L’Artisan Thé Pour Un Été

It really takes some seriously hot weather to snap me into summer scent mode. The past week we’ve had a massive heat wave and I finally succumbed to wearing a few of my favorite summer scents.

Bear these facts in mind, I generally dislike jasmine and I frequently disparage L’Artisan for their complete lack of longevity and sillage. Aside from a few, namely Timbuktu, Iris Pallida and Premier Figuer Extreme, I’m awfully annoyed by the fleeting nature of most L’Artisans. My all-time favorite L’Artisan, Mimosa Pour Moi, is also fleeting but I adore the scent so much I just put up with it by bathing in it.

Thé Pour Un Été is one of the most perfect summer perfumes, period. It is fresh, airy and sublime. Here’s the overall gist of Thé Pour Un Été; imagine a glass of chilled jasmine tea, with lemon and a sprig of mint. I don’t even like jasmine but the jasmine in Thé Pour Un Été is so perfectly orchestrated that I simply adore it. The jasmine is tempered by the green/herbal notes, keeping it crisp rather than indolic and the tea note gives it just a little more character than a plain floral fragrance. For me, the ratio is like this: 50% crisp jasmine, 25% tea, 25% lemon/green.

Olivia Giacobetti created Thé Pour Un Été in 1995. I’ve begun to notice that I’m a big fan of Giacobetti, particularly for warm weather fragrances. Giacobetti also created some of my other summer favorites, such as Diptyque Philosykos, Hermes Hiris, Frederic Malle En Passant, L’Artisan Premier Figuer and Parfum D’Orsay Tilleul. Giacobetti’s style seems to involve delicacy, naturalism and a little surprise factor. In Hiris, Giacobetti added a carrot note; in En Passat, she used a doughy-bread note; in Premier Figeur, she included green leaves and coconut milk; and in Philosykos she put the entire fig grove, bark, leaves, fruit and all, in the bottle. In other words, Giacobetti ensures that her fragrances are gorgeously natural, never an artificial or synthetic smelling note, but always a little shock factor, to keep things interesting.

L’Artisan Thé Pour Un Été is divine. While the idea of chilled jasmine tea with lemon might seem overly simplistic, the aroma itself is too jarringly beautiful to disregard. Thé Pour Un Été is an olfactory antidote for a hot summer day, it lifts my spirit and keeps me sniffing my wrists all day. As mentioned above, L’Artisan drives me crazy with their lack of tenacity, but Thé Pour Un Été’s longevity is better than most of their fragrances, it still isn’t great, but it sticks around for about 3-4 hours on me. Like Mimosa Pour Moi, I like this scent so much, I just re-apply.

Rating: 5 stars
Sillage: a little
Longevity: below average but not terrible, about 3-4 hours on me

Frederic Malle En Passant: A Review

On the southern edge of Boston, there’s a section called Jamaica Plain, where Harvard University maintains a huge public arboretum called the Arnold Arboretum. I lived “on the pond” in Jamaica Plain (affectionately referred to as “JP” by the locals) and felt fortunate to be able to take walks in a beautiful natural landscape that’s also so close to the city. One of the best times of year to visit the arboretum is “Lilac Sunday” which is an annual event in May. The arboretum has literally hundreds of lilacs (I’m guessing the number, there may be more) in all varieties and colors. For anyone who loves to sniff flowers and especially lilacs, Lilac Sunday is a-m-a-z-i-n-g.

As much as I love the smell of lilacs, I was never particularly interested in En Passant. A fragrance focused on lilacs seemed a bit too quaint and innocent to me, like something a 12 year old girl could wear. I had also read the reviews of En Passant and the description of a fragrance smelling of lilacs with aquatic, cucumber and wheat notes just didn’t appeal to me whatsoever.

Well, leave it to Olivia Giacobetti (who created some of my favorites such as Philosykos, Ofresia, L’Artisan Premier Figuer, Safran Troublant and Dzing!) to make me swoon for this seemingly oddball scent. En Passant IS a quaint scent; it’s gentle, innocent and hopeful. To me it smells like walking through the lilac bushes at the Arnold Arboretum on a drizzly spring day, the leaves of the trees are still drooping from the downpour, but the rain has stopped and the sun is coming out. It’s April so most of the trees are just beginning to bud, there’s that singular smell of spring in the air, the breeze carries the aroma of new growth, a green herbaceous scent fills your lungs, and you smell the damp soil along with the leafy green wetness of life. En Passant is a fragrance but it’s also a moment in time, it’s a memory and it’s the feeling of hope.

Most reviews I’ve read about En Passant suggest that the scent of dewy lilacs slowly recedes and the smell of wheat or bread take center stage. After about 90 minutes I do smell bread, it’s very similar to L’Artisan Bois Farine actually, but this wheat note never overtakes “Lilac Sunday” for me. The wheaty-bread smell seems to dry the previously wet, herbal, green lilac scent to the point that it’s as if the sun came out and dried off the lilacs.

En Passant seems the perfect fragrance for hot weather or when you don’t particularly feel like wearing a complex perfume, just something simple, sweet and hopeful.

Longevity: Good, about 3 hours
Sillage: Soft
Rating: 5 Stars, lovely