I Wore This: Dior Addict (Original)

(Or: Why I Seem to Have Stopped Writing "Reviews")

For a long time now (let's throw a number out and say five months) I've spent more time on customer review sites than on perfume blogs proper. Until recently, I didn't really ask myself why. I must have just concluded, in some hazy region of my hamster wheel mind, buried chin deep in everyday routine, that I'd lost interest in perfume. Why else wouldn't I want to read in depth analysis, let alone write it?

I guess it gradually occurred to me that a loss of interest wasn't borne out by the amount of time I spend on, say, Fragrantica, a site I visit at least ten times a day - often impulsively. It gradually occurred to me, in some equally hazy way, that I don't want to write or read about perfume the same way anymore. The blog review has come to feel essentially reductive to me: these are the notes, this is the perfumer, here's a brief evocative list of things this scent evokes or recalls or references. Here is how long it lasts, here is something the perfumer told to me at a cocktail party I was invited to as I stood at the red hot center of the fragrance industry. Here is the history.

Whose history?

I appreciate the notes. The anecdotal information can be interesting. Knowing that you see a woman standing under a tree eating an apple in a flowing white gauzy dress when you smell this perfume is...maybe over-sharing. It's at least beside the point. The problem for me is that the monolith this template has become in aggregate, across scores of blogs, obstructs in some ways and minimizes in others what perfume actually does for or to me. It makes fantasy feel rote. There is a catalog element to a great deal of perfume writing now: Here is this, and this is this that and the other thing. Moving right along, here is another.

How can I expect anyone to see the point in making imaginative, truly inspired fragrances when so much of us spend so much time and space making what we say we love sound so phoned in?

I think I just want to step off the hamster wheel for a while? Maybe that's it. I don't expect to get to the bottom of anything; I want to stop pretending that you should read me because I can, or because it's possible.

I used to stand at my grandmother's vanity to smell her perfumes. I've written this at least twenty times throughout the lifespan of this blog. It's often the only thing that matters to me. I've gone back to that memory my entire adult life. The sun coming through the windows, the colors of her pale rug, the gilt mirrored tray the perfumes sat on, the light blue velvet chaise off to the side with an afghan my grandmother made draped across it. She made all of us afghans like it. My sister got one in the same colors. I was a boy, so mine was red, white, and blue.

It was difficult for me to pretend to sit on that blue chaise in my own room, back at home, with that red, white, and blue afghan. I used to sneak into my sister's room to sit with hers. In my memories I chart one forbidden moment after another like that; I sneak into an endless series of rooms, rooting around where I'm not meant to be. For a long time I had a recurring dream: The house was always different, but it always had a secret room I discovered during the course of the dream. The room was enormous, stockpiled with deep dark glamorous (to me) family secrets.

It occurs to me writing this that part of the reason I store my fragrances the way I do, deeply layered in no particular order, stacks upon stacks, in a bureau, is because it makes looking for anything involve finding many things I'd forgotten about. It recreates that sense of discovery and secrecy. This entire system of memories exists in the perfumed air surrounding my grandmother's vanity.

I'm always finding Dior Addict pushed back to the rear. I might have three bottles to make sure that virtually anywhere I dig I'm bound to come across it. I don't know why I don't wear it more often, or why I want to keep being reminded it's there in this particular way.

Hedonist by Viktoria Minya: What's in a Word

It's been interesting, as early reviews of Hedonist have come in, to see what people make of the word. I had no idea it had quite the reputation it does - you'd think, from some of these reactions, it were a synonym for harlot, trollop, or worse - and I wonder what Viktoria Minya, the perfumer behind the scent, thinks about all this, because to my nose the fragrance is more in keeping with the actual definition of hedonist than with these apparently somewhat popular connotations, and I imagine she must have been thinking of the bigger picture too.

Strictly speaking, hedonism has to do with the pursuit of pleasure - as in, first and foremost - which would make a hedonist, I guess, on the one hand a pleasure seeker and on the other averse to anything which veers in the opposite direction. Nothing in that definition privileges carnal pleasure, though the physical would obviously be included in any bullet list of what floats the boat. That bullet list might also include fine cuisine, silk clothing, spring days, comfortable furniture, and feathers, depending on your taste. It probably wouldn't include okra. Regardless, Hedonist doesn't make any effort to claim one pleasure at the expense of others - and when I smell the perfume it's far more expansive in tone than the "merely" sexual, if those two words can be used together.

