Wrapped in Fantasy: Andy Tauer's Loretta

When I first smelled Loretta, a little less than a year ago now, I wasn't prepared for it. Andy Tauer and I had been discussing Miriam, the first fragrance in the Tableau de Parfums line, for some time by then, and I'd had some time to get my mind around that one. Loretta was a sucker punch, and seemed to come out of left field.

Miriam, as some of you maybe know by now, was inspired by the character in a film series Andy and I have been doing together, Woman's Picture, and it speaks directly to the character of the same name played by Ann Magnuson.

Miriam, the woman, is heavily influenced by the past. Gripped by it, really. Her life is at a crisis point and she looks back to the past for comfort, maybe in a distorted way, certainly nostalgically; like a lot of us she looks back and selectively chooses to remember the good parts. She filters out the things she'd rather not carry forward with her pretty aggressively. The fragrance associated with her character is an interesting dichotomy and speaks to these conflicted feelings, paying homage to classical perfumery from a distinctly modern vantage point. Full of grand gestures, accented by sweet, bright moments, Miriam walks into an old, dim room where the past is all around, and throws open the windows to let the sunlight in.

All of the characters in Woman's Picture thus far are pretty complicated. That's a central premise of the series for us, I think: women, people, are much more complex than our impressions or accounts of them would lead us to believe. It can be difficult to see them as they are, watching so closely only for things we can handle and recognize. Loretta, played by Amy LaVere, is maybe the most perplexing woman of all in this series. Part femme fatale, part guileless child, her motivations are opaque, and reading her can be a bit bewildering. It's unclear why she does what she does. There are no concrete signals with her. Her face, and her persona, are totally inscrutable.

I couldn't imagine how Andy would translate her world into a scent. I might have been doubtful that he could - that anyone, even a talented, perceptive perfumer, could. Without giving me advance notice, Andy sent me a sample of the Loretta fragrance in progress. We were in the midst of trying to find words for Miriam, making our decisions about what that fragrance meant, how it might relate to its namesake character, how we might communicate all that. My mind was consumed by those issues and challenges, and when Loretta arrived in the mail I was in deep in Miriam's "voice".

I opened the package in my car and spritzed some on my hand, and was blown away. I'm not sure how he did it, but Andy translated all of Loretta's tricky, deceptive complications into a scent. It was the first time in a while I'd been surprised like that by a fragrance, left without words to describe what I was smelling, and yet the fragrance was so emphatic that it seemed like it couldn't have been anything else, however unexpected. Immediately I was frustrated. How would I manage to refrain from talking about it for months to come, until its release in September of 2012? Asking someone who loves perfume not to talk about something so fantastic seemed pretty unrealistic to me.



To say that Loretta is a tuberose fragrance is to me like calling Notre Dame a building. It isn't that it's a large fragrance particularly. In some ways, it's quite soft. I wouldn't say it's grand in the way, say, Miriam might be. Like Cinnabar, for instance, Loretta has a smoldering, fuzzy warmth to it. The tuberose is laid out on a bed of woods and spices, and has a dreamy, moody quality. Like Loretta the character, it's wrapped up in its own fantasies. Andy has called Loretta sensual, and it is that. I would say voluptuous. It has some of Loretta the character's sweetness and childlike qualities - a bit of fruitiness throughout. But the sensuous aspects make it feel very adult and mysterious, and the plum note feels decidedly forbidden.

I'm a fan of tuberose, but this is no Fracas or Carnal Flower. Those scents, for me, are principally bright, however creamy the former, however rich and complex the latter. Loretta is a different kind of sensuality and a different kind of tuberose, like nothing I've smelled before. It's the first tuberose I've smelled that truly takes things in the direction of dark mystery. I'm hopelessly biased when it comes to Andy, of course, but can tell you this is not only a different tuberose but a different Tauer. It's one of my top five fragrances of all time, for reasons I'm probably just as hopelessly unable to describe.

