Versace Crystal Noir: fragrance review of enduring best-seller

Lately I have been noticing a strange phenomenon which brought about this examination. Versace's post-millennium child, Crystal Noir from 2004, has been the über perennial for each and every occasion on the Fragrantica members' collections! The members come from far and between, dressed in many guises among eclectic collections, but the bottom-line is always the same: Crystal Noir comes across as the perfect passe-partout fragrance for a very wide audience. Fit for day, sexy by night. This is why it has endured for 20 years to the day.

I am not such an ardent fan of it, but I do get the crowd-pleasing aspect of it very well. It's very easy to wear and mingles with the skin. The presentation with the lid that seems like it takes Herculean capacity to lift helps, too. Capitalizing on the mysterious allure of both purple and black and revisiting the Tom Ford ads element of women reclining with men over them, it catches the eye in a somewhat tacky way. The marrying of a floral note hidden inside a soft, mellow cocoon creates this impression of being immersed in clotted cream. Cream brings on thoughts of gluttony, indulgence, pampering and also whiteness. White also brings to mind gardenias (supposedly in the heart of Crystal Noir's floral chord, though I don't really discern it as such) and shredded coconut whites, all delicious and tropical. White and tropical don't really mix together, mentally, but in this case they do and — lo and behold! — it makes for the converging of territories. We can feel clearly the white floral hint creamed in coconut and deliciously comfy materials of milky woods, fluffy clean musks and a mental interjection of a hot white towel impression. It's worthy of a spa, yet oddly sexy and beckoning-come-hither, too. No wonder it's the fragrance for day and night, for business or pleasure, for just abut any woman. If she's shy she can comfort herself that it's her armour. If she's bold, she can cajole her fancier moods by saying to herself she's always the lady (and she is).

Santa Maria Novella Gardenia: fragrance review

“The house smelled musty and damp, and a little sweet, as if it were haunted by the ghosts of long-dead cookies.”
~Neil Gaiman, American Gods

Smelling the little known Gardenia by the Florentine pharmacy brand of Santa Maria Novella, thanks to the inquisitive generosity of a special reader, I am reminded not of cookies exactly, but of cachous, the French candies that are composed of minty, bitter elements (minus their licorice), and of another candy conflated, popular with elder ladies, those chalky rounds flavored with violet and aniseed but seemingly without much sugar. Gardenia, you see, has the rare ability to go for the effect of not one, but two candies at the same time, eschewing allusions to syrupy delights, as it goes about its business; more the ghost of candies past than real ones.

Domenico Ghirlandaio, detail from Visitation, at Capella Tornabuoni at Santa Maria Novella, Florence

But that's half the story. In Gardenia there's detectable camphor on top, a hint of mothballs, surely lent by either a small tuberose facet (close kin to natural gardenia, but its advantage is that contrary to gardenia it can be sufficiently extracted), or via organic chemistry.
The mushroom dampness that evolves in a potted gardenia plant surfaces too in the Santa Maria Novella perfume (much like it did in the since discontinued Velvet Gardenia in Tom Ford's Private Line of fragrances), the earthiness of the soil in which the stems grow, the greenery, the humid air of the tropics that is its natural habitat. The end result smells little of the total that makes a lifelike gardenia perfume (all the more so a soliflore, a fragrance imitating the scent of a single flower), highlighting in odd focus elements of the live gardenia, like a super-sized vision through a microscope, germs appearing like monsters of the abyss or engulfing other micro-organisms via tentacle-like arms and legs: the green, the undergrowth, the musty note, the camphor….they're there in giga size. It also adds elements that are unfamiliar to our perception of the gardenia plant, copious ionones, smelling like violets & wood, and anethole (the molecule recognizable in anise).

It feels green & mauve, not white. It's demure long dresses in dove grey rather than a silky top over a hugging the curves pencil skirt. It's unkempt chestnut hair in matted tresses rather than glossy waves licking bronzed shoulders. It's John Dowland's I saw my lady weep, not Manuel de Falla. It's melancholy with a dash of neglect and abandonment, rather than boiling passions. To me at least.

For a photo-realistic gardenia fragrance you need to access either the discontinued Yves Rocher Pur Desir de Gardenia (in which the effect is rendered via jasmolactones) or Estee Lauder's Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia (in which the latter floral effectively upstages the usually diva- esque former one). Santa Maria Novella's Gardenia is an atypical one, a "difficult" to get scent but quite interesting all the same, and probably better appreciated as an earthy, non sweet violet scent trampled in undergrowth than the waxy petaled white flower of the tropics that induces ultra-romantic reverie.
(For one such, read a different take by Jane Daly)

Tocca Margaux: new fragrance

Feast your eyes on the gorgeous bottle of the newest feminine fragrance by Tocca cult brand, as it's so very beautiful as usual. Margaux eau de parfum, the upcoming feminine fragrance release, planned for October 2013, is a new proposition  in the line with a richer, more sophisticated scent than we've been used to previously (see Colette, Touch or Cleopatra by Tocca for instance).

via Perfume (Larie) pinterest.com

Fragrance notes for Tocca Margaux:
Top Notes: Blood Orange, Bergamot Blossom, Cassis, Green Gardenia
Middle Notes: Black Jasmine, Ambery Violet, Cashemere Woods
Bottom Notes: Warm Musk, Benzoin, Vanilla, Heliotrope

TOCCA Margaux Eau de Parfum (50 ml) retails at $68 at Sephora and Nordstrom stores nationwide and online at www.TOCCA.com, www.sephora.com, www.bluemercury.com and beauty.com beginning October 2013.

Hermes Jour d'Hermes: fragrance review & insights into fragrance creation

Things which are equal to the same thing are equal to each other.
~Euclid

photo by AlberCAN (copyright 2012) for use on PerfumeShrine

By guest writer AlbertCAN

Simple elegance is often the hardest to grasp. The emphasis here, of course, lies in its sophistication: the fusion of ideas being so purposely concised and delicately tailored that the communication becomes deceptively simple. Ideas just float on their own merits, process gone and vanished. For years now, for instance, many have quipped that the great Anna Pavlova probably danced her famous “The Dying Swan” program as party entertainment, but judging by the technical brilliance, intricate grace and athletic poise displayed by prima ballerina Ulyana Lopatkina below I wouldn’t classify it as a simple dance: to even stand on pointe for nearly four minutes while delivering all the nuanced emotions? Not ever for the faint hearted.

