeling fresh and young and able to conquer the world on a wink or a smile.
To categorise it as clean or as sexy is doing it an injustice. Its erotic power hinges on the creation of a distinguished, sophisticated eroticism which is ethereal and distanced from heavy seductions that in reality repel rather than entice. The absence of saccharine girliness despite the assured overall youthfulness of the composition speaks highly of a sexual being who is ready to consumate the affair with a playful toss of the leg up in the air and not after losing its virginity at the school's prom dance. Whether that would be the net result in the end is fair game to its paws, but nevertheless this is not the iniative on which the fragrance operates. It hums of unmade beds in homes rather than hotels, where the warmth of humans and the life of lovers has found a nest out of the cold harsh mechanical world outside.
Narciso Rodriguez eau de toilette is said to include notes of honey flower, solar musk, orange flower, amberlyn, tactile musk, and tactile woods.
Amberlyn by the way is a petrochemical that is intended to smell a bit like ambergris. Honey Flower is an evergreen shrub (genus Melianthus)native to Cape of Good Hope.
Too abstract for words really in its aroma-synthetic marvel, this Francis Kurkdjian oeuvre is a masterpiece that has it own place in the pantheon of great scents. I am sure that the future will be kind to its beautiful visage.



Painting "Young Girl" 1971 by greek painter Giannis Moralis courtesy of eikastikon.gr

Glorious stink

The ebb and flow of human taste and its modus operandi is an undecipherable commodity. What is considered appealing and desirable and what is not doesn’t obey any quantitative measure. Which of course accounts for trends, market research and lost fortunes in wrong assumptions side by side with the successful lucky guesses.
The same applies to smell and fragrance. More pointedly so when the aromas emanating from someone are of a more intimate nature.

Ever since the dawn of humanity homo sapiens has shared the biological fate of his ancestors in the olfactory field. His sense of smell has primarily directed him to opt for the healthy game and fresh produce and avoid the stale and rotten. It is also possible that it has directed him via odorata sexualis to suitable mates through which procreation might be consummated with the imperceptible help of pheromones, aroma materials that are emanated by individuals to attract. For millennia man has been content to do just that.

And then civilization came into the picture. In the great civilizations of antiquity such as Egypt, Greece and Rome, the desire to distance oneself from the animal nature and embrace the humane, as manifested in science, philosophy and the arts, has made man take measures as to maintain a level of cleanliness that is beyond the mere necessity of survival. All those civilizations have been very hygienic indeed, if we take into mind that there was no running hot water and no bubble baths in a million permutations.
Yet Herodotus talks about how the ancient Egyptians of his time bathed regularly shaving their body hair and even their scalps as to not let perspiration nestle in intimate parts of the body and fester bacteria (OK, he did not use the word bacteria precisely). How they had inward lavatories for their needs and how they took pains to maintain hygiene there. How they used sweet scented oils and incense to accompany the dead to their last dwelling place on earth.
The Greeks were by no means less clean. They too -living in a warm climate- had been taking regular baths using silver and golden basins followed by massage with aromatic oils of thyme and basil at every possible occasion, cleaning their clothes in the rivers with ash and aromatic herbs as described in the Odyssey and equating hygiene with sanity and longevity. Numerous are the mythological tales of gods and goddesses taking baths while mortals gazed hidden. It was Galenos who invented the first bar of soap mixing crushed flower petals, olive oil and ash from burnt logwood.
Ancient Rome was the apex of public baths, in which people of all ages intermingled and talked about state matters in elaborate buildings divided in unctuarium (where they chose the unguents with which they would groom themselves), the frigidarium (cold bath) and the caldarium (hot bath) and then on to the labrum for the final cold shower.
Even lavender that clean smelling herb is named after the roman word for bathing, because of its ubiquitous use.
The tradition of the bath as a civilization index is no more apparent that in Tacitus’ opus Germania where he mentions with some disdain that Germanians, considered barbarians at the time, bathed in rivers. At least they did bathe! Which is more than can be said for the squalor and filth in which Medieval Europe lived for centuries after the fall of Rome.