Minya, who is based in Paris, has mentioned in the literature for Hedonist that it harkens back to classic perfumery, and it does feel classical, even grand. There's a retrospective quality to the fragrance that nods back to early twentieth century perfumery, certainly - but again, I think the scent sees a bigger picture in its references as well. Some reviewers have compared its wonderful peachy facets to Mitsouko (a reference point I can get behind, as long as I'm not stuck there). For me, one of the fragrance's biggest bonuses, not to mention pleasant surprises - and there are many - is how strongly it relates to some of my favorite eighties fragrances.

That's where some of you will stop reading, I suspect, whereas some will now have perked right up. Hedonist certainly has the iconic sensual boldness that characterizes some of my favorites from that era - Poison, say, or Diva - but without their take no prisoners bombast. I see an 80's connection, I guess, mainly because that decade was the last great period for this kind of sumptuousness, a time when a fragrance was meant to be smelled rather than merely perceived, to register not as a whisper but as a declaration - of elegance, of personality, of intent. Poison, Diva, Paris, and, say, Giorgio, are the no-brainer 80's benchmarks, but Hedonist reminds me more of lesser known favorites from that era; particularly, a fantastic earlier Krizia fragrance, Moods.

Like Moods, and some of the other 80's fragrances I'm thinking of - the once wonderful Creations by Ted Lapidus, for instance, Houbigant's Demi-Jour, or the reformulated Shocking de Schiaparelli - Hedonist is maximally honeyed. It has a green-tinged vanillic sweetness to it I remember from Moods as well. It's a fully saturated fragrance but plays off the skin in a very contemporary, radiantly diffusive way. I imagine people will notice its sillage, without feeling victim to it, and in that way, among others, it updates some of its influences.

Honey-faceted fragrances often have a slightly animalic quality to them, to put it diplomatically. While its aura is lush and dramatic, Hedonist has a sweeter, cleaner disposition. I get a tea note, a very nice tobacco storyline going on, orange blossom, and that honey, primarily. It's a fascinating combination, which lasts well and conjures any number of nostalgically pleasurable mental and emotional sensations. One Fragrantica reviewer characterized the overall effect as "really golden...[reminding her of] honey and ambrosia with a glass of Alsatian Gewurztraminer." I've never had gewurztraminer, but I like the sound of all that. Hedonist feels strangely familiar at various points during its lifespan, maybe because in some way it catalyzes little memories of comfort like this. It's familiar the way remembered pleasures can be. The dry down does interesting, even subtly unusual, things with its osmanthus/peach/tobacco combo, opening it up rather than narrowing it down. The fragrance is heady but bright, surrounding rather than suffocating the way fragrances this opulent can tend to do.

I miss some of those eighties honeyed fragrances, so Hedonist has been a welcome surprise. They don't make them much like this anymore. In most ways the perfume landscape, commercially and otherwise, is starting to seem pretty spare and minimalistic, kind of anemic in the pleasures it affords. Hedonist would be a welcome change at half the fragrance it is. Fortunately, its pleasures pay off in dividends. In the few weeks I've been wearing it I've grown to like it more and more, and I keep noticing different things - like, I think, some cedar in the mix, and a presiding creamy warmth I hadn't singled out for a while because I kept focusing on the peach and the tobacco specifically.

Fragrantica calls it a woody chypre. For me, it has more affinities with the floriental. I hope Minya does more but Hedonist already feels like an old favorite, and I'll take a new line with a single fantastic scent over one with ten mediocre fragrances any day. Luckyscent sells the fragrance, which comes in an appropriately luxurious bottle (pictured above) and box. Already, with this perfume, Hedonist has a new connotation for me.

More Alien Still: Alien Essence Absolue

Apparently, the folks at Mugler decided that two Alien flankers a year just wasn't enough, and this year, in addition to the flanker associated with Les Parfums de Cuir and the summer version, Aqua Chic, the brand released Alien Essence Absolue, a purportedly richer, more intense version of the original.

