First Impressions

I never really thought much of the flagship Van Cleef and Arpels fragrance, aptly titled First. It seemed a lot like Chanel No.5 to me, and not just due to its overdose of aldehydes. There are many aldehydic perfumes I love, and many don't smell much like emblematic No.5. Arpege, old and new, is much warmer to me, for instance, and smells as much of the tobacco pouch as the flower garden to my nose. White Linen is its own wonderful beast, a bottle full of unique radiance which, however floral, reminds me more of a spring day than a perfume.

Not that one thing smelling like another has ever stopped me from buying it. I found a fantastic fifteen dollar Vicky Tiel aldehyde several months ago, which I'm convinced smells even more like No.5 than the real No.5 does, and I have many florals and green chypres and orientals which would be indistinguishable from one another to your everyday nose. Similarities don't bother me. More of the same is great if I liked it enough to buy it to begin with. The truth is, I'm not a huge fan of No.5, and that was my biggest problem with First.

I want to like No.5. I keep trying. I do actually "like" it. I think it smells great. The issue I have is that it smells great for all of ten minutes on me, no matter which concentration I apply. I appreciate the iconic recognizability of No.5. You know it instantly, and over the years it has cut such a wide swath that it means something to nearly everyone, whether its name is known or not, so in some ways it can operate interestingly in a room, unifying or dividing people in mood or mindset on a level beyond your average bit of social anarchy. You feel the presence of various dearly departed figures, and suddenly the room has doubled in size. But every time I try to conjure this alchemy on my own skin it goes flat, like a genie bottle whose genie I can't figure out how to summon.

Before things fade, First isn't as ladylike as No.5. After a night of carousing (however chic the pitstops) it checks in at the barnyard before continuing on to the manor. First has a simmering honeyed warmth you don't find in anything Chanel, as well as a slight booziness. There are strange, plush dissonances at play. No.5 is a much more remorselessly chilly affair, bent on leaving you hanging. The focus on lemon and bergamot in No.5's opening moments sharpens the initial effect of the aldehydes. First switches out lemon for mandarin, and the addition of blackcurrant gives it a tart succulence I really like. Both perfumes have the jasmine / rose combo you might expect from a perfume of this particular subset of classic perfumery. But No.5 is all about cool, aloof orris for me in the heart stages, while First plays around with Ylang-Ylang and hyacinth.

The rage over the last several years for iris (and other things, like, say, oud and vanilla) has kept me until recently from paying much attention to notes I might actually hype myself if given the platform, but it becomes increasingly obvious to me that Ylang-Ylang really does it for me. Part of this is my ability to identify it a little more clearly these days. Cheap-o Histoire d'Amour, by Aubusson, helped. A recent favorite of mine, Histoire contrasts Ylang-Ylang with a particularly dry, woody patchouli. It has a rubbery succulence not too dissimilar to First, and a slightly off quality to it.

I only know how much I like First now because I came across a bottle of the EDP concentration a few days ago. Unlike No.5, it seems, concentration does effect longevity when it comes to First. The toilette made First seem a lot more like No.5 than it actually is. It was so fleeting on me that I had no idea really what to make of it. Maybe it stopped at the barnyard. All I know is, it stopped altogether. I couldn't make it out. The EDP extends the dry down significantly, giving me time to notice how fantastic First truly is. I assume the civet is synthetic, if really there at all anymore. No matter. The Ylang-Ylang provides ample interest, an edgy, vaguely mentholated frisson. Vetiver and vanilla contribute to its sense of warmth with a subtle earthiness. Oddly, First reminds me at times of Opium, now that I've absorbed it. I wasn't surprised to see that Opium lists Ylang-Ylang among its heart notes. I'd never noticed that, either.

Apparently, First is harder to come by as an EDP. It makes me wonder how many people have dismissed the fragrance, like I had, simply because it didn't sit still enough for a proper appraisal.