I was pondering all these intricacies almost three weeks ago when I was introduced to Jour d'Hermès (2012), the latest feminine fragrance by master perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena, and when I was informed of the project scope I was very surprised by its seemingly effortless premise: a modern soft floral, radiance from dawn to dusk. No emphasis on particular notes. No PR blitz upon the initial launch. Boutique only until Spring 2013. All against the grain.

The name is also deceptively simple, another subtle risk. Jour d'Hermès (pronounced roughly as ‘joor dair-mess’), though perfectly fitting with the brand’s chosen theme for 2012—Gift Of Time, or Le temps devant soi—isn’t the most accessible name for non-francophones and does require a reasonable grasp of the language. The name does, on the other hand, complement the core theme* of Hermès perfectly: the land and the sky. Case in point? The two best-selling scarves: “Brides de Gala” (on the left) on saddlery and “Astrologie” (below right) on the zodiac constellations—of the land and the sky. Olfaction wise, since we already have the masculine Terre d'Hermès (2006) representing the earth, and since Ciel d'Hermès would have been too obvious, here we have Jour d'Hermès representing the other half of the universe—though I should point out that the above-mentioned names are slightly subversive, with la terre being a feminine word in place of a masculine fragrance and le jour being a masculine word in French. One might think little of the seemingly archaic French noun gender categorization, but I should point out that the name “Calèche” was originally chosen in part because it is a feminine word in French—la calèche. Still, I’m ahead of myself: more on that front later.

The fragrance is yet another intricacy in disguise: Jour d'Hermès opens with quite a tart grapefruit element (quelle surprise) followed immediately by a soft verdancy—all against a floral murmur. Long-time readers of Ellena’s olfactive works would also notice a fruity syntax to the mix, though purposely kept non-specific with a soft sensual mango bias as the fragrance wears on. (The master perfumer has mentioned his partiality to the scent of mango in his book “Journal d'un parfumeur”.) Then in comes the radiance and the scent deftly draws out a delicate array of flowers: sweet pea and gardenia most prominently, although I have also observed a quote of the translucence lifted from Vanille Galante (2009), the lilting orange blossom in Iris Ukiyoe (2010). Further, if one can excuse my impertinence: with the help of the IFRA-sanctioned ingredient label—and my humble training in perfumery—I can also deduce the following floral elements: lily of the valley, modern hybrid rose, tuberose, ylang ylang, jasmine—although these elements are utilized in such a quasi-deconstructed manner that Ellena the magician here only shows an whiff of the ideas. It’s a dawn-kissed, dewy garland—not a Floriade by any stretch of the imagination. The overall structure of the fragrance is kept clean and tailored; the diffusion pattern is built with a purpose; sillage modern, sensual and very long-lasting.

The contradiction of this maximizing minimalism is worth pondering here. This is a luminous floral built under and only under the aegis of our time: three decades ago this idea of floral barraging would have been a Maupassant Realism, as testified in “First” (1976) by Van Cleef & Apels, another Ellena creation; a mere decade ago J’Adore (1999) by Christian Dior with its coquettish charm fronted by the saccharine champaca and violet. Jour d'Hermès is unapologetically floral at heart but decidedly anti-FlowerBomb.

Which begs the question: how does Jean-Claude Ellena manage such sustained flurry of floralcy in flight without all the burdensome cliché of heft often associated with the genre? Without the help of gas chromatography (out of the respect of the master perfumer, really) I would offer a possible hypothesis after a careful examination of his interviews and writings.

I have already mentioned the use of sweet pea, which Ellena has devoted a spirited entry in his “Journal d'un parfumeur” (2011). My English translation of the passage in question offers a glimpse to his art.

                                                                                                       Cabris, Wednesday April 14, 2010
Sweet peas, when in bouquet, remind me of ruffled flamenco dresses. The flower has graceful petals and has the appearance of organdie. They do not have a determined smell, but a scent that hesitates between rose, orange blossom and Sweet William, with its touch of vanilla. I threw in seven components that seem necessary to sketch the smell. One, two, three attempts to balance the proportions, to which I added a carnation note to the fourth test to correct myself again. The fifth test seems appropriate. I have a sketch of smell with which I can start a perfume.

SWEET PEA (FIFTH DRAFT)
phenylethyl alcohol               200
Paradisone ®                      180
hydroxycitronellal                 50
Rhodinal                           30
acetyl isoeugenol                  15
orange blossom (abs colorless)     15
cis-3 hexenol                       5
phenylacetic aldehyde 50%           5
______________________________________
                                   500

Diluted at 5% in perfumery alcohol at 85°.

While it’s not certain whether Ellena adopted the exact sweet pea accord above for his latest feminine fragrance the olfactory essay is of interest. The accord is emblematic due to its hologramatic nature: the nuance of the gentle flora is evident, yet within there’s also a radiant magnolia (Paradisone), a splash of lily of the valley (hydroxycitronellal), a boutonnière of carnation (acetyl isoeugenol), a blade of fresh luminous verdancy (cis-3 hexenol) and a whiff of tartness (Rhodinal) for good measure—not to mention the orange blossom absolute and the frilly rosy touch from phenylethyl alcohol. As an avid gardener who has harvested his share of sweet peas I must say Ellena is shockingly spot-on with so few ingredients.

Within the same book Ellena’s thoughts on gardenia is even more sparse. Again my English translation:

Gardénia

aldehyde C-18 prunolide
styrallyl acetate
methyl anthranilate

For the scent of gardenia I prefer that of Chanel because it does not smell like the flower but happiness. The odour of gardenia is a drama between jasmine and tuberose.