I'm not complaining, because Essence Absolue is the best of the Alien enterprise to date, right down to the bottle, which resembles a cybernetic pear considered by citizens of the planet Jupiter to be the last word in exotic delicacies. True to the literature, Absolue is richer, but exactly why and how, even with a side by side comparison, is hard to explain.

There's said to be myrrh, white amber, incense, and animalistic black vanilla pod. The balance is such that I'd be hard pressed to identify any of that specifically, though at times I feel I can detect what I think might be myrrh or what could be animalistic black vanilla pod. I'm a big fan of Alien Liqueur, and Liqueur was, itself, richer than the original Alien. I was skeptical, when I heard about Absolue; it seemed unlikely that the composition could be made any richer than that. I should have known better, because it's rare a Mugler fragrance seriously disappoints.

What Absolue seems to subtract from the original equation is the very thing I thought made that composition so complex and satisfying. Gone is the roasted jasmine quality, that super saturated, burred nutty thrust. When you smell the two side by side, they seem very similar, for just a short time, as though the same hologram has been projected before you. As that initial impression shifts, their differences, subtle but profound, become gradually more apparent.

The incense aspects of Absolue are minimal; still, they replicate then variate the fuzzy quality of the original's jasmine, generating a strange edged effect to the floral components of the fragrance. Overall, the heart of the thing feels the way the juice looks, golden, shot through with light. While Absolue definitely smells vanillic, it's only when you compare its dry down to the original that you see just how much more vanilla it has, and how the amber elements dominate. I can't detect anything remotely animalic in the mix, and yet this is a different kind of vanilla fragrance, slightly more savory than sweet. The spectral silhouette of original Alien remains, hovering there, but the body of the fragrance has arranged itself differently around that outline. Absolue has more than a little in common with the L'Or version of Dior J'Adore, but where that flanker sat obediently on the skin - even meekly - Absolue has kick.

I find both versions, original and Absolue, to be comparable in projection and longevity, though I've read many customer reviews saying that Absolue is equally tenacious but less of a headache, basically. I never got or get a headache from original Alien, nor am I exactly ever clear on what people who dislike it so strongly are chiefly complaining about, so I can't tell you why Absolue is considered by many of them to be a marked improvement. For me, it's simply a variation, if something so profoundly good can be called simple.

Note: This fragrance could have been far less interesting and still worth the price for the bottle alone.

Vanilla perfumes for those who dislike gourmands

If you’ve read here before you probably know that I’m not a lover of gourmand fragrances.  I have two major issues with gourmands; 1. They make me hungry and 2. I’d rather not smell like actual desserts.   The few times I’m worn things like Serge Lutens Un Bois Vanille, Guerlain Spirituese Double Vanille or Guerlain Tonka Imperiale I find myself stopping at Starbucks for a latte and 3-piece order of their petite vanilla scones or whipping up a spontaneous batch of cookies at home (no joke).  I can't even burn vanilla or foodie scented candles in my house as I've been known to burst into random baking episodes due to the yummy aroma.  Obviously, I don’t need any sort of encouragement when it comes to my sweet tooth so for the sake of my waist line can’t wear gourmands.   

Even so, I still have the desire to wear comforting vanilla scents once in a while.  After thinking I simply couldn’t wear vanilla prominent fragrances I found a category of vanilla scents that I can wear.  I’ve come to think of the first three in the below list as “cologne vanillas” because they incorporate a fresh citrus quality in their top notes and once dried down these fragrance never veer too foodie for my liking.  The fourth fragrance on my list isn’t fresh or citrusy but it’s a dry, herbal vanilla.

Jo Malone Vanille & Anise
The Non-Blonde reminded me of this underrated gem the other day when she reviewed it.   I don’t think Jo Malone’s Vanille & Anise was met with high praise precisely because it isn’t a sweet, foodie vanilla scent.  I would guess that most people wanting a vanilla fragrance would expect something with the name “Vanille & Anise” to be mostly vanilla extract, licorice and heavily influenced by candied desserts.  JM Vanille & Anise is a light, air-spun fragrance that begins with a fresh citrus character and ends with a slightly sweeter but dry anise-vanilla quality. For the first few moments JM Vanille & Anise does make me think of a dessert, but it’s lemon meringue, with its white meringue top impossibly high and air-filled.  Jo Malone Vanille & Anise loses most of the citrus notes once dried but never becomes dense, it remains gauzy and effortless.