While Islam reveled in the luxuries of bathing (aided by the religious prerequisite to clean one’s head, hands and feet before every prayer, a phenomenon that occurs with frequent regularity throughout the day), western Europe inaugurated a practice of not washing up one’s body at all, for which the church can be found to be a great culprit.
Maintaining that mixed baths (as were previously tentatively explored) were corrupting the soul and that tending to one’s genitals might lead to impure thoughts, they condoned the absence of bath as a means of chastity while at the same time they traditionally equated holiness with the sweet smell of myrrh and incense. How those two could co-exist is beyond me, but this is not the only paradox one comes up against if one explores the matter further.

It was as late as 1750 according to Alain Corbin and his book “Le Miasme and la Jonquile”, which explores the adventure of sanitation and the desodorisation of society, that the élite chose to distance itself from the foul stench of the gutters and disease that were abundant in the crowded -by then- cities of France. A taste for the aroma of deer musk or of catty civet and of pure country air mingled in what was to become the height of French perfumery. The impression of cleanliness underscored by the reminder that we are all human, full of smells that could be perceived as disgusting in their pure state.
However perfumes seemed to be necessary still to repel the germs and bacteria through their cleansing properties as the tradition of filth continued, albeit a bit subdued: at least the clothes were as freshly clean as possible.
Louis XIV was said to have only bathed two times in his whole long life despite asking his guests and courtesans to wear a different perfume every day and the mere thought disgusts us today, earning a reputation of filth for Frenchmen which sadly has not been totally shifted if I judge by the miniscule pieces of sanitary paper that come out - one at a time!!- through the automatic devices at French toilets today.
On the other hand there was also an allure of the animalic and forbidden in similar practices when Napoleon infamously wrote to Josephine: “Je reviens en trois jours; ne te laves pas!” (I return in three days; don’t wash yourself).
The pair of them began a vogue for heavier smells as Josephine was madly in love with the smell of musk, to the point that her boudoir at Malmaison still has an aura of the aromatic essence present. Napoleon on the other hand preferred her in violets.

The Victorian age reveled in pure and simple smells as a contrast to the more decadent Empire style, using single floral waters (soliflores) for men and women alike. But it was the Puritans more than anyone else that began the hysteria for cleanliness with their desire to eliminate all traces of animalic tendencies from man. Sadly this is an insurmountable task, as the human body has to produce bile and bacteria to break down food which accounts for a smell that cannot be completely eradicated however hard one tries.
Indoor plumbing and hot water at the click of a button made taking baths an easy and swift procedure that is as an automatic reflex for today’s men and women as brushing one’s teeth. Technological progressions made the manufacture of industrial strength deodorants to put under one’s armpits as a necessity of every day life that is a god sent if you’re ever stuck up in a crowded underground wagon on a hot day of August. Perfumed products in an array of mind arresting variety are manufactured to lure as in and buy more, more, more…

And yet in all that progress we seem to have lost what has once been ours in ancient years: the conjugation of mind and body, the clean with the human.
The examples of complete perfume bans in offices in latter days, the denial of the sensual and natural in favour of the sanitized and deodorized has permeated every single aspect of today’s life. Everything around us is artificially scented with a chemical aroma that defies every law of nature. We scrub fanatically to remove any trace of human smell from our bodies and then we apply perfumed products that would supposedly give us back what nature intended to give us in order to attract a mate. We seek to find “clean” but at the same time “sexy” smells. Above all we do not want to offend. Being accused of smelling of body odour is the height of mortification for anyone beyond infancy. (since kids do not really “smell”; there have to be sexual hormones at play to do that…)
In an overcrowded planet that has no room for any more bodies, this was to be expected.
And this is what accounts for the recent resurgence of perfumes that aim to regress in the stink and funk of our human condition: from the goat-y magnificence of Muscs Kublai Khan by enfant gaté Serge Lutens to the dirty smell of Kiehl’s Musk eau de toilette and from the soft caress of a slightly sweaty body that has been active in human activities of L’air de rien by Miller Harris (with the collaboration of Jane Birkin) to the gimmicky Sécretions magnifiques by état libre d’Orange which recalls semen and blood (sounds the recipe for some tabloid article)…

It is clear that one yearns for what one is denied of. And the reason why isn’t very hard to see.


Artwork by Patric Boivine for CGnetworks.com