Compared to the natural scent the gardenia accord above does not have the notorious mushroom lilt simply because of the absence of the tiglates. (The stryrallyl acetate, itself smelling like tart rhubarb, may have also given Jour d'Hermès the verdant tinge.) Yet what does the master perfumer meant when referring to “a drama between jasmine and tuberose”? Let’s break down the individual accords from the master perfumer:

Jasmine
benzyl acetate
Hedione
clove bud oil
indole
methyl anthranilate

Tuberose
aldehyde C-18 prunolide
methyl anthranilate
phenylethyl alcohol
benzyl salicylate

Thus elements from both are appearing in the gardenia accord, although our Elena Vosnaki has also made the following observation: "Methyl anthranilate (orange flower and ylang-ylang in low concentration, grape in high concentration) also produces very popular Schiff's Bases for a variety of floral effects, when added to aldehydes. No surprise in its being featured so much!"

Based on the info above I can deduce that Jour d'Hermès doesn't have the notes listed in part because the ‘notes’ are all connected together: sweet pea into magnolia, magnolia helping the orange blossom, orange blossom into tuberose, tuberose into gardenia. And certainly the Paradisone is known to create a radiant effect, as per both perfumer Arcadi Boix Camps and master perfumer Alberto Morillas. Under this manner Ellena, though clasping onto his aesthetics firmly, is to me also taking a page out of the notebook from old master perfumers of the 20th century such as Francis Fabron, despite obviously going after vastly different olfactory effects: very short but self-contained formulas with each 'note' sharing a set of chemicals so the elements are tightly woven as possible.

After all, what’s the point of naming all the notes in Jour d'Hermès when all the ingredients are synced to perform as one, in calibrated harmony?

I have mentioned that Jour d'Hermès is quite long-lasting, and much to my intrigue it works very well as a unisex fragrance. The use of the pricey muscone, itself a creamy modern musk, does help coaxing flowers to a more prolonged bloom...

(Hidden in the drydown I do very much suspect the use of honey absolute in conjunction with the musk, since the diffusion is such positively radiant. Oakmoss extract is also used, not at the forefront of the story by any stretch of the imagination but enough for me to see maybe classified by others as a modern chypre floral.)

...To test my hypothesis I ended up wearing Jour d'Hermès for two days straight, and on my skin it’s becomes a soft unisex fragrance. And given that Terre d'Hermès can work on the right woman perhaps the gender confusion among the two French nouns (le jour, la terre) isn’t so random after all: Ellena does believe the freedom in fragrance categorization among genders—perhaps the names are a reflection of that belief as well, that fragrance shouldn’t be gender assigned but completely up to the taste of the individual. And given the marketing scope of the latest offering I have good reasons to believe that the ray of light is being granted in the name of personal freedom, freedom in the name of simple elegance.

Hermès Jour d’Hermès is available in 50 and 85 ml Eau de Parfum, and in a 125 ml refill. It’s available now exclusively in Hermès boutiques and will go into wider distribution early next year.

*Editor (Elena's) Note: Jour d’Hermès was presented to the world in late November 2012 in Delphi, Greece (as seen here), the default spot of LIGHT worship. The god of the oracle, Apollo, has  no doubt shed a ray of sunshine on the perfumer and his works. It remains to be seen whether -to borrow a Nietzsche reference- the next fragrance, tackling the Dionysian this time, will be Nuit d’Hermès and presented in Arcadia. I'm throwing this to the mix as an idea to the Hellenophile people at  Hermès!

Photo, from top: Jour d'Hermès and “Journal d'un parfumeur”, photo taken/copyright by AlbertCAN; Uliana Lopatkina in “The Dying Swan”, photo via Tumblr; “Brides de Gala” scarf by Hermès; “Astrologie” scarf by Hermès; cover of “Journal d'un parfumeur” by Jean-Claude Ellena; Jour d'Hermès illustration via Hermes.com

Serge Lutens Une Voix Noire: fragrance review & draw

The melancholic timbre of Billie Holiday's voice, the "black voice" behind the inspiration for Serge Lutens's latest Paris-exclusive perfume, is reverberating through the unusual paths of the fumes rising from the bell-jar bottle with its beautiful brownish, maroon almost, shade of juice inside. The waxy, thick petals of gardenia with their irresistible browning that is poised between sweet rot and carnal abandon have a way of capturing hearts like mine...and Billie's too, who wore one tucked beneath her ear as a trademark. But to designate just gardenia to Une Voix Noire would be doing it a disservice.

Guy Bourdin photo via thinmoonsugar.blogspot.com

Gardenia and tuberose are olfactory allies in crime. Both nocturnal creatures with creamy white blossoms which exude a kaleidoscope of weird and wondrous facets, from sharp greenness that recalls camphor, to blue cheese and mould, all the way to meat rotting in the heat to help attract various pollinators, they're fascinating flowers to cultivate in a warm climate that oozes with the dangerous atmosphere of a film noir. Lutens and his trusty perfumer Chris Sheldrake have been no strangers to tuberose's wiles thanks to Tubereuse Criminelle with its jarring contrast of rough edge against smooth silk.
But Une voix Noire is to gardenia a new take on the flower, less simplistic and more complex, with an abstract background that brings it closer to a Bois variation than a fleshy, photorealistic photo of the opulent flower with its blue cheese timbre that Tom Ford put in the forefront for his (now discontinued) Velvet Gardenia or the spring-like styralyl acetate greenness it exhibits in Lauder's life-like, budding Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia. The candied plumminess of the cedar & fruits base is certainly progeny of the Feminite du Bois school of mock dilettantes (posing as less serious than in reality) and the rich, satisfying, warmly honeyed core to be explored on further wearings would be most pleasurably received by those who have enjoyed Mary Greenwell's Plum, Botytris, Jar's Jardenia and -naturally- the rest of the Lutensian series of "woody" cedar & fruits melange fragrances.

The perfumer and the art director play in chiaroscuro with extreme grace in Une voix Noire, bringing on an opening tuberose-gardenia note that is fresh and real but dissipates fast into clean and metallic notes that ring like cold air in the stillness of the night. Smoky and indolic, almost animalic facets slowly reveal themselves, darkening the proceedings through a sweetish, leathery, tobacco and boozy (rum, according to the official notes) phase which creates an effect worthy of a blues singer velvety sighing her pain into hard vinyl.

Like Billie's voice, Une Voix Noire is indelible...lasting a lifetime and then some.



Une Voix Noire is a Paris-exclusive Lutens fragrance available as Eau de Parfum 75ml in the bell jar bottles.