Creed Sublime Vanille
I wrote about this back in 2010 and have continued to find it to be a wonderful ‘cologne vanilla.’  It’s essentially a classic eau de cologne over a fairly dry vanilla base.   It wears and smells so simply which is why I’d be a lot more excited about it if it didn’t cost as much.  For a seemingly simplistic fragrance the price might make you balk but I’ve come to terms with the cost and find Sublime Vanille to be a worthy addition to my (small) collection of wear-able vanilla perfumes.  Sublime Vanille has slight citrus tendencies at the start and dries down to a fresh, vanilla-cologne for any occasion and any season. 

Atelier Vanille Insensee
Like the two above, Vanille Insensee is a beautifully rendered vanilla lying beneath a fresh beginning of lime and citrus.  There is vetiver and moss in the base keeping the vanilla in check, never veering too foodie.  Vanille Insensee can be worn year-round.  Even though “fresh,” “clean,” and “sheer” often spell AVOID in my perfume vocabulary book, this fragrance is all three adjectives and yet it’s absolute love, bliss and vanilla-genius.

Annick Goutal Vanille Exquise
Vanille Exquise is not a cologne vanilla but instead an unusual herbal and dry vanilla.  There is a note at the start which bothers some people and I think this note is angelica.  It’s a jarring start, like a sharp, herbal knife to the nose.  In almost all other instances, I dislike angelica (Guerlain Angelique Noire and L’Instant) but in AG Vanille Exquise, I know this jarring quality subsides (well, somewhat, it never entirely disappears) so I enjoy the ride knowing it will become softer and gentler once dried down.  The edgy beginning coupled with soothing dry down makes me think of the saying about the month of March “... comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.”  AG Vanille Exquise also has a beautiful gaiac wood note and is overall a perfectly sophisticated woody-herbal vanilla, actually, it's my favorite.

I’m not including vanilla-orientals in this list.  I have a number of orientals which are prominently vanilla that I also enjoy, but I mentally file these in a different category.  Some examples are Profumi del Forte Roma Imperiale, The Different Company Oriental Lounge, Love, Chloe Eau Intense, Parfumerie Generale Felanilla and L’Artisan Havana Vanille (renamed recently but I’m too lazy to look it up). 

If you're like me and can’t wear gourmands, what are some vanilla fragrances you've found yourself able to wear?

Mona Di Orio Vanille

In November, I reviewed Cuir, a fragrance I continue to love but rarely wear.  Cuir was different in many ways than most of what I'd smelled by Mona Di Orio, which wasn't a bad thing.  It was simply stronger and a lot more linear, and it felt more operatic in its singleminded bullheadedness than anything else she'd done, including famously skanky Nuit Noire.  What you got at first was what you got at long last.  I admire Cuir and I think it smells fantastically assertive - it's bold in a way I appreciate - and maybe it's just the heat that's turned me away from it for the time being.  Like Norma Kamali's Incense it becomes something approaching a sci-fi creature in the humidity.  It has spinning teeth and goes into attack mode.  Still, I'm defensive about it, because it seems to be one of those fragrances that people who don't like what Di Orio does use as an illustration of her failures, and the perfume's so-called drawbacks always seem like bonus points to me.

I was doubtful when, during a recent visit to Luckyscent's Scent Bar, someone raved about Vanille and suggested I smell it, I guess because something in his voice and praise led me to feel that Vanille was going to be the "break out" fragrance for the line.  I assumed, in a knee jerk way, that this was meant to imply that everything before Vanille was a near or total miss, and I figured it must be pretty boring.  I smelled other things for a while before I finally brought myself to smell Vanille--including Di Orio's Tuberose and Vetyver, neither of which I particularly liked - but I was pleasantly shocked when I got around to the third of this most recent trio, part of the perfumer's L'Ombres D'Or series.  Vanille smells like a Mona Di Orio fragrance, and yet, like Cuir, it smells like something different - not just for her but in general.

