Histoires de Parfums' 1740 Marquis de Sade: Dulling the Whip

As excited as I was to smell one of the latest Histoires fragrances, Editions Rare Petroleum, recent sniffs from the rest of the line's testers were a serious disappointment. I like most of the fragrances, but I liked none more than 1740. Discovering that many of them seemed to have been ever so slightly tweaked was shock enough, given such a relatively young brand. Changes in 1740 have left it, for me, a ghost of its former self, and I feel that absence the most acutely and personally.

As with most subtle tweaking, the smallest alteration can wrought a most profound transformation, and while 1740 is there in basic structure it feels gutted somehow. I doubt anyone associated with the line will confirm this, no more than anyone at Lauder would fess up to the renovation of Private Collection, but I detected the difference instantly and was heartsick about it.

I have an older bottle, and sprayed some on this morning. I went out for a walk through the state forest, up hills, down around creeks, past a massive hornet's nest dangling by a thin vine from a tree branch. I perspired from the heat and exertion but the scent stayed with me, and even now I can smell it wafting up from my skin, creating some future narrative of memory around the experience of the woods. I don't know of any other scent that endures with the potency of 1740.

For me, aside from Tauer's Lonestar Memories and Vero Kern's Onda, no other fragrance I own has built up a wider series of stories over time, intertwining with my own day to day life. As with Lonestar Memories, which conjures back trips to LA and Massachusetts and the momentous things I went through while at those places, 1740 reads like a roadmap of my recent past, detailing all the emotional peaks and valleys. The latest version of the fragrance barely made it out of the store and down the street on my skin with anything resembling its previous tenacity. It's hard to imagine it surviving past the first serious incline in the forest.

The notes list davana sensualis, patchouli, coriander, cardamom, cedar, elemi, labdanum, and leather. What I've always smelled is something sitting between the honeyed savory of immortelle, tobacco, and tawny port, a fantastically sensual arrangement of notes which on their own would be too much to stomach but in this particular combination take me right to the point of excess and hover there. This latest version airs everything out to something approaching sheer. The basic qualities are still present but they feel shrill and excessive without the heart of the fragrance there to cohere them. Once rather rich, the perfume now feels merely loud, and only for a short time.

1740 is - was - one of my favorite fragrances. It's a day long event and I've reserved it for times I know I'll be able to stick with it and remain in a reflective frame of mind. I'll be hoarding it even more selectively now, and it frustrates me that I'll never be sure which version people are talking about.

Burlesque Without the Kicks: Moulin Rouge

I didn't know what to expect from Moulin Rouge, as I'd heard contradictory reports, none of which seemed very promising, given my expectations. Histoires de Parfums is one of those lines you wouldn't expect to be the underdog it is. The quality is good, the presentation is first class, and the price point, though on the high side, suggests a sense of exclusivity the fragrances tend to justify. And yet for a new release, Moulin Rouge has received relatively little comment; nor did the recent Tubereuse trio, all of which I love (though there is a very good piece on them over at Grain de Musc). The line itself is available in only a few places, neither of which is Luckyscent or Aedes de Venustas. All of the fragrances were reviewed better than favorably in Perfume: The Guide, so maybe backlash is part of the problem. I was shocked to see the line dismissed en masse on one of my favorite blogs recently; and even more shocked that some of the fragrances were regarded with the kind of disdain usually reserved for celebrity scents du jour.

I'll start by saying that, as a whole, Moulin Rouge isn't my thing. I think it's lovely, if not lush or plump enough to qualify as gorgeous. I wouldn't say it's delicate; nor is it effervescent. But it's a skin scent by my definition of the term. It doesn't project much, if at all. I mention these things right up front to make it clear that the deck is stacked against such a fragrance for this reviewer, and in fact when, before receiving it, I read a review which characterized Moulin Rouge as sheer, an alarm went off in my head. However, if I were presented with three other popular skin scents and Moulin Rouge, chances are I would choose the latter.

Often with Histoires, I don't really see much of a connection between the stated inspiration and the resulting perfume. 1740 is one of my all time favorite fragrances. It speaks to me like a hypnotist. Other than the sadistic power it holds over me, I'm not sure I'd call it an apt tribute to de Sade. Colette seems even more of a stretch. Mata Hari comes a little closer. Moulin Rouge is a near perfect evocation of its namesake in ways both literal and associative. Its real failure for me is that it paints what should be a colorful portrait in watercolors rather than oil.