For our readers, a generous decant of the new Une Voix Noire is available. Draw is open internationally till Friday 28th midnight. Just answer in the comments what "a black voice" conjures up for you to be eligible. Draw is now closed, thank you!

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Serge Lutens news & fragrance reviews

Puredistance Opardu: fragrance review & draw

I am doubtful as to whether an elegant yet lush floral with woody undertones is really reminiscent of the opulence of the 1920s and 1930s. Historically, I know these were years when florals were given the sheen of aldehydes, transposing them from worlds of flower beds into vistas of abstraction (Je Reviens by Worth, Chanel no.5, Bois des Iles), and big profuse chypres, often with decadent fruity notes (see the pineapple in Colony by Patou, the peach-skin in Mitsouko by Guerlain et al) or leathery scented accents (Cuir de Russie by Chanel, Scandal by Lanvin for instance), reigned supreme. In that sense Opardu, the latest fragrance by Puredistance, is rather incongruent, but it is delightful all the same in its own genre, much like all the fragrances in the line have proven so far: from the smooth bravado of M by Puredistance to the nostalgic femininity of Antonia, the compact line is well thought of, evidenced by the lack of continuous releases heaping up like an avalanche on us -much like it happens with some other niche lines that shall remain unnamed.

via http://osullivan60.blogspot.com

No, Puredistance makes an effort and as soon as the first transparent drops of the new elixir, Opardu, landed on my skin I knew that this was another quality fragrance from them. My only complaint? For a parfum concentration, it seems weaker, less lasting than the others. But don't let that stop you from trying for yourself.

The inspiration
The word 'OPARDU' is a creation of the owner and creative director of Puredistance: Jan Ewoud Vos. "When he came up with the word OPARDU he felt that this word had always been there, in a mysterious way... evocative and strangely familiar" the official story goes. I can't say it means anything specific to me, yet it does evoke leopards, bringing to mind Visconti's glorious and utterly romantic Il Gattopardo in mind.

"It took more than a year to further work out OPARDU. Central to the 'feeling' of OPARDU have been the expressive paintings of Kees van Dongen, in particular one of his illustrations for the book 'PARFUMS' by Paul Valéry, published in 1945 in a limited edition of 1000. (Jan Ewoud Vos is the owner of book no. 429)." [according to this info]

 The bouquet in the middle below is an illustration of Kees van Dongen

The perfumer

When Jan Ewoud Vos showed this illustration of Kees Van Dongen - a rich and lush bouquet of flowers - to Annie Buzantian, the famous Master Perfumer from New York, she instantly fell in love with it. The first word that came to her mind was 'Opulence'. She also felt this nostalgic feeling for the early years of the previous century; the golden age of perfumery. And then her work began. As a starting point Annie used a reinterpretation of a classic carnation she had already created which was safely stored in one of her 'secret' drawers.

How it Smells 

To my nose the dominating sensation is not of a classic carnation (those tended to be clove-spicy affairs, like in Caron's Poivre & Coup de Fouet), but rather of lilacs; pollen-dusted and with nectarous facets that mingle with a smidgen of green, transparent gardenia impression and a hint of powder and cedarwood. These lilacs are divested of their more melancholy, rained-upon ambience that En Passant by perfumer Olivia Giacobetti for Frederic Malle's perfume line has turned into a cult. That was a passing impression of walking under an umbrella in the early spring just catching a whiff of white lilacs in the distance from some stone and cement-walled garden afar. Here, in Opardu, the purple lilac is trembling under the morning sun and the white flower notes (not especially indolic, but not sanitized either) provide a tinge of honeyed sweetness. The wink of a bit of spice could be said to evoke a carnation interpretation, though I'm mostly struck by the inclusion of the non mentioned powdery soft and woody-earthy garland of ionones (rendering a violet note) and what I could liken to a hawthorn/mimosa note with a little muskiness. If you have always admired Vacances by Patou (1936) but have been frustrated by its rarity (now that even the 1980s reissue is discontinued for so long), Opardu can provide a good substitute.
This delicate bouquet in Opardu makes for a very feminine and subtle composition that is graceful rather than opulent and restrained in very good taste. I would have loved it to be a bit more maxed out for the opulent effect and for greater tenacity, but that's just me.

Notes for Opardu by Puredistance:
Main notes in Opardu as announced in time of writing are: carnation, tuberose absolute, jasmine absolute and gardenia with a background evoking the gentleness of romance through soft powdery notes. (All notes will be officially revealed in the first week of November, when I will update).

OPARDU will be available in a 17.5 ml. Perfume Spray and a 60 ml. Perfume Flacon as pure Perfume Extrait (32%) only, in November 2012. Available at select carriers.

A sample of the as yet unreleased Opardu parfum will be given to a lucky reader who comments on this post. Draw is open internationally till Sunday midnight. Draw is now closed, thank you!

 Music: Φεύγω (i.e.I'm leaving...all those years I'm leaving) by Greek songwriter Orpheas Pieridis, adapted here & sung by Dionyssis Savvopoulos.

In the interests of full disclosure I was sent a sample for consideration.

Madonna Truth or Dare: fragrance review

To extrapolate that Madonna's Truth or Dare celebrity fragrance is a Fracas-inspired vehicle is a given unless you had been living under a rock for the past 20 years. Not only had the reference been clearly made when the classic Fracas by Robert Piguet was re-issued under new directorship sometimes in the mid-1990s (along with the equally classic and controversial Bandit perfume) ~and Madonna was letting the world know she wore Fracas because it reminded her of her mother~ the famous quinquagenarian has been known to love tuberose and gardenia anyway. True to form, though not daringly enough, her fragrance Truth or Dare, late on the bandwagon of celebrity fumes, is indeed a sharp, loud tuberose with added side notes of waxy gardenia, coconut for a tropical feel to the white flowers and amber-musks in the base. It's the right thing to wear if you're decked in a conservative tailleur and fishnet veil with black eyeliner and red lipstick and horny after a handsome toreador just like Madonna herself was in "Take a Bow". (The image says it all, really; lady and tramp in equal measure).

via hollywoodreporter.com

Because Truth or Dare is a true celebrity perfume (the face behind it infinitely more important than the juice), but at the same time coming from a celebrity who is well known for her genuine interest in fragrances and her vast collection, I decided to evaluate the fragrance in a "game" of plus and cons. After all, Madonna has played the Madonna-Whore duality herself for decades.

