Dior Addict: A Review

It was only a matter of time before I got to Dior Addict. I’d guess that anyone who loves Loulou, Amarige and other big, loud floral-orientals would be inclined to like Addict. Addict is an attention getting fragrance. It’s a sultry, sexy, spicy, complex vanillic fragrance. I love Addict.

Don’t get the wrong impression of me. I’m not the woman in the office that everyone gags when they’re around because of the headache-inducing cloud of perfume surrounding her. I wear all types of fragrances and they aren’t all loud. I certainly don’t over-apply the uber-strong ones – but, without a doubt, there’s a place in my heart for certain fragrances that so many love to hate. Like Angel for instance – love it.

Addict is a rather difficult perfume to describe. It’s complex and smells differently from person to person and from day to day. Overall Addict is a citrusy-vanilla-floral-oriental. The structure of Addict reminds me of Angel. By this I mean it’s an addictive (I had to use addictive just once!) combination of traditionally feminine and masculine notes. Addict has a good dose of heady florals and vanillic sweetness, the typical feminine stuff, but it also contains a balancing amount of dry ambery woods, and it’s this combination that makes it so good. If Addict were solely a sweet sticky floral-vanilla I’d surely find it gaggity. The addition of the dry woods and spices give it depth and diffuses the sweetness - so instead of being repulsive it makes you want to smell it again and again.

I won’t lie to you and tell you it’s not a trashy fragrance. Addict smells utterly trashy. But it’s a good trashy. Addict is definitely that rebellious sister, friend or aunt that seems to live a rather (ahem) interesting life that you’d love to experience for maybe a month. I have an aunt named Paula. Paula was brilliant. She was a straight “A” student, got into an Ivy League college, quit college, became an exotic dancer, moved to California, did lots of drugs, wrote a book, married 4 times, re-married husband #1 recently, had a string of interesting and oddball jobs, owned a bookstore once, was a therapist for a few years (yup, a sex therapist), traveled the world, created her own line of vitamins, and is now a yoga instructor. Addict makes me think of my aunt Paula. It’s trashy yet it’s interesting, intelligent, thoughtful and creative.

To describe Addict more specifically, it starts as a citrus and very sweet vanilla scent. It’s not among the listed notes but Chandler Burr mentions that Addict contains coumarin. Coumarin is a sweet synthetic smelling vanillic-almond-salt water taffy aroma. Addict smells mostly of citrusy coumarin for the first 30 minutes or so. This isn’t my favorite part. Addict becomes a great fragrance once it dries down and the sweetness fades a little and the spicy, ambery woody notes appear. Upon dry down Addict shows it’s most interesting facets – it swirls about in a circle of sweet coumarin, florals and cinnamon, amber & spice.

Addict is not for the faint of heart. But if you like the occasional loud fragrance with sillage and longevity to spare check it out.

Longevity: Forever
Sillage: Huge – be careful

Notes: mandarin leaf, silk tree flower, Queen of the Night flower, rose, jasmine, orange blossom, absolute of bourbon vanilla, sandalwood from Mysore and tonka bean.

UPDATED a few moments after posting: Actually I just had an epiphany. Addict reminds me a lot of a supercharged Trouble by Boucheron on steroids.

Givenchy Amarige Harvest Edition 2007: A Review

Today I went to the Short Hills mall in New Jersey. The fictional family from the Sopranos lived right around the corner in Caldwell. Carmella and Meadow must have loved shopping here. This mall is a dream for perfume fanatics. Stores of note: Saks, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Sephora, L’Occitane, Molton Brown, Bloomingdales and Macy’s.

I went in search of two new fragrances: Lolita Lempicka Forbidden Flower and Hermes Un Jardins Apres la Mousson.
I purchased the following: Amarige 2007 Limited Harvest Edition, Prada Infusion d'Iris, Missoni Aqua, Annick Goutal Petit Cherie, Comptur Sud Amour Cacao, Lolita Lempicka Forbidden Flower, Kenzo Amour Indian Holi. Unfortunately, Hermes Un Jardins Apres la Mousson was out of stock everywhere.

I’ll discuss all the others later, tonight I’m swooning all over myself because of the Amarige 2007 Limited Harvest Edition. I adore the regular Amarige. But this stuff is stunning. It’s like regular Amarige minus anything noticeably synthetic and with greater mimosa clarity. Givenchy says the main note of Amarige is mimosa. The Limited Harvest Edition contains Mimosa exclusively from Tamil, Nadu, India. Apparently 2007 was an exceptional year for mimosa from Tamil, Nadu, India. I guess perfume is similar to wine in this regard. Like grapes, floral harvests vary from year to year. I might have though this was a marketing gimmick until I smelt the juice and my knees buckled.

Amarige 2007 Limited Harvest Edition doesn’t conjure up any childhood associations or memories for me like most other perfumes do. If I had to (upon the threat of death or something) choose a perfume that I consider to be my signature scent it would be Amarige. Givenchy launched Amarige in 1992 and I began wearing it in 1994 or so. I was in college. I wore Amarige exclusively for the next 4 years. Being just out of college and broke had something to do with wearing it for 4 years straight, but I do love it just the same. As much as it’s considered a very popular fragrance I never come across anyone wearing it. Not being from India or wherever else mimosa grows naturally I’m not familiar with the scent of mimosa. I’ve smelt Mimosa Pour Moi by L’Artisan but this is so light and subtle and smells nothing like Amarige. The image that comes to mind when I wear and smell Amarige is orange molten lava. In fact, the color association is most definitely orange, an orangey-yellowish-brown crusted lava. It’s lava because the fragrance is thick, warm and enveloping. It’s thick and heavy but also airy all at the same time. One does need to be careful with light application because too much and it could easily walk in the room a few feet before you and stay 10 minutes after you leave.

Technically it’s a floral oriental with a woody base. Among the listed top notes for Amarige are neroli, mandarin leaf and coumarin. This makes sense, because I love neroli and I also love Lou Lou by Cacharel which is said to be based upon coumarin. Coumarin is an old fashioned perfume note, and when it’s done well I think it lends a sophistication and timelessness to modern perfumes.

I looked up Coumarin and found this from Wikipedia: Coumarin is a chemical compound (benzopyrone): a toxin found in many plants, notably in high concentration in the tonka bean, woodruff, mullein and bison grass. It has a sweet scent, readily recognized as the scent of newly-mown hay, and has been used in perfumes since 1882. The name comes from a French word, coumarou, for the tonka bean.

The newly mown hay note must be what gives Amarige it’s greenish airy quality.

Oh, Amarige, you are such a complex and gorgeous fragrance, you’re citrusy & green (neroli, coumarin & mandarin leaf), yet you’re heavy and airy, while also earthy and woody, and after a few hours you become orange molten lava all set upon an airy woody base. Amarige is complex, unusual, feisty and unabashedly sexy. If Amarige were a person, she’d be one very complicated dame. She’d be sometimes unbearable, but mostly a magnetically charming knockout. But she doesn’t stop there, I told you she was complicated, she’s much more than just a sexy vixen, because she also has a heart and softness and a worldly sophistication that is certainly classy and timeless. She is so utterly enigmatic and impossible to describe that when you wear her she simply becomes you.