I was excited when Andy offered to make the fragrance available for our kickstarter campaign for ONLY CHILD, the second feature length film in the Woman's Picture series. We begin shooting the film in April, if we can meet out kickstarter goal by the deadline on March 29th. Excited because for those interested in smelling the fragrance a little early, it can be shared, and I might have people to talk about it with. Excited more than anything because it's one of my favorite fragrances and I think it will surprise others as much as it has me.

The fragrance won't be available to the general public until September. There are 16 days left in our campaign to get a sneak sniff. The help and support of perfume lovers is most important to us, as we make these films for you really. Your encouragement and support is invaluable to us, and we've tried to come up with incentives in the kickstarter campaign that will work hard to repay you in advance for your support of our efforts.

If you haven't visited the page lately, please check it out here.

We've added Loretta and several other fragrant items (two more soaps by Andy, as well as the opportunity to get a full bottle of any fragrance in the extended Tauer range at a discount).

Notes: ripe dark fruit, a velvet rose, spicy tuberose, orange blossom, pathcouli, woody notes, ambergris, leather, sweetened orris.

Above is a clip from Woman's Picture showing Loretta immersed in her complex fantasy world.

Dark Passage: A Limited Edition Fragrance by Andy Tauer

For the next 25 days, Dark Passage, a limited edition fragrance by Andy Tauer made exclusively for the Woman's Picture series, will be available here.

Dark Passage is a film noir fragrance, and is presented as part of a new series in the Tableau de Parfum/Woman's Picture project called "Snapshots".

Packaged in 7ml enamel atomizers and available in limited edition quanities, the Tableau Snapshots are smaller in scale, providing Tauer the opportunity to experiment with new ideas. The snapshot fragrances are hand held, and seek to preserve fleeting moments in time.

Dark Passage is being presented for only the next several weeks as part of the kickstarter campaign for ONLY CHILD, a mother/daughter noir in the tradition of Mildred Pierce and Now, Voyager starring Grace Zabriskie (Big Love, Twin Peaks) as a mother searching for her vanished daughter. ONLY CHILD is the second feature film in the Woman's Picture series. We start shooting it in April.

I was always resistant to do a kickstarter fundraising campaign in the past, but this time I wanted to do one, as long as I could do one well. When I say well I mean a campaign that includes true incentives, rather than well-intentioned "thank you's" alone. When I started looking at kickstarter campaigns before building our own for ONLY CHILD, I was surprised to see that people didn't offer more for donations. After all, you're asking people for help. If you're making a film, you're creative, nine times out of ten. Why not pull together all your creative resources and come up with something that really thanks them?

Andy and I came up with a lot of incentives for your average person who can do without perfume but loves film. But we wanted to do something extra special for people like us who love fragrance. I was so happy when I first smelled Dark Passage, because in a sea of mass marketed banality I knew it would feel special, smell special, be special, and few things feel that way anymore. We would be forever grateful if you helped us out with this film. Like Woman's Picture it deals thematically with perfume. I make these films for you. I really do. If you like them I know I did good. But in addition to our gratitude and making a good film we want to offer you something else in return.

Dark Passage contains patchouli, cacao, birch tar, and iris, among other things.

Inspiration:

Noir films are typically black and white. Dark Passage isn't quite so polarized, but it contains equally bold contrasts. The wonderfully rich, refined patchouli used by Andy in the fragrance is something to behold, at once earthy and clean shaven. Birch tar and cacao move this patchouli theme in interesting directions, evoking the open road and the small town diner, steaming cups of coffee on a formika countertop, bright sun coming in parallel lines through window blinds, crisscrossing a dim room with their highly keyed stripes. DARK PASSAGE is both femme fatale and private eye, a happy union between feminine and masculine.  It speaks in Lauren Bacall's smoky baritone and regards you with Bogart's level gaze.