The minus points
By now tuberose and gardenia have been tackled beyond the iconic Fracas in a pleiad of guises by niche perfume companies, sometimes to incredible results: The natural green and tropical vibrancy of Carnal Flower by Frédéric Malle is hard to beat. The silkiness of the initially mentholated Tubéreuse Criminelle by Serge Lutens is unsurpassable. The refinement of Beyond Love by Kilian, very close to Fracas, but a bit more natural feeling, is a wonder of artistry and nature: Calica Becker used the fresh flowers as a reference to narrow the gap between the oil and the real blossom and the injection of coconut gives a sensuous mantle of real human skin. For real gardenia we have Estée Lauder Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia which smells as real as the living thing, green buds, browning petals and all.

Madonna's effort therefore seems too little, too late. If Truth or Dare had been issued 15 or even 10 years ago (why wasn't it? that is the question) we would have been more responsive to its white flowers message. By now, it's almost a cliché. (And inspires its own caricature, please open with caution) Even Kim Kardashian has issued her very own version in her first fragrance; with an added dose of sugarcane, of course...And if rock-babe Courtney Love issues a celebrity perfume in the future, I'm sure she will get endless propositions on the same model of tuberose-gardenia given her self-proclaimed love of Fracas as well. (Whether she will capitulate though, that's another matter)

The plus points
Presenting a waxy tuberose-gardenia combo ~and a loud, unashamed one at that~ to the audience of teeny-bopper consumers who are used to sugar-laced sanitised white florals or fruity swirls with a ton of ethylmaltol & patchouli in there is commendable. Obviously not only teenagers have a right to a celebrity perfume and fans of Madge have reason to celebrate, I guess. It's not going to garner you "youthful" comments though, be prepared (Not a bad thing in itself) and if you live in a subdued environment that only tolerates "clean" non-perfumey perfumes and winces at anything else, you will have to wear this at home alone with the windows taped.

As to the perfume composition, the duality of the name Truth or Dare is cleverly built into the formula overseen by Coty. There is on the one hand the tropical, sweet, nail polish acrid, very indolic (with jasmine and jasmolactones), loud white floral tentacle with a hint of lily; lethal and femme fatale. On the other hand there is the more subdued belly of resinous ingredients, benzoin, emitting a hint of vanilla, amber and the blank canvas of synthetic musks, giving an almost monastic feel due to their subdued effect and low projection. This schizoid personality of Madonna's Truth or Dare seems totally intentional and for that reason I can't but admire the smarts (and dare I say, the guts).

Bottom Line: Madonna wouldn't be shamed to death to be caught wearing her celebrity perfume, which is more than I can say for many other celebrity scents out there. If you are a lover of Fracas, tuberose-gardenia compositions and loud, a tad vulgar-but-out-for-a-good-time perfumes, it's worth a try.

Note: The ad campaign has been deemed too racy for prime-time. Was this really unexpected? Nope...  

Related reading on Perfume Shrine: Tuberose perfumes reviews, Gardenia perfumes reviews, Celebrity Scents

Chanel extraits now available online

Oh glorious day for our American readers! The renowned Chanel extraits (No.22, Bois des Iles, Cuir de Russie and Gardenia) are now available online for buyers in the USA.


The company offers complimentary shipping ONLY for April 29th until 11:59PM EST.
And they won't be the only ones, it seems!! (may our wishes for 31 Rue Cambon and Sycomore extrait be granted)

I will be having another post coming up shortly, I have been getting late on some projects and working on those. Stay tuned for your feedback is wanted!

Chanel Gardenia vintage vs. modern Les Exclusifs Gardenia: fragrance review & history

The original Gardénia, issued by Chanel in 1925 and composed by legendary perfumer Ernest Beaux who created all the early opi/opera of Chanel, was built on a fashion premise: The deco motifs of the 1920s exalted the almost cubist arrangement of flower petals, resulting in designs which were transported into impressive jewellery. Gardénia was not conceived as, nor was it meant to be, a gardenia soliflore, although the heavy-smelling blossom was picked thanks to its optical resemblance to Mademoiselle Chanel's favourite flower: the camelia, which doesn't hold a scent. The name in reality derives from the English word "garden" (it's jardin in French): a popular reference of the times, especially if we recall the Shalimar story and the gardens of Lahore that made the imagination run wild. That was then.

But gardenia fragrances in particular re-entered the consciousness of the public with a vengeance in the next decade, the 1930s, in a different manner. This was a time of financial difficulties and a more conservative cultural milieu, when every company was launching or re-issuing their own gardenia fragrance; advertising them as a return to neo-romanticism, the gardenia boutonnières of Edwardian dandies and the gardens in the South of France which provided welcome escapism. Indeed an American advertisement for Chanel Gardénia mentions how it's meant to evoke romantic gardens at the Riviera and tags it as a youthful fragrance. [Chanel is no stranger to capitalizing on advertising to promote specific perceptions of their products, as it famously did with No.5.]
It was 1936 after all when the hit song "These Foolish Things (Remind Me of You)" by Eric Maschwitz & Jack Starchey included the infamous lyric "gardenia perfume lingering on a pillow"...alongside "an airplane ticket to romantic places". Is it any wonder that in the economically "tough" decade of the 1970s Brian Ferry & Roxy Music chose to bring this song back doing their own cover on it (1973)? Chanel would eventually bring their Gardénia back from the dead too; but almost two decades later. And as recently as the end of the 2000s yet again, this time in their boutique line Les Exclusifs where's it's still available.