I think probably my reluctance had a lot to do as well with vanilla's vogue.  I felt the same about iris and fig at one time, a kind of eye-rolling, enough already resistance.  Don't get me started on oud. But Vanille isn't the kind of vanilla I've smelled before.  The listed notes are petitgrain, clove, orange, rum, vetiver, sandalwood, guaiac wood, amber, tonka, and vanilla.  What you get from that is something unique among vanilla fragrances, something at once drier and more succulent, slightly boozy throughout, and spiced to perfection.  The tonka and guaiac, I think, give the fragrance something that feels like vintage Guerlinade, though the overall feel of Vanille is distinctly contemporary.  Vanille is a sexy fragrance.  It makes you want to touch yourself.  I can only assume it would make you want to touch other people, too, if they happened to have some on.  I'm going to guess this one will bring its wearer a lot of compliments, the kind people get closer to give.

A word of caution about words of caution:  Everything I've heard warns against spraying too much of Vanille at once.  It might just be my skin but Vanille is nowhere near as diffusive as Cuir, and to my nose, while not subtle, it's certainly no powerhouse.  Like Cuir, it stays fairly consistent throughout, but it's playing at a lower decibel.  Several people have advised against spraying it altogether, opting instead to dab.  I've yet to find any fragrance I'd rather dab than spray, for my own sake or anyone else's, and Vanille is hardly the place I'd start.  Wear it with abandon, I say.  It might just make you some bedfellows.  This is a beautiful fragrance, and another demonstration that Di Orio is infinitely more talented than her detractors would have you believe.

Creed Sublime Vanille

People like to poke fun at Creed for their over the top marketing. I think almost all marketing is over the top and Creed’s doesn’t bother me any more or less. The bottle which houses Sublime Vanille is absolutely stunning and I find the jus inside equally as stunning. Sublime Vanille is simple. Or at least it seems exceedingly simple because there’s no complexity to speak of or much to ponder here, but don’t let this fool you, because it’s beautiful, especially if you are looking for this simple sheer type of vanilla.

When I first tried Sublime Vanille my reaction was “so what?” But over many months and many sprays of other vanilla fragrances I’ve realized this one is really good. It’s good if you are looking for something that sings vanilla, in a soft and not-entirely foodie way, that is also fresh and citrusy in addition to its sweetness. I don’t think it truly smells like Shalimar, but in my mind, it’s like a deconstruction of Shalimar, rebuilt to suite modern tastes. Of course it’s a bit more fleeting than I would like, but I solve that with about 5-6 healthy sprays and then I’m all set for at least half the day. I think of Sublime Vanille as the ultimate comfort scent. The one you reach for when you're a bit down in the dumps and need a soft cozy perfumed hug. Sublime Vanille is just so easy, deceptively simple and pretty, which is the reason I thought it was plain and boring the first time I tried it (and especially for the price tag!). But I've come around to thinking that Sublime Vanille is the best in it's class if you are looking for a soft yet fresh vanilla scent.

I have a growing list of vanilla fragrances that I like these days, which is a big step for me because I previously disliked almost anything with vanilla or gourmand tendencies. Most of my favorite “vanilla” scents are only barely focused on the actual note of vanilla. I generally choose vanilla scents where the starring roles are reserved for woods, spices, booze and incense, such as Annick Goutal Vanille Exquise, L’Artisan Havana Vanille, Parfumerie Generale Felanilla, The Different Company Oriental Lounge, Guerlain Tonka Imperiale, Boucheron Trouble, Guerlain Spiritueuse Double Vanille and Dior Addict. If you happen to be looking for a simple vanilla that is soft yet fresh I can’t think of anything better than Creed’s Sublime Vanille. Well, you might also try Paul & Joe Bleue (for a fraction of the price), which is beautiful but even closer to being a copy of Shalimar. L’Artisan Vanilia is much too candy sweet and childlike. Same for Serge Lutens Un Bois Vanille, this is woody vanilla with burnt sugar but it’s more foodie than I’d personally like. Creed’s Sublime Vanille hits that perfect G spot of sweet fresh citrusy vanilla that doesn’t make you feel like you've been baking a cake, only that you’re wearing a lovely perfume.