You get a rush of that wonderful cosmetic smell up front and for the first ten minutes or so; a smell not so far removed from Lipstick Rose. Unlike Lipstick Rose, this quality in Moulin Rouge resonates more three dimensionally, creating a deeper, more detailed drama in the mind. The fragrance requires a degree of transparency to achieve this, so that you might see through it, though in the bargain it sacrifices the vivacity and even good natured garishness you'd expect from something inspired by one of the world's most infamous burlesque venues. In Moulin Rouge, the cosmetics mingle with the cool, medicinal tones of iris. Somehow, iris is made to perform a sleight of hand I've never known it to execute. Before I read "feathers" in the company's PR description, I pictured them, sensing that weird smell ostrich feathers can have, half animal, half glamor. The iris also adds just enough powder to evoke blush and eye shadow stirring in the air.

There's the slightest touch of vanilla. And the cosmetics wear down to reveal a barely perceptible fruit medley I've gotten from other Histoires scents. I appreciate the artistry and the subtlety behind Moulin Rouge. What I miss is a sense of the raucous activity and even some of the sweat and cigar smoke which would inevitably have been a big part of the place's experience. I wanted something more voluptuous and unpredictable. What I got suggests a picture postcard for tourists. Unfortunately, it's the kind you'd bring back to your mother.

More on Histoires de Parfums: Tubereuse L'Animale

Abigail and I often think along the same lines. We split L'Animale over a month ago, and though I loved it instantly, and we've talked about it some since, I kept forgetting to write about it. This week I started thinking about it again. I wore it two days ago. All morning, I reminded myself to sign on so that I might put it into words. It's hard to put into words, as Abigail (aka Birthday Girl today) said. It's beyond words in certain ways for me. I read a review of L'Animale and the other two in the trio of HDP's tuberose-themed fragrances on Grain de Musc where Denyse seemed able to put all three into words (is there anything this fantastic writer can't put into words), and Abigail's done a decent job too, so what's my problem?

I think part of what stymies me lately when it comes to writing about perfume is that in a lot of ways I don't always feel so wordy about fragrance. It's not something which prompts me to immediately start looking for a vocabulary in my head. I value that part of smell which falls beyond words and the intellect, and I like to spend some time gestating with the fragrance. More often than not, after this gestation period I'm further beyond words, and the scent has entered some psychic space of mood and memory. What leads me to blog is wanting to communicate about fragrance in general. I like talking about it. I like hearing what other people have to say. I like our giveaways because people come out of the woodwork and this can feel like something close to a conversation. But I don't often like narrowing any fragrance down. And the posts I do best are free-associational.

Along those lines, I considered discussing some of my favorite green scents. By green I mean the color of the juice, not the category. Some fragrances make perfect sense in green: like Yendi, which is a cut grass aldehyde. Others should be green and aren't, like Givenchy III or Jean-Louis Scherrer. Stick with me here. Others make sense in an unusual way. Think of Eau Noire by Dior, which isn't "green" in theory but feels so right, so apt, when you smell it and look at it simultaneously. The color registers emotionally. Are so many scents amber and clear because we expect them to be, and imagine something must have gone wrong if they aren't? I suspect green feels so right to me in the context of Eau Noire partly because a green fragrance is unusual to a point approaching decadent--and Eau Noire has some pretty decadent pleasures: rich, almost savory but sweet too, like sex on skin.

L'Animale has immortelle in it, as does Eau Noire. The color of the fragrance is greener still. It seems even weirder in the case of L'Animale because the Histoires perfumes, though there aren't a ton of them, are all pretty predictably hued. When my bottle of L'Animale arrived it was thrilling to see that shade of emerald, not brilliant but swampy green, through the bottle. It was almost like a warning. The most shocking thing was how little like tuberose the thing smells. Tuberose you say? Oh really? It totally caught me off guard, which is a fantastic way to experience a perfume.

Unlike Abigail (and a lot of other bloggers, judging by the sometime hostility toward the line), I've been very impressed and smitten with Histoires de Parfums overall. Some could have better longevity, but this is a constant issue for me. My favorites are Noir Patchouli (hold up, also green!) and 1740 de Sade. De Sade is a good comparison, one I made the moment I smelled L'Animale. In fact, L'Animale seems like a more androgynous version of 1740. Both focus on immortelle. 1740 is intense, the same way Angel Liqueur and Malle's Une Rose are, with the near-syrupy density of a tawny port someone's been storing in a dark cask for decades.

Denyse from Grainde Musc smells the tuberose eventually. I never do. I might not be looking too hard. I don't ever smell the tuberose in Vierges et Toreros by Etat Libre D'Orange, either. I smell wet dog and rubber (don't assume I don't love this smell). L'Animale feels like a sweaty scent. Something your body would make of a more delicate perfume after a night out dancing in a tropical climate. It seems old--not vintage necessarily, not the way people mean "vintage fragrance". More like something stored in a crypt, some special elixir with dangerous properties meant for the right hands.