Olfactorily, the two versions cannot be any more different, providing a valuable history lesson for any inquisitive perfume lover:

The vintage Chanel Gardénia was composed on a narcissus base with a green accent of styrallyl acetate; a freshly green note, naturally present in budding gardenias and a very popular inclusion in many classic floral chypres: It provides the gardenia greeness in the heart which compliments the mossiness of the background, from Miss Dior to Ma Griffe. The trick of composing a "gardenia chord" instead of using an extract from nature was necessitated by technical complications: No essence could be rendered (till very, very recently in fact and then only in some extremely limited distribution niche fragrances). The gardenia in the hands of Chanel is oscillating between green and creamy, as it's allied to other white florals with a powdery veil.
The top note of the vintage Gardénia however is surprising in that it's built on a violet accent, composed through octin and heptin methyl carbonate. The progression from the sweeter violet to the feminine floral harmony in the heart, featuring natural jasmine, makes for a rounder experience with woodier base notes recalling those in Chanel's own Bois des Îles or even Coty's Imprevu, with a spicy whiff of vetiver lingering.
The vintage came in extrait de parfum (a very round and feminine smell) and later Eau de Toilette in the standard square bottles with the round black screw-on cap. Opening one, made me realise how different the perceptions of a floral were in those eras back contrasted with today: Although I can feel the delicate rendering of petals, there is no immediate "department-store atmosphere" of a hundred florals sprayed simultaneously into the air. Drop by drop, it's silky and polished, like a strand of patina rose pearls in slightly differing diameter.

The original version of Gardenia circulated well into the 1950s, but it disappeared at some point when other Chanel fragrances such as No.19 and Cristalle entered the scene. Sometimes the labels did not have the French accent aigu for the American market.
An effort was made to bring it back alongside the more faithfully rendered classics Cuir de Russie and Bois des Iles in the Chanel "Rue Cambon" exclusive boutique circuit at the cusp of the 1990s: Regrettably, it was the least resistant link in the chain, accounting for a rather destitute white floral. The bottle in extrait was rectangular with a white label like standard Chanel extraits (depicted) and the colour of the juice a light yellow. There was also a limited edition Eau de Toilette in a rectangular bottle edged in gold, with white label and white cap in the 1990s (shown on the right).




The modern version of Gardénia as part of Chanel Les Exclusifs more upscale line, reworked by Jacques Polge, conforms to the latest regulations and changing tastes. Thus it is comparatively much thinner, stretched to its limit, based on a standard white floral chord with fresh & green jasmine/hedione, "clean" orange blossom cologne-ish notes and just a smidgen of tuberose (and absolutely no gardenia whatsoever). A delicate vanilla base is the only other detectable note, very light and soft without much sweetness. The fragrance's popularity and reception is no doubt accounted by its transparent and easy demeanor which lends itself easily to any wearer. There is a young, ice-princess vibe about it, rather classy in its sex-denying way.

It leaves something to be desired in fulfilling a powerful romantic imagery and rather much in providing an avant-garde entry in the field of white florals (which it could have tried if it wanted to); but its wearability provides options for casual & office wearing, which is more than can be said for some of the more sumptuous and demanding vintages. Among Les Exclusifs, in Eau de Toilette concentration with an even paler colour of juice than before, Gardénia is also one of the most fleeting, making for a brief experience that needs to be constantly renewed.

Notes for Chanel Gardénia: jasmine, gardenia, orange blossom, tuberose, clove, sage, pimento, musk, patchouli, sandalwood and vetiver.


Ella Fitzerald sings These Foolish Things


And Brian Ferry reprises it in his own innimitable style in a rare 1974 video.

pic of vintage parfum via musclecars.net. Ebay & stock bottle photos. Pearl necklace & gardenia extrait bottle via the Romantic Query Letter.

Miss Dior Cherie L'Eau by Christian Dior: fragrance review

It's not often that I am caught completely off-guard and totally surprised by something. Usually my instincts and my (hard-paid for) experience guide me through most eventualities with assured steps. Yet the latest Miss Dior Chérie L'Eau managed to make me do a 180 degree turn! Not because it is a masterpiece. Far from it. But because I was fully prepared to absolutely hate it, just because I have been alienated by the sugary, patchouli, fruity spin of Miss Dior Chérie, a scent that is completely different than the classic chypre Miss Dior from 1947 (Dior's first scent) of which you can read a review here. The shared name makes one think hard on how much travesty one can stomach.

Furthermore, the developments at Christian Dior for some years now have been quite unsettling as the whole image has been cheapened and ultimately vulgarised. Not to mention that the very latest observations I made regarding reformulations afoot to all their classics, from Diorissimo and Diorella onwards ~signaled by cunningly new-old looking packaging only~ has left a bitter taste in my mouth... So a testing at Sephora just because it was the latest thing provided a rather pleasant jolt out of the doldrums of contemplating on "what Dior had been"...
According to its creator François Demachy, "Miss Dior Chérie L'Eau is not a complicated fragrance". Imagine a freshly scrubbed young lass, put a headband on her bouffant long hair, a mock pout with no depths of murky sexuality à la Catholic girls and you're basically got your sanitized BB.9
(ie. Bardot version 2009) ~a product of bourgeois paternalism and market satiation! Yet, didn't Bardot herself began her career posing for bourgeois magazines and studying ballent under Boris Knyazev?

Demachy has been instrumental in the creation of Aqua di Parma Colonia Assoluta, the re-issue of Pucci Vivara, Fendi Palazzo and a pleiad of scents for parfums Christian Dior (he almost seems like in-house perfumer at this rate, which I m not sure how to interpret!): the newest Dior Escale à Pontichery which we recently reviewed, as well as last summer's Escale à Portofino, Farenheit 32, the masculine Eau Sauvage Fraicheur Cuir and Dior Homme Sport, the Dior numbered Passages special collection of scents Collection Particuliere, Midnight Poison, Dior J'adore L'absolu...

Vogue.co.uk describes Miss Dior Chérie L'Eau as "a sparkling and distinctive floral scent blended with notes of tangy yet spicy bitter orange, Gardenia and white musks that aims to sum up the certain 'je ne sais quoi' of the ultimate French girl. Pretty in every detail - down to the bottle's iconic bow - this lighter, François Demachy-designed adaptation of the original perfectly fits a long-standing perfume brief from Christian Dior himself, "Faites-moi un parfum qui sente l'amour" (make me a fragrance which smells of love)."