Here's another take on Sublime Vanille from Patty at Perfume Posse. I'm mostly agreeing with Patty, except that after wearing this "middle of the road" vanilla as she calls it, I've decided that Sublime Vanille is excellent precisely because it's the best of this sort, and sometimes I'm looking for a vanilla fragrance without an angle or an agenda.

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.

Aziyade

While not so surprised that I like it, I am surprised how little Aziyade reminds me of the things I'm told it should. What's not to like? Are there many who don't like Serge Lutens' Arabie? I don't know many of them. It's likable, too. It smells to me of dates marinated in various resins, and Aziyade has some of those fruity woody aspects too. As do Kenzo Elephant and Feminite du Bois. But Aziyade has so many peculiar qualities those don't that I'm not sure I would have made the connection on my own. For me, likability is about the biggest thing they have in common.

I made a comment the other day, talking about Noix De Tuberose, that tuberose fragrances often seem very similar, with only very fine distinctions. I see the school of thought which places Aziyade among the sugared fruits and woods of the perfume world, but it has such a nice, tart angle, with some leather and terpenoids going on in there too. I get some pine, though it isn't listed. I think this might be ginger, which is. None of the notes come as a shock to me. Yes, okay, there are those crystallized dates and prunes, but they're more of a backdrop. Orange is a big player here, adding to that terpenoid zing. Pomegranate, a cameo. The ginger, almond, cardamom, cinnamon, cumin, carob and ciste season the mix in a way which feels uniquely spicy. Aziyade isn't a cold smell, it has some warmth, but it lacks the fuzzy splendor of Elephant and Arabie. Those have always reminded me of Cinnabar in a certain way: they heat up on the skin the way the smell of food on the stove spreads through the house.

Aziyade is brisk. I would call it radiant. It doesn't smell anything like them but its radiance brings Caleche and Clinique Wrappings to mind. Those have a similar, slightly camphorous edge for me which should probably be chalked up to aldehydes. Aziyade's tangy vibe isn't something I've smelled anywhere, except perhaps in another Parfum D'Empire fragrance, Ambre Russe. What to call this? Both make me think of a rich, high end liqueur like the one I sometimes see and covet: a pear floats inside, like a model ship in a bottle. Aziyade dries down into a dreamy booze of a fragrance. It doesn't have the forceful longevity of Elephant and Arabie but it lasts quite well. Actually, now that I bring it up, it smells a bit of pear.

And the wait is over: L'Artisan Havana Vanille

Man, it took long enough for this stuff to show up! I pre-ordered Havana Vanille in August and just received it Monday (12/21). I admit that during this long wait I became thoroughly disenchanted. I’ve been reading very negative posts on MUA & POL and I became less and less interested in it ever gracing me with it’s presence. Many noted it’s lightness, suggested it was fleeting, thought it smelled like something wet and moldy. Now that I have my bottle I gotta ask: what on earth are you smelling out there? Havane Vanille is simply gorgeous.

I’ve been wearing Havane Vanille for two days. One thing is for sure; this is not a fragrance you can judge based on a dab from a 1 ml vial. You need to spray HV – and I mean several big, bold sprays of it. Today I scanned MUA and read a post by DorothyEm where she wrote this in response to someone asking how to make L’Artisan scents last longer:

DorothyEm: “I read a post on another board from a L’Artisan representative and he suggested that you spray enough so it "pools" on the skin. In other words, spray liberally and enough to make your skin WET.”