Andy Tauer has made the fragrance available this one time and this one time only in an effort to help raise the kickstarter goal for ONLY CHILD and help get the film made. After the campaign, Dark Passage, like a fugitive character out of noir, will never show its face again.  Please check out the kickstarter page to see what other things are available for your donation (hint: an exclusive soap built around tuberose) and comment on the page if the mood hits you. With any donation above 15 dollars you'll get an online link to Woman's Picture, our first film.

Note: surprises are coming there in the next week or two, including a sneak peak sniff opportunity or two.

Honey, I Stunk the Kids: Byredo M/Mink

Even among the fragrances I love, there are those I put on once in a while and like a little less than I usually do, but Byredo M/Mink never fails to to satisfy. It took me about six months to a year after I first heard about it to get my hands on some, and I expected to be disappointed, or at least only mildly enthused. I wasn't prepared to admire it as much as I do, but the reaction was instantaneously favorable. M/Mink pushes all the right buttons for me.

A wonderfully strange mix of honey, incense, and aldehydes, M/Mink is one of those fragrances people on the perfume forums warn you to give time to mellow out on your skin. They complain about the top notes and advise patience, promising a more bearable result as your reward. I've never really understood this line of thought, because generally when I like a fragrance two hours later I liked it two hours before. M/Mink, especially, smells pretty linear to me. And in fact that first spritz is maybe the best part of all, if only because it never fails to give me a little shock of pleasure.

Honey I guess is a love/hate element in perfume. The most legendary use that comes to mind, or at least the most polarizing, is in Serge Lutens' now discontinued Miel de Bois, where the stuff is so overloaded you feel you've wandered into a neglected public restroom. More recently, honey was used more subtly in Aromatics Elixir Perfumer's Reserve, its acrid bitterness made plush by jasmine, rose, and orange blossom. Honey, or something like it, was a staple in a lot of the 80s fragrances I love - Ted Lapidus Creation, YSL Kouros, Rumba, and Guerlain Jardins de Bagatelle come to mind, though not all of them list it - often mixed with so much tuberose that where one begins and the other ends is anyone's guess.

M/Mink has an entirely different approach. Rather than emphasize honey's drippy, dense qualities, it shoots it through with aldehydes. Givaudin describes Adoxal, the aldehyde listed in M/Mink's published pyramid, as "fresh, marine, powerful, floral," adding that it blends well with floral notes but, more to the point here, "can also be seen as having a typical 'fresh linen' odour which makes it very useful for detergent perfumes."

I would call M/Mink minimalistic. Others have called it unfinished. But it's only unfinished to me in the way an Agnes Martin painting would be. That fresh linen quality, contrasted with honey and frankincense, registers alternately as animalic and inky, justifying the name. There's something like hot steam and iron in M/Mink. It's both balsamic and breezy, unwashed and clean. Only a minimalistic composition, a bold juxtaposition, could achieve such a strange but harmonious contrast, by turns stark and full bodied. An underlying waxiness is maybe the best part to me, because it somehow seems incompatible with the overall blend, and yet right at home.

It's harder and harder to achieve such startling, or refreshing, results in modern perfumery. Most perfumes seem trapped in the losing battle to recreate the big picture past of classic perfumery with increasingly thinned out materials meant to mimic the opulence of the things they replace. M/Mink does an about face, showing I think that the road ahead might be less, artfully judged, rather than more, artlessly combined.

(Pictured above: an untitled painting by Agnes Martin, circa 1997)

Hanging Out with the Gorillas: Several Lush Scents

You can tell Mark and Simon Constantine, the father and son perfumers behind the Lush fragrances and their offshoots, first B Never Too Busy to Be Beautiful then Gorilla Perfume, are having a good time. The fragrances are touch and go but often at least interesting, and more often than not surprising. Some of them are very good.

