There is a serenity but also a dark horror surrounding incense. The zen and the apocryphal. Which is which, each time? While Kilian's I...

Although we tend to overlook Boss fragrances, if only because of their ubiquitousness and confusing names, apparently, they still possess th...

  My friend Chandler Burr unfolded the story of how the charming and cerebral Jean Claude Ellena was inspired for this fragrance in a New Yo...

Frankincense is met at the church as the censer spreads the fragrant smoke in the congregation. Myrrh is met at asketaria; monastic places o...

The divide between darkness and light, between sanctity and profanity, between spirituality and carnality, and the overtones of a Catholic u...

Certain perfumes give an illusory first impression like people who come into a party seemingly underdressed only to impress you with their s...

If like me you have been searching for a Catherine Earnshaw kind of fragrance all your life, then the options haven't always been that p...

Much like the mysterious (and incestuous) half-sister in Leos Carax's   radical adaptation of   Melville' s Pierre: or, the Ambigu...

One of my preferred short stories in the canon by American author Edgar Allan Poe is William Wilson . Less popular than many of his more ...

She walks on through the night Her circumstances slight Are only helping her to fail And though she feels she's right She tries with...

Incense has long been not only one of the badges of niche perfumery, but also one of my own personal hot buttons, so it sounds both logical ...

The fragrance lurking inside the intensely yellow container of Alien Essence Absolue , that weird-looking bottle that looks like a pear muta...

Monastic, cool, ethereal? In many ways L'Eau Froide is anti-Lutens, whereas Passage d'Enfer is L'Artisan Parfumeur down to the...

Guerlain does Middle East. At last! After several companies catered to the affluent and genuinely discerning Middle-East market, an audience...

The Armani Privé collection falls under the scope of "niche fragrances within mainstream houses" trend; exclusive, upscale composi...

The releases by pop-art fragrance phenomenon État Libre d'Orange ever since Like This (fronted by Tilda Swinton) have been lacking, bel...

I distinctly recall watching Cio-Cio San ritualistically commit suicide with her father's knife at the end scene of Madama Butterfly an...

Perfumer Annick Ménardo does a Marc Buxton on us with Le Labo Gaiac 10 ; a sensual, diaphanous and creamy season-less woody fragrance with j...

It was just the other day when we were discussing the merits of a vanilla laced with other ingredients to cut down on the sweetness, the st...