It now occurs to me that I should do this will all L’Artisan fragrances, not just Havana Vanille. Maybe I should be ‘spraying myself wet’ with Annick Goutal, Chanel and Jo Malone, too. Just a thought. Anyway, back to HV. The fact that I wasn’t particularly interested in Havana Vanille ever showing up combined with the second fact that I don’t get excited by vanilla fragrances in general makes me recommend HV highly. Or perhaps this means HV is a vanilla fragrance for those who don’t care for vanilla scents. Case in point: I love Guerlain Spirituese Double Vanillle but this is perhaps the only vanilla I go crazy for and I wear it about 3-4 times per year, usually when I’m on a diet or when the weather is frigid and I need to olfactory equivalent of a big down comforter. My taste in vanilla scents pretty much runs toward ambery woods and not straight vanillas at all. My favorite ambery woods are Givenchy Organza Indecence (amber, cinnamon, and woods, woods, woods), Theorema (clove, orange, spices, and woods, woods, woods), Annick Goutal Ambre Fetiche (gorgeous ambery woods), Serge Lutens Rousse (cinnamon & woods) and Parfum d’Empire Ambre Russe (decadence bar none). So, as you can see, vanilla fragrances are pretty much not in my collection (well...I really dig Cristobal by Balenciaga and I think of it as a highly vanillic oriental). But, in general, I prefer ambery woods. So, if you are like me, you might also love Havana Vanille.

Havana Vanille begins like an after dinner drink heavy on the booze, specifically rum, and it's a very dark rum. Think of something along the lines of a Black Russian or Baileys Irish Crème. Something thick, boozy and spiked with milk. I might be hallucinating but I also smell something like almond liqueur – along the lines of Frangelico. Havana Vanille transports me to a dark retro lounge with me draped in the corner leather booth and, yes, on this occasion, I'm smoking a cigarette (maybe even a clove cigarette, it’s been years, give a girl a fantasy indulgence). Havana Vanille simmers down and loses it’s gourmand quality once the rum note dissipates but it never leaves entirely. Once the rum simmers it becomes a veritable spice fest; clove, cinnamon, nutmeg, dry smoky woods and burnt sugar. I know there is tobacco here but it’s so mild mannered I can’t pick it out. I can’t say I smell anything that resembles straight up vanilla, or vanilla as I know it in perfumery, and this is likely why I enjoy HV so much. To me, it smells like the idea of vanilla, and those I asked to smell me the past two days did not say I smelled like vanilla (fyi: they said I smelled really good, but didn’t know what it was). I don’t find much resemblance at all to Tom Ford’s Tobacco Vanille, which is good, because I’m not a fan. I think of Havana Vanille as a love child, a result of the coupling between Guerlain Spirituese Double Vanille and Givenchy Organza Indecence. It’s a blessed child – born from good parents. If you like ambery, spicy woods as I do, you ought to check out HV.

Notes include rum, clove, dried fruits, narcissus, tonka bean, helichrysum, vanilla, smoked woods, moss and balsamic notes

More on L'Heure Bleue

From the foreword of The Blue Hour: A Life of Jean Rhys, by Lilian Pizzichini:

"In the summer of 1912 the French parfumier Jacques Guerlain concocted a scent from musk and rose de Bulgarie with a single note of jasmine. He intended his new scent, which he called L'Heure Bleue, to evoke dusk in the city. The blue hour is the time when heliotropes and irises in Parisian window boxes are bathed in a blue light and the well-groomed Parisienne prepares for the evening.

"For the novelist Jean Rhys, the blue hour was also the hour when the lap-dog she saw herself as being during the day turned into a wolf. Dogs hunt best during twilight. Underneath our surface sophistication lurks a predator. Jean Rhys was always concerned with what lay beneath the top notes. In Quartet, her first novel, set in paris, a young female character, smarter and bolder than her heroine, is wearing L'Heure Bleue by Guerlain. Rhys's heroine absorbs the woman's scent as though in breathing it in she can capture her rival's self-possession..."


Though Jean Rhys published only a handful of books in a brief period of time, I've returned to her work more often than any other writer. I relate that strongly to her characters, always some poetic inversion of their author, always sad, alone but fighting against it, somewhat self-sabotaging, romantic but fatalistic, hopelessly dreamy, grafting onto the peeling, water-stained wallpaper of a Parisian flophouse images of high fashion, glamorous independence, the head over heels dizziness of ill-fated love affairs, all while remaining glued by inertia to the room's filthy mattress, waiting for dusk and perhaps a free meal.