The packaging, once pretty naff (hot glued dime store jewels! Confetti! Cheap metal pedestals!) is now avant garde utilitarian, basic black, allowing the scents to speak for themselves, unless you're venturing the wilds of the brick and mortar satellite stores, with all their ear-piercing, nose singeing, slumber party fanfare. I say visit Lush online, where no one will rush up to you with a mixing bowl and some mysterious mud they insist on slathering somewhere, because the fragrances are fun enough they don't require a rave party or a glow stick to get you revved up.

There's a bias against Lush - not just from people who are turned off by the noise- and air- and eye-pollution of these pungent, neon-saturated satellite stores - but from many perfumistas/bloggers, for whom anything short of 150 dollars and a certain kind of wan exclusivity is worthy only of meticulous disdain.

It's true, you probably won't sign a book deal writing about Lush. You won't be invited to dinner or court with Serge. There's a risk that people won't think you are discriminating, that you drink at home out of plastic cups and record episodes of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills for anything other than anthropological research.

It might even be true that people will avoid you altogether if you admit to admiring Karma, thinking you must not truly appreciate the original Coty Chypre, and question your judgment: after all, why would anyone who wants to be taken seriously admit to liking something so Mitsouko-oppositional? How will you get a regular column in the New York Times if you admit to appreciating anything so base?

Alas, I can't answer these questions. I can only put my unworthy bourgeois little tail between my legs and tell you what my favorites are among these pedestrian-centric scents. I've already written about other favorites (Karma, Icon, Orange Blossom, Tuca Tuca). These are the newest additions:

DIRTY

I couldn't get behind this one at first, let alone wrap my head around it, so it seemed certain I would eventually like it a lot. Like Andy Tauer's Pentachord Verdant, Dirty has a persistent minty diffusion that you're either going to love or write long essays about, citing its foulness, its failure, its unmitigated gall. Dirty has a strange aquatic thing going on, as well, which the snob nose will shorthand, stupidly, as "synthetic".  Aquatic and minty aren't things I myself get in line for typically. Add to this the name's confusion. Dirty isn't dirty at all; neither animalic nor grungy.  Some say skank. I don't get that either. I do get herbs: the tarragon, maybe, in addition to the mint. Maybe thyme? Who knows.  Like a lot of the Gorilla scents, Dirty has a weird kind of creamy base, which works well here, bridging its contrasts. There's something simultaneously metallic and organic about the fragrance, bracing but relaxed. The listed notes are tarragon, mint, thyme, oakmoss, and sandalwood. It coasts along indefinitely, infinitely reversing your decisions about it.

DEAR JOHN

Dear John takes recognizable mainstream masculine motifs and twists them in some interesting directions. Vetiver, pine, and cedar are familiar territory, and while clove, coriander, lime and coffee aren't exactly strangers to the format, the overall combination feels just a little more interesting than the average fare. Just enough for me that you get a sense where so many of its kind go wrong. Dear John's coffee note isn't as forthcoming as in other masculines which make use of it. Neither is the clove.  The lime hops right out at you but settles down soon enough. It just wants to make sure you know it's there, and it plays nicely with the vetiver. At first you think you're smelling some country cousin of Guerlain Vetiver, all tart and woodsy. After a few minutes that comparison seems pretty suspect. The truth is I reach for Dear John far more often than I do GV, which in recent years has become so transparent that it's technically its own country cousin. The reason the comparison seems suspect, I think, is that Dear John is closer to the shock of pleasure I remember first smelling GV, years ago.