I don't think Miss Dior Cherie L'Eau quite captures all that (especially the amour part), but it's not typical of the myriads of fruity florals on the market: First of all, the scent is decidedly floral for a change, but with a certain modern translucence and a lightl dewy feeling that makes for a refreshing take on green florals. The direction is "muguet"/lily of the valley "clean" (the lucky charm of Christian Dior himself) but done via a green, budding gardenia accord; which might be replicated by jasmolactones, if the eerie feeling of familiarity with Pur Desir de Gardenia by Yves Rocher is anything to go by, although the Rocher one is much more gardenia-oriented than this one. A small facet of the pleasantly bitter citrusy touches of Escale à Portofino and Mugler Cologne is also hiding in there with a very soft powdery drydown, fluffy like an air-spun macaroon with green filling and a little laundry-day feel. The girl wearing the John Galliano dress in the shade of candies, model Maryna Linchuk shot by Tim Walker, is perky, and innocently upbeat in a 60s kind-of-way (hold the orgasmic cries of the original Bardot song that accompanies the commercials shot by Sofia Coppola,; this one is a pouting Bardot seen through unknowing ten-year-old eyes!). The blotter beckons me from the depths of my old, ivory LV Monogram Vernis handbag: should I give it one more chance?

Notes for Miss Dior Chérie L'Eau:
bitter orange, gardenia accord, white musks

Miss Dior Chérie L'Eau has just launched widely, in amounts of 50 and 100 ml (1.7 and 3.4 oz) for 59€ and 85€ respectively.
If you have a few moments to kill, the Dior website for the fragrance is fun!

The rather confusing Miss Dior Chérie line comprises so far:
Miss Dior Chérie Eau de Parfum 2005,
Miss Dior Chérie Eau de Toilette 2007,
Miss Dior Chérie Eau de Printemps 2008(limited edition),
Miss Dior Chérie Blooming Bouquet2008(exclusive aimed at the Asian market),
Miss Dior Cherie L'Eau 2009.

Last but not least: For those of you who might as well get a dose of the old standby classic gardenia chypre of Miss Dior, there are some bottles over at Fragrancenet.com as well as the standard Miss Dior Chérie. Using code SHRINE saves you a further 10%!(offer good throughout May).


Related reading on Perfumeshrine: the Dior series

Pics via punmiris.com and imachildofthemoon.blogspot.com

Un Matin d'Orage by Annick Goutal: fragrance review

In Giambattista Basile's charming tale The Murtle from Il Cunto de li Cunti (The Tale of Tales, 1694), a sprig of myrtle is transformed through the liberating love of a prince into a beautiful woman who regenerates even after evil forces tear her to pieces. Almost tasting the thick retro-baroque prose of the author I am contemplating how the essence of the tale is caught in a fragrance which defies the stylistic approach, choosing to place magic and beauty into a zen setting. Un Matin d'Orage, the latest fragrance by Annick Goutal, means "Stormy Morning" and was inspired by a Japanese garden after the rain, evoking the idea of delicate white petals in dew, with discernible notes of gardenia, jasmine sambac and Indonesian champaca.

Isabelle Doyen, resident perfumer for parfums Annick Goutal, is ingeniously re-interpreting both gardenias and ozonic floral fragrances through an approach akin to painting a watercolour in vivid hues which make you momentarily doubt the duo-dimensional reality of thick drawing paper; an oxymoron that is breaking somewhat with both the well-worn-slipper feel we have come to expect of prettified, neoclasical scents of the Goutal portfolio (for the flowing haired Ophelias and the accompanying Mr.Darcys with bohemian fashion sense) and the en masse manner in which white florals are treated from the perfume industry as creamy textured pattiserie notes folded into huge tropical leis. Like I had said when first reporting the news of the upcoming Goutal fragrance: "This conceptually reminds me of both Après l'Ondée by Guerlain (the after-the-shower garden part) and Un Jardin Après la Mousson by Hermès, (the Monsoon storm evocation ) although from the listed notes one would deduce that the limpid bog water and transparent gloom might not be there. Although Annick Goutal already has a fragrance tagged Gardenia Passion in their line, the scent actually emits the ruberry feel of a proper tuberose rather than gardenia, so it's not like they're re-hashing ideas." Indeed the watery aspect is here but with a softer, less stagnant fruity or spicy nuance than the Hermès offering. Nevertheless if Fleur de Liane for L'Artisan Parfumeur, Vanille Galante and Un Jardin Après la Mousson for Hermès and now Un Matin d'Orage are any indication, the Lazarus-resurgence of the aquatic floral is looking like a strong contestant for your attention in the following couple of years at least.

Gardenia is a fascinating blossom, no less so because of its extensive scope of transformative stages: from the slightly bitter budding greeness, the mushroom-like overtones of musty wetness (which nota bene it was Colette who first described as such), into the lush, still fresh flower that has just opened; and from then inevitably seguing into creamy, narcotically sweet and velvety ripeness, into the dying stage of indolic decay when the petals brown and wither...Such a parallel with human growth and decline could not have escaped the attention of perfumers who have been trying to replicate the effects with styrallyl acetate (naturally found in gardenia buds), jasmolactones and at scarce cases with monumentaly expensive gardenia absolutes rendered through experimental enfleurage. Some gardenia perfumes try to be figurative, creating a very realistic olfactory image of gardenia bushes like the ones composed for Yves Rocher (Pur désir de Gardenia), the wondrous hologram of Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia by Lauder or cult-scent Kai. Some don't even try, despite the name, like the suavely musky Cruel Gardénia, traitors to holy causes with variable results. Others go for baroque exagerration which like an angled composition by Caravaggio creates tension through dramatic chiaroscuro and the accentuation of one facet over others, pushed to extremes; example: Tom Ford's Velvet Gardenia. And others still go for an impressionistic approach in which the gardenia becomes an accent piece in a moment suspended ad infinitum, when a coalescence of particular elements creates a dreamy memory ~like gardenias floating on a bowl of water in some postmodern urban appartment in Marc Jacobs eponymous Eau de Parfum, a willowy girl with lank, dark hair picking one up to put behind her ear.