Another thing I thought of when I saw and smelled L'Animale was a trip I took to Barcelona once. You couldn't get Absinthe anywhere else but, I think, I don't know, like, Prague or something? Someone will correct me if I'm wrong. You can get Absinthe all over now, but it doesn't have wormwood, which is what I was told made it outlawed. Only a few places in the maze of old town Barcelona served Absinthe at the time. We spent an entire evening looking for it, searching with the kind of manic zeal I usually reserve for the perfume counter. When we found it, and drank it, and were in some head space I hadn't entered before and haven't since, and couldn't really put into words (here we go again), I looked at the green residue in my glass and thought how perfect the color was for the sensation of the liquor. L'Animale has the same kind of vaguely clandestine mystery about it, and I can picture someone pouring it into the bottle over a cube of sugared immortelle laced with who knows what.

1876 (aka Mata Hari): Histoires de Parfums

Some time in the last year, the Histoires de Parfums line, one of my favorites, reformulated several of their fragrances, which makes discussing them more than a little challenging now. Adding to the frustration, older and newer versions are often equally interesting, sometimes equally good, but for the most part entirely different perfumes. Reading about them online, one should always try to keep in mind the transition point and whether the fragrance at hand made the cut unchanged.

For my money, I'd start with Noir Patchouli (unchanged) and 1740 (also unchanged). Inspired by the Marquis de Sade, 1740 is unbelievably good. Though it seems slightly familiar at first sniff (as if it had been around for centuries), there's nothing remotely like it, not just in terms of smell but longevity, quality, and projection. At one time I believed Sonoma Scent Studio's Tabac Aurea to be very similar. They do have common motifs, but 1740 is darker and denser, and ultimately an entirely different beast. 1740 is a slightly woody tobacco and supple leather fragrance, one of the richest scents I own, and the best (i.e. most judicious) use of immortelle I've come across in a so-called masculine. Noir Patchouli is essentially a milked rose patchouli. No one ever mentions the rose--even the notes indicate only "floral bouquet"--but for me it's a fascinating update of fragrances like Aramis 900 and Aromatics Elixir, presided over by the feel of a unisex rose chypre.

1876 (Mata Hari) does list rose in its pyramid, but I smell less of it there than in Noir Patchouli. Regardless, I'd had my eye on 1876 for a long time. I'd received a sample pack from Histoires when I purchased 1740. All of the scents were nice--1969 being another standout--but 1876 attracted me most. The bottles are about 200 bucks: no more than the Chanel Exclusifs, but, at two ounces less, a lot more expensive than almost everything else. When an online merchant liquidated its old Histoires formulations, selling them dirt cheap, I bought a few, 1876 among them. The original version is a lot more openly fruity floral, with a weird off note I like very much, but it has nothing on the reformulation, which has some of the caustic, singed allure of Ava Luxe's now apparently discontinued Midnight Violet.

The notes of the newer 1876 vary depending where you look. I've seen: bergamot, orange, litchi, rose, iris, violet, caraway, cinnamon, carnation, vetiver, guaic wood, and sandalwood. But the notes listed on the bottle, surely the most reliable source, include cumin and white musks, and say nothing of violet. 1876 is a well blended fragrance, and picking out these individual elements isn't easy, but I do discern the carnation, the cinnamon, and a subtle interplay of orange and rose. Perhaps because of the carnation, 1876 reminds me of orientals like Opium and Cinnabar. Despite the orange and bergamot, it lacks the dense, dewy fruitiness of those classics.

It doesn't lack their forcefulness, and it won't be something anyone who dislikes that kind of bombast will find very appealing, I suspect. The charm of 1969's friendly succulence will not be lost on such a person, making that his go-to Histoires fragrance. Though I prefer 1876 and typically can't get enough bombast, I sometimes wish 1876 had the lasting power of 1740 and Noir Patchouli. For something named after showy, boastful Mata Hari, it starts whispering too soon, and I get impatient with it, wishing it would back up its initial come on. 1876 sticks around but becomes pretty mellow a little earlier than I'd like. You come over for a party and the only other person partying has brought out the bong and enjoyed it a lot more than makes for good company, zoning out there next to you.

I'm guessing that some of the fragrance's medicinal buzz is from the iris, but I could be wrong. This vaguely camphoric element places 1876 in a different arena than the orientals mentioned above, giving it heat, an ongoing frisson they lack. It's probably inevitable that this will start to resemble the candied sweetness of red hots on most people, given the cinnamon, but that isn't an entirely unwelcome development, contributing, along with the orange, just the faintest touch of the gourmand.