COCKTAIL

It's a brave fragrance that doesn't immediately busy itself apologizing for the rubbery, mentholated facets of Ylang Ylang.  The closest comparison I have for Cocktail is Aveda's Number 20, but even number 20 gets a little embarrassed by the direction it's taking, and back pedals about half way through, arranging itself in a more ladylike pose.  Cocktail has something in common with Tubereuse Criminelle in its boldness, and the price point confirms what Lutens works hard to deny: what makes this kind of juxtaposition so fantastic is essentially its straightforwardly crude approach. There's nothing delicate about it, and I'm not sure even Lush gets it right by calling this a fragrance for a fancy night out. Cocktail might be nocturnal, but it's heading for a speakeasy, and if pearls are part of the equation they're only an ironic means to a decidedly hedonistic end. That isn't to say Cocktail is animalic, which is usually the shorthand for a fragrance put to such uses.  Part of what makes Cocktail so wonderful to me is that it gets to the same place by entirely different strategies. It has the kind of good natured carnality no amount of civet or castoreum can match, and it's ultimately more about the fun of the hunt than the spoils anyway.

IMOGEN ROSE

Back wen I first smelled this, it was my least favorite of its bunch (Tuca Tuca and Orange Blossom, which came out right around the same time). It's grown on me. What I disliked initially about Imogen Rose I now appreciate most: the dread powder. I spend so much time defending scents which don't really smell like powder against the accusations by non-perfume lovers who see it everywhere they look that when I do smell it I tend to dismiss it out of hand. Every time I smell Imogen Rose I like it a little more, so that now, a year or so later, I like it very much. The listed notes, in addition to the obvious, are iris root, ambrette seed, tonka bean, vetiver, and bergamot. I might have gotten used to the powder, but IR seems less powdery to me than it once did. What I smell now is iris, and IR has turned out to be one of my favorite uses of it.  I first thought IR was a bit dowdy as well. I don't get that anymore either. Go figure. IR reminds me a lot of Hermes Hiris, but it satisfies every expectation that Hiris disappointed. In the past year, I've looked to many niche fragrances for this kind of pleasure and richness, and found them lacking.  All this time, it was right under my nose.

25:43

I like 1000 Kisses, a strange little medley of apricot, mandarin, and (allegedly) resins, but it's such a light kiss that I might have subtracted several zeroes. 25:43 is more my style, and could use the extra digits in its name, giving its citrusy elements more oomph with vanilla, ylang, and a laurel note I find addictive. I suppose it comes down to the difference between sweet little batting-eye pecks on the cheek and an open mouth approach. As with many Gorilla scents (too many to name) I thought I didn't like 25:43 much at first. After wearing it for an afternoon I changed my mind. Apparently, Mark Constantine created the fragrance in honor of his son's wedding day, picturing his bride walking down the aisle, with lime and tonka. It was said to "capture the moment beautifully." Later, son Simon added the rest, because as we all know, the wedding aisle leads to the bedroom.

I haven't tried some of the latest Gorilla offerings like Twilight, Silky Underwear, and Rose Jam. Thoughts from those who have?

Our Winter 2012 Top Favorites (and more): A Joint Blogging Project

This is my first winter in the southeast and goodness gracious it’s a mild one.  Not a flake of snow, hardly any rain, and most days are in the 60s.  I noticed a magnolia tree in my neighbor’s yard starting to bloom a few days ago.  I know the weather isn’t usually so warm but after the record breaking hot & humid summer we deserve a nice winter.

Even though true winter temperatures elude me, I have pulled out all my usual faves the past few months anyway (hey, it’s in the 50s & 60s which sometimes feels sort of chilly lately!).  My winter scents are all about spices, woods, patchouli, amber and near-gourmands.  A big favorite the past month has been Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant, which I only recently fell in love with after years of not getting it.  I certainly get  Jungle L’Elephant now and now that we're BFFs I'll never be without it.  After a post from The Non Blonde about a wonderful tea company called Harney & Sons, I have been pairing Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant with a seriously good tea, Harney & Sons Hot Cinnamon Spice.  This tea is life-changing.  I've actually mailed tea bags to various friends and family so they could experience the deliciousness of Harney & Sons Hot Cinnamon Spice.