Three Worth Looking Out For

I've seen the following three items for over a year now at the local discount fragrance outlet. I might have smelled one, but didn't even go that far with the others. Bias, probably. They seemed cheap to me and I assumed they must have been made with inferior materials. Funny thing, though. The way things are going, it could be argued that yesterday's cheap perfume is downright expensive by the standards of so called quality fragrance today. I won't name names. I doubt you need me to. Pick a fragrance from the mall. Chances are it smells like a fraction of what it costs. I finally picked up the following, and discovered that they smell like a million bucks. They have--shock--oakmoss, natural musks, civet, that old school patchouli, which is neither headshop nor headspace. They project. They last forever. They're pretty easy to find. That said, word of caution: I have older formulas. I can't speak for the current versions of these. From what I've heard, they're not as good. That can make finding the right version tricky, but we all seem to like a good quest.

Enigma

Is it any wonder I ignored this stuff, with a name brand like Alexandra de Markoff to recommend it? I know it's been around forever, but it rang of some aging Tennessee William's belle to me, like Geraldine Page's character in Sweet Bird of Youth. Alexandra Del Lago. Even their names are similar. Enigma was created in 1972. I was only--well, I'm no aging belle myself but I'm not given to announcing my birth date either. Let's say I'm not a day over 25--okay, 30--and Enigma is a peer. I did smell Enigma a year ago, when I first discovered the discount store in question. It smelled stuffy to me and I probably gave it all of a minute or two on a strip of paper. But my tastes keep expanding and contracting. Now it smells fantastic. To be sure, there's a bit of that powder note which broadcasts "boudoir", but Enigma is also one of the more remarkable older ambers I've smelled, and though it never goes butch, it's decidedly masculine as it develops. You get your rose, your jasmine, a robust influence of carnation. It's a lot more Paul Newman as "Brick" than you might suspect. There are spices in there: fragrantica lists only coriander and allspice but others are indicated. There are "green notes" and "cut grass". Oakmoss and patchouli in the base. About ten minutes in, Enigma lives up to its name. It's hard to say what the magic is here, but a spell of some sort is definitely being cast. It radiates warmth. The older bottles have darker liquid and different packaging. My bottle is square with a gold tubular cap. The decal is white and bears the image of a tassel (also gold) over the name.

Van Cleef

Ignore Turin's bad review. I didn't at first, opting to ignore the perfume itself instead. When I finally gave it the time of the day I was put off and thought him right. Then, driving home with the testing strip, I started to smell the most amazing stuff. I couldn't believe it was coming from the same place. Van Cleef is a little younger than Enigma. Created in 1993, it calls back to the eighties, referencing loudmouths like Carolina Herrera and Poison, those declarative orientals and florals which speak in exclamation marks, every other syllable underscored. The most interesting thing about Van Cleef is the most off-putting initially. Is it orange blossom? The listed notes include it. I get the play-doh quality of heliotrope. It took some getting used to, but once I adjusted to the unusual combo of that, marigold, tonka and galbanum, I was seriously hooked. It doesn't hurt that the fragrance lasts forever and days on the skin. Van Cleef makes use of some unidentifiable note it shares with Miss Arpels, another Van Cleef perfume which followed a year later. That one is hard for me to stomach. This one gets the balance just right. It's an intense wear. Come prepared. My bottle is EDT. Those I've seen for sale online are EDP. I have no clue what the differences might be. My version dates back to the nineties.

Histoire D'Amour

I saved the best for last. Trust me when I say this stuff is not to be believed. It's available online for a song. For less than a song. I don't know whether they're still producing it. If so, it must have been changed. The ingredients of the bottle I own are listed as perfume, aqua and alcohol. I'm guessing it dates back to the late eighties or early to mid nineties, tops. Histoire was released in 1984 and is classified as a woody chypre. I smell galbanum and ylang ylang up top, but the moment you spray it on the patchouli, musks, and oakmoss from the base activate, weaving up throughout the fragrance. I can't recommend it enough. It's unisex, robust but easygoing, smooth, a refined but herbal, earthy bearing to it. It's an EDT but lasts well, if not with as much thrust as Van Cleef. It's closer to Enigma in terms of vigor. It's a lot more contemplative. People talk about powder, and I get a little of that, but not so much really. It's no Teint de Neige. It reminds me a bit of Sibeline by Weil, one of the fragrances the furrier created to take a bit of the animal out of, say, a mink stole--minus the aldehydes. The trick was to compliment that beastly quality, rather than conceal it, making animal and human natures seem as one. Histoire brings the outdoors to the skin in a similar way. Some of the pictures I've seen online (like above) depict a much more golden-hued Histoire than the bottle I own, which contains a balsamic brown liquid.