For those who don't know, Mata Hari was an exotic dancer of Dutch descent who pretended to be far more exotic, trading on a vogue for all things oriental by cultivating a fictitious past steeped in Asian culture and training. A contemporary of Isadora Duncan, she was known for her sequined costumes and a trademark routine which involved what seemed to amount to glorified striptease. Typically, her performances ended in rather ornate brassieres and jewel-dripping headdresses. She was a courtesan, mixing company with various military brass during the first world war. One of these men seems to have made her a spy in service of the Germans, though there's some debate about the veracity of that reputation. Some suspect she wasn't a spy at all; but a scapegoat. In any case, her sexual encounters made her privy to top secret information. Her name is synonymous with sexual intrigue and the term femme fatale. She was tried and executed by firing squad at the age of 41.

Floral but spicy, bold but soft, the sexy orient impostor 1876 manages to conjure associations which are perfectly in keeping with her mythos. Like Mata Hari herself (see above picture) it's a masculine disguised as a feminine.

Sonoma Scent Studio Tabac Aurea

A while back, Abigail raved about this little wonder, and I made a mental note to check it out. I don't know what's going on with Sonoma's website--the till is down, so you can look, essentially, but you can't touch--and some of you are going to be frustrated after reading this review, because I have high praise for the fragrance, but look at the bright side: you can't possibly know how truly wonderful Tabac Aurea is, and what you're missing, until you get your hands on it, and even then the exact nature of its powerful appeal will elude you.

For Abigail, Tabac recalls vintage fragrances--their complexity, attention to detail through depth and drama, the rich, dovetailing stories they tell. Her presiding image for the fragrance was Bette Davis. Funny how things work, because I'm picturing Robert Mitchum, whose sharp-angled cheekbones are trying to make something feminine out of what is clearly butch-saturated stock. Clearly, Tabac Aurea is unisex, gender-friendly, but in a sea of bland, interchangeable, unimaginative masculines, I'm apt to claim it as one for the boys. Then too, Tabac recalls some of my favorites: Histoires de Parfums 1740, Parfum d'Empire Fougere Bengale, Annick Goutal Sables. In all of these, immortelle plays a big role, and though there's no indication that Tabac Aurea even contains immortelle, the argument could be made that I simply love the kind of fragrance Tabac resembles.

That isn't giving what I'd include in my list of the top ten masculines of the last decade much credit, now is it? And yes, Tabac is that good. It's certainly the best tobacco fragrance I've ever smelled, but it's more than that, possessing the kind of magic words fail. Looking at the facts alone--persistence, projection, quality of materials--it blows Sables off the table. Sables is gorgeous, if you have something on hand to apply thirty minutes later, to console you once it has vanished. Tabac Aurea lasts all day on my skin, has the kind of diffusion that makes my presence beg questions from those I come into contact with (what...is that? Are you...is that...cologne? Where did you get that? What is that called? Will you have sex with me? Would you mind doing it right here? Let's get married--just for the next ten minutes? Actually, can I just have that smell, so we can have sex alone?) and it is abundantly clear, from the moment you first smell it, that Tabac's creator refined and refined again in her effort to achieve such a careful, unlikely balance.

While it falls within the olfactory range of 1740 and Fougere Bengale, Tabac distinguishes itself enough that it's worth having all three--if, like me, you're that obsessively inclined, and worried about redundancy. Tabac speaks to those fragrances the way one smoky-voiced singer speaks to another, through tone and texture, but the music and personality are unique. The vetiver in Tabac imbues it with qualities neither 1740 nor Bengale possess, moving it farther away from the insular combustion immortelle gives the former, the sense that 1740 has a lot on its mind, is troubled and needs some time to think about it. 1740 harbors things, relishing its drama. To 1740, Tabac says, Hey, lighten up; it might never happen.

Which isn't to say Tabac is happy-go-lucky; just that it doesn't brood. Like Fougere Bengale, which uses lavender in a similar way, as if to clear its head, Tabac loosens up with vetiver. Unlike Bengale, which comes on like the most intoxicating (or, okay, I'll give some of you this: nauseating) spice cabinet this side of reality, Tabac has a persistent but subtle tangy aspect, a barely there fruit accord which operates similarly to the cassis bud in Iris Bleu Gris, subverting what might otherwise be an austere, stand-offish disposition. Tabac is foody, but more savory than sweet. It has woodsy undertones to it. Clove, tonka, labdanum, leather. Need I say more? If you're into this sort of thing, I'm guessing not.