I’m in a book club now so we vote each month on what we’ll read.  This month its Stephen King’s 11/22/63 and I’m still slogging through this hefty volume.  It’s OK.  The best book I’ve read in the past few months was The Sister’s Brothers by Patrick deWitt.  I have a Kindle now so it seems I can’t get through books fast enough.  There are so many I want to read and I can acquire them so quickly.  I do sometimes miss the feel and experience of real books, though.  So I pepper my book buying between purchasing real books and Kindle books.  

The after-Christmas sale at Bath & Body Works saw me buying a year’s supply of my favorite wallflowers in Sensual Amber.  This scent is really nice for the bedroom.  It smells like amber should; not foodie but almost an ambergris-amber.  I’m also still enjoying B&BWs Fresh Balsam candles (I should be still be enjoying them since I bought 12).  Fresh Balsam is an invigorating scent with excellent throw.  It does smell like Christmas but it also simply smells of a pine forest which works for me all through the winter months.

Previously a fan of Chobani and Siggi’s greek yogurt I’ve now converted to Trader Joe’s Vanilla Bean Nonfat Greek yogurt.  There are actual flecks of vanilla bean in this stuff.  It’s delicious.

Other fragrances I’ve been enjoying the past month or so are two entries from Parfums Divine: L’Inspiratrice and L’ame Soeur.  L’ame Soeur has recently been reformulated.  This latest, updated version of L’ame Soeur is less aldehydic than the original.  At first I wasn’t sure I liked it as much but now I’m gaga for it.  It’s rosier, brighter and more floral.  It’s still aldehydic and very close to the original but you can sniff the differences side-by-side.

I’ve also been enjoy the original FlowerbyKenzo.  I think folks about 10 years younger than me have always known about Kenzo Flower.  Somehow I wasn’t aware of it when it launched, or I vaguely remember trying it and not smelling much.  Lately I find it to be an easy-going powdery violet floral.  I’m surprised it doesn’t come up more often when people are looking for a nice violet entry.   It’s definitely not all about violet, but the overall feel is parma violets to me.

 For fans of SNL-type comedy you must watch Portlandia.  

Unlike last year, I haven’t enjoyed most of the films nominated for an Oscar.  I saw The Descendants last week and thought it was good; some great characters but nothing amazing.  The IMDb summary could be: rich white folks living in paradise still have some issues.

I’m going through a sun-dried tomato phase.  I buy the little dried bags at Trader Joe’s (no oil, just a bag of loose sun-dried tomatoes) and add them to everything.  You’d be surprised how sweet tomatoes can be.

Two fragrances I know I like but haven’t fallen head over heels for yet:  Mary Greenwell’s Plum and Tommi Sooni Tarantella.  Both are wonderfully classic and well-crafted offerings in a sea of mediocrity and while I like wearing them I’m just not getting verklempt about them (yet).  I would still highly recommend both to those who enjoy floral diet-chypres (Plum) and spicy, green chypres (Tarantella). 

Other favorite fragrances I've been wearing (and I feel like a broken record with these!) are Teo Cabanel Alahine, Canturi eau de parfum, Love, Chloe Eau Intense, Jo Malone Vanille & Anise and M. Micallef Gaiac.

Special Thanks to Elena of PerfumeShrine for organizing this joint project!  

Other participating blogs are as follows:

All I Am A Redhead

Waft by Carol

Katie Puckrik Smells

The Non Blonde

Under the Cupola

So, what's new with you dear reader?  What are you enjoying in perfume and many other arenas this winter? Do tell..... :)

Parfums Divine L'Inspiratrice: Perfume Review

I’ve noticed recently that several of my all-time favorite perfumes fall into a similar category as Parfums Divine L’Inspiratrice.  This category consists of fragrances which have a classical oriental structure but might initially seem boring, ordinary and definitely not groundbreaking.  Let me digress for a moment to say that I am so tired of the “groundbreaking” label. Groundbreaking is used in a manner that suggests anything which isn’t groundbreaking is derivative and not especially good.  I don’t care whether a fragrance is groundbreaking or not, I only care whether it smells amazing.  In fact, only about 2-3 of my very favorite fragrances would fit the “groundbreaking” label.