Rhys herself was both fiercely independent and disastrously beholden to a series of not-so-charitable older men, the most notorious of whom was the writer Ford Maddox Ford. It was Ford who helped Rhys get published, which is to say organized. Her childhood in Dominica had ingrained in her a sense of elaborate languor bordering on laziness, at least as far as others were concerned. Getting her shit together was always a challenge for her, and I imagine a scattered heap of intuitively- if not technically connected notes and sentences before Ford came along, mixing encouragement with sexual attention. Naturally, he dumped her. Almost everyone did. People leave. Where's the motivation in that?

She was a woman of sharp observational powers, in possession of what seemed to be an inherently poetic sense of the world. The combination of these two attributes made for writing which is often so sad, so melancholy, so blue, that you think you can't get through it, so that the act of reading it replicates how Rhys must have felt about life and the world in general: too gorgeous and brutal for words. She is best known for her last novel, Wide Sargasso Sea, a reinterpretation of Jane Eyre. For me, her earlier novels are the strongest, the most unrelenting in their beautiful remorse. Start with After Leaving Mr. Mackenzie and work your way through to Good Morning, Midnight.

I was excited when The Blue Hour came out, because very few biographies on Rhys exist. After buying the book, I packed it in my bag for a recent trip to Italy. It seemed a good place to engross myself in Rhys' life, though her particular adulthood haunt was France. In any case, Italy is nearer than Memphis, and closer in spirit and tone. I've been obsessed with perfume for over a year now, relentlessly obsessed to some, and yet I had no reason to associate Jean Rhys with anything from that world and made no connection between the title of the book and the beloved Guerlain perfume. Reading the foreword on the plane was a moment of epiphany, because of course Rhys would have loved L'Heure Bleue. It makes perfect sense. It was perhaps the only fragrance for her uniquely lonely world view, but more than telling me something new about Rhys, the connection has opened my eyes about L'Heure Bleue itself.

Often described in a way which makes it seem sad and cool in an almost satirically quaint way, L'Heure Bleue is in fact magnificently, deeply melancholic, an unlikely, tense but simultaneously languid fusion of the medicinal and the floral, both edible and inedible. There is carnation against iris, itself enough contrast for a dozen perfumes, the warmth of tonka and vanilla working alongside a powdery detachment. It is spicy but sweet, powdery dry but dewy, a study in perfectly calibrated contrasts, so well blended that they cease to be contradictions; rather, a persistent sense of vaguely perceived oppositions precariously balanced into some sort of olfactory truce. This delicate balance is a wondrous thing, giving you the sense that to breathe the wrong way might send it all flying back into discord like dandelion fluff.

I went straight out to the nearest profumeria in Milan, where I purchased a bottle in EDP concentration. I need it with me as I read The Blue Hour, I decided, a ticket into Rhys's headspace. L'Heure Bleue reminds me of moments I've since had here in Lugano, Switzerland, where I've been staying for the last several days. A wall of windows in my host's apartment looks out over a parallel wall, higher and wider still, of softly sloping mountains. Buildings dot these, clustered at the bottom. Trees cover their angular reality with an illusion of cozy tenderness.

The city surrounds an enormous lake. I saw it up close as the train came in from Milano. I left Italy reluctantly, feeling somehow, somewhere, someone had gotten it wrong. I'd ended up in America rather than Italy, where I clearly belonged. My family came from Lucca over fifty years ago. What kind of mistake was that--and how had we paid for it? And now my life back "home" is so complicated, I reminded myself, that there's no getting out of it, and of course much of it I don't want to leave, making things more difficult, more confusing, more bittersweet. I thought of all I'd be losing in the imagined immigration back to Italy.

Lugano is impossibly pretty. There's a garden outside with a chaise lawnchair waiting for me as I write this. It's seven o'clock and the mountains have gone foggy, imbued with a faint cast of pale, powdery blue. They seem like an apparition, an embodiment of my conflicted feelings. My sadness has lingered into the visit. It got off the train with me. I stare out the windows into this beautiful landscape, seeing it through that sadness, and twilight, which should be descending any minute now, will erode the boundaries between this beauty and sadness even further, so that they seem one and the same thing, the differences between the two indistinguishable, something you can only live with, or through.

This is L'Heure Bleue for me. And, reading The Blue Hour, I think it was something like this for Jean Rhys, too. It's some kind of consolation, learning we have this in common.