I've resorted to comparison in an effort to convey an inexplciable mystery. Shame on me. Stupid, I know--but to do otherwise I would need a vocabulary which hasn't been invented yet. I love this stuff.

On Coffee and Booze: A*Men, Pure Malt (Cafe Noir, Michael for Men, and 1740)

I've never been much of a whiskey fan. Actually, I can't stand the stuff. I'm just not the patched elbow sort, nor do my fantasies revolve around leather armchairs, dark paneled libraries, chauffeured limos, smoking jackets, or prince nez, so I was a little disappointed when I heard that the latest seasonal flanker to Thierry Mugler's A*Men would venture into this infinitely stuffy territory, especially after the letdown, this time last year, of Pure Coffee.

Pure Malt, according to the company's ad copy, is "an innovation in perfumery," honoring "the tradition of Scotland's peaty whiskeys with its smoky and sensual woody accents. The result is a surprising fragrance of elegance and sophistication in which several malts collide." There's also talk of truly noble and refined masculinity, whatever that means. None of it sounded very thrilling to me, and yet, I kept returning to the Macy's counter over the last several weeks to see if the shipment had arrived.

I'd adjusted my expectations to "diminished", but was excited despite myself, and when I finally smelled Pure Malt I was a little...bored by it. I suppose I wanted it to upset my cynicism with some shocking quality I couldn't have expected to expect. Turns out, Pure Malt is just a great men's fragrance, but it took me a week of wearing it to remind me that in a world of marine scents and faux woody yawn-prompts, decent is hardly chopped liver. Spending time with Pure Malt, I remembered my first reactions to the original A*Men and, after it, B*Men. Both failed to thrill me upon initial application. Now I love them, and wouldn't want to be out of stock.

People's reactions to A*Men still surprise me. This tends to happen a lot with perfumes I love. They seem so unquestionably fantastic to me that the idea anyone might be less than floored by them seems inconceivable. The most frequent complaint against A*Men is its patchouli/chocolate/coffee cocktail. For those who hate this trifecta, the addition of caramel can't help. Me, I adore the combination. Something about the addition of lavender takes the fragrance to unexpected places, away from food into fresh, adding depth and tension. A*Men has great (correction: killer) longevity, which might be part of the problem. Patchouli haters aren't typically excited about a patchouli note which sticks it out to the bitter end, straight into the morning after.

Interestingly, Pure Coffee had many fans. The perception seems to be that it improved upon the overzealous mistakes of A*Men original, as if the people who had suffered through A*Men deserved an apology, but I found it to be a pale variation, too similar by far to merit a purchase. It smelled like coffee for all of four minutes, after which it smelled like A*Men lite. I much prefer the infinitely more tenacious Cafe Noir by Ava Luxe, which is a more streamlined, bare boned impression of coffee and lavender making nice, more long-lasting than Pure Coffee, drier and brisker than A*Men original, making them both bottle-worthy, rather than interchangeable.

Pure Malt is smooth, and long-lasting--and who knew malt would be such a nice compliment to the caramel undertones of A*Men? As for the woods, not so much, unless I'm just immune to what people consider woodsy at this point, having been pummeled over the head with it so often. Pure Malt reminds me a lot of Michael by Michael Kors. Michael is a cruder iteration of Pure Malt's agenda, but I'm a sucker for what Tania Sanchez calls a cheap and cheerful fragrance, and Michael has always fit the bill. Malt isn't listed in the notes but Michael gives off a rich, boozy vibe, mixing tobacco, patchouli, incense, and dried fruits with the herbal inluence of coriander, cardamom, tarragon, and thyme. Like A*Men original, Michael lasts for days, drying down into a deep, complex patchouli-dominated accord, but it has its own distinct character, much of which I suspect is due to the weird combination of shriveled prune and frankincense.

Pure Malt is subtle and smooth, and primarily a skin scent. Typically, skin scents are a pass for me. But I'm reaching for Pure Malt a lot, and I think this has to do with the fact that, though subtle, it projects in a curious way, wafting up as a glass of whiskey might from the tabletop. You can't beat the price. 70 bucks for 3.4 ounces is some kind of miracle for a new fragrance these days, even at Victoria's Secret. I'm not sure I would have spent more on Pure Malt, but I'm happy with it. The smell puts a smile on my face. It smells like a classic men's cologne but, like Histoires de Parfums' sublime 1740, it manages to transcend the category without trashing it. Far removed from the library, Pure Malt calls to mind a good pint of lager, fireside at the pub, the very faint smell of cigar in the background, a smoked aroma coming off the nearby grill, and not altogether unpleasant trace odors of the dog someone left tied to the tree outside. That's a fantasy I can wrap my mind around.