In Un Matin d'Orage that flowing gardenia on the water is prickling and alive, discernible as such, and coming out of the bowl, breathing deeply the steely blue air, under a drizzling mist that showers it with flinty sparks of an impending electrical storm. The tension is provided by a jolting effect of dew-drenched leafy accents reminiscent of green tea and still whitish peach-skin with a slight smokiness and lemony-anisic accents (magnolia, ginger, shiso*) that provide an intriguing contrapunto to the floral smoothness of gardenia, green jasmine vines and champaca. The ozonic cool part feels like a new technique has been short-cirquited into creating what was 15 years ago created through Calone but without Calone*. The flowers are separating into soft billowing layers that overlap, creating a smooth impression of dewy beauty. The jasmine is green and cool between hedione and orange blossom, like the one rendered in Pure Poison. There is no meekness in the gentility, no paleness in the ether of Un Matin d'Orage and the impression subsists for a long time, as if we're left to see a zen garden tingling after the storm. Not for tropical gardenia lovers, but to be explored by modern anchorites.

Notes of Un Matin d'Orage by Annick Goutal:
Sicilian lemon, perilla leaves**, ginger, gardenia, magnolia, jasmine sambac, Indonesian champaca, sandalwood.

The characteristic feminine bottle of the Goutal perfumes gets a pearly white opalesence for Un Matin d'Orage and is issued in both 50ml/1.7oz and 100ml/3.4oz sizes of Eau de Toilette. More widely available in the coming months.

Related reading on Perfumeshrine: Gardenia scents, Jasmine Series, Champaca scents.


*Calone is an aromachemical used in the 1990s to render an ozonic marine note, smelling halfway between a watermelon and a cantaloupe.
**The Perilla note (often referred to as shiso in Japanese cuisine) is interesting in that perilla seeds form an essential part of the seven spices of Japan (originating more than 300 years ago in Kyoto)while green perilla leaves are used for sushi or sashimi. The essential oil steam distilled from the leaves of the perilla plant, consists of a variety of chemical compounds, varying depending on species. The most abundant however (comprising about 50–60% of the oil) is perillaldehyde ~most responsible for the aroma and taste of perilla. (please read about aldehydes here). For reference a fragrance focusing on perilla/shiso is Shiso by Comme des Garcons.

Pic of Un Matin d'Orage bottle copyright ⓒ by Helg/Perfumeshrine
Pic of Japanese Garden by J.Jennings via mobot.org

Making Love in a Gardenia Garden

The burlesque phrase of the title, comical in its exaggeration and Fabio-jacketed-romance tendencies, sounds like the antithetical mood of Perfume Shrine's usual outlook on life.
But I am not making this up. It' a quote, funnily enough. In fact it comes from the musical Gigi starring arch-gamine French actress Leslie Caron, along with Maurice Chevalier and Louis Jourdan and based on Colette's book by the same name. It was however the inspiration for indie perfumer Ayala Moriel to create an unusual, sui generis gardenia soliflore that bypasses the drama to be pliable to your own specifications which prompted me to reference it today for your reading and smelling pleasure.

Too often gardenia fragrances remind me of an infamous literary heroine from Greek satirist Demitrios Psathas: Madame Sousou. The story is set in the 1950s, in a low-class suburb of Athens. The eponymous heroine is a small, petty bourgeois married to a hard-working fishmonger in love with her; she wants to emulate the aristocracy, peppers her talk with French, torments her naive maid and makes the most terrific blunders both in her speech as well as in her general deportment, but with the utmost confidence and high-falluting airs! After inheriting a large sum of money she tries to change her life and leaves her husband, but devious people manage to gnaw her fortune and she has to go back to her forgiving and loving husband and what she deems the vulgarity of a low-class life.
So infamous is the character that in a strike of onomatopoeia genius someone coined the phrase "sousoudismos" in Greek to describe the way of trying to emulate something unattainable to ridiculous effect. And it has since stuck.
{It is no accident that a famous Melbourne restaurant/bistro (assuredly founded by some Greek immigrant) is using the name with fabulous results}.



Yes, gardenia fragrances often take themselves too seriously, too keenly, trying too hard. Gigi is nothing like that I am happy to report.

The strange green and slightly bittersweet vibe of entering the scope of a gardenia garden greets me with a trail of mandarin and what seems like the musty bitterness of vetiver up front. Kewda Attar which is more commonly known as "pandanus", that East Indian flower whose essence is marinated in sandalwood oil to render the attar, with its remarkable sour, yet soon segueing into floral notes contributes to the peculiar aroma of the top. If one does not know it's there one would be inclined to believe as I did that some citrusy peel oil mixed with hyacinth and vetiver emits that strange, hypnotic aroma that beckons you closer.
White florals unmistakeably raise their head from the mix smoothed down with a great powder puff of cornstarch, musk, and bittersweet resins.

The overall effect is not as photographically realistic as Lauder's Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia, nor as titillatingly musky and unrelated to gardenia as Cruel Gardénia by Guerlain, but somewhere in a happy medium. You put the personality in it, more than it wearing you on its sleeve as regalia of conquest, and perhaps that is a new direction which was lacking in this genre.

Arguably the only fault is the staying power: it is admittedly rather short. Perhaps it is accountable by the sheer character of the base, which was intended not to overshadow the delicate heart of flowers. But since it is a scent to be enjoyed in warmer days, one can always reapply.

Ayala used the following natural essences to render an interpretation of gardenia without the synthetics usually used.
Notes:
Top: Yellow Mandarin, Coriander essential oil and Cardamom CO2, Kewda Attar, Rosewood
Heart: Jasmine Sambac, Jonquille, Tuberose.
Base: Myrrh, Sandalwood, Ambrette CO2, Vetiver from Sri-Lanka and Vanilla CO2 and Absolute.

GiGi is available for a limited time only while the Indian sandalwood essential oil stock of Ayala lasts, in the 1/4oz parfum extrait flacons, or parfum oil roll-on bottles, and the 1ml sample vials so you can try before you buy.
Available at Ayala Moriel perfumes and at Etsy shop.


And for our readers: an assortment of samples giveaway for anyone who is lucky enough to win the draw (my drawers were again filling up and action must be taken!). Please leave a note in the comments if you want to enter.

Pic from the film "Gigi" comes from Ebay. Clip from Madame Sousou series on Greek TV uploaded by dimdindan