In any event, this seems a sort of defensive way to begin a review of Divine L’Inspiratrice, and perhaps I shouldn’t have begun in this manner because there are no defenses necessary in admitting just how much I love this gem from Parfums Divine.

L’Inspiratrice was created by Richard Ibanez and introduced six years ago in 2006.  A quick categorization of L’Inspiratrice would be that it’s a rose-patchouli-aldehyde scent but that would be almost a useless description of it.  When I think of rose-patchouli fragrances I imagine L’Artisan Voleur de Rose, Gucci L’Arte di Gucci, Teo Cabanel Oha, Frederic Malle Une Rose, Bond No. 9 West Side and so many others.  L’Inspiratrice isn’t nearly as rosy nor as earthy as most of the well-known perfumes in the rose-patchouli category.    Rose IS present and patchouli IS also present, especially at the start, but these two elements are not the only or most prominent members of the cast.  The most crucial part of understanding and enjoying L’Inspiratrice is to really wear it.   Spray L’Inspiratrice liberally on yourself, give it a good sniff, then come back and sniff it again in an hour.  The dry down of L’Inspiratrice is heaven.  

Angela over at Now Smell This made an interesting observation about Divine L’Inspiratrice.  Angela suggests that there really isn’t a base to L’Inspiratrice.  It’s as if the fragrance is exceedingly diffuse, hanging about me in a veil, without a grounding base.  This is something I love about the way L’Inspiratrice wears, it is the absolute definition of a veil-like scent; it’s all airy sillage, not dense, but wonderfully diffuse.  Not having a hefty base doesn’t mean it won’t stick around.  In fact, L’Inspiratrice sticks around at least 6 hours on me and the dry down is the best part.

L’Inspiratrice begins as a rose-patchouli scent but, as I’ve already mentioned, it isn’t especially rosy or heavy on earthy patchouli.  The rose is done with a light hand and it’s a warm, sweet rose.  The patchouli is also done with a light hand and this isn’t a heavy, earthy patchouli but instead an effervescent airy patchouli.  The heart of the fragrance builds into a sweeter floral-patchouli, that is recognizably a patchouli note but one I would think even patchouli-haters might enjoy.   The dry down becomes a soft musky tonka vanilla.  This is one of those fragrances where it seems downright silly trying to dissect its various notes because it is above all an abstract perfume and one which is more amazing than its list of notes could ever suggest.

Divine L’Inspiratrice is classic, refined, airy, diffuse and an outstanding patchouli creation.  

Official notes list: Rose, ylang-ylang, vanilla, tonka bean, vetiver, patchouli

Other reviews:

Perfume Smellin Things  

Fragrance Bouquet 

Savvy Thinker 

Legerdenez 

Lalique Le Parfum: A Review

 

I’ve been wearing Lalique Le Parfum occasionally for several years.  It’s interesting the way I’m noticing different facets of familiar fragrances these days.  Initially I thought Lalique Le Parfum was a beautiful, sweet vanilla-oriental, but slightly boring.  I still think of Lalique Le Parfum as a beautiful sweet vanilla-oriental but now I find it to be an unusual vanilla fragrance.  It’s a sweet vanilla scent with a striking twist which sets it apart from most other vanilla-orientals.  

The notes list is fairly helpful with this one.  I’ll post the notes here and then discuss further below

Top notes: bay leaf, bergamot and pink peppercorn
Middle notes: jasmine and heliotrope
Base notes: sandalwood, tonka bean, patchouli and vanilla

Lalique Le Parfum begins with a minty-pepper quality positioned atop a boozy whipped vanilla base.  The vanilla is so frothy and fluffy it makes me think of a down-stuffed pillow, filled with the finest white feathers but also the softest and most powdery marshmallows.  The minty and peppery top notes are slightly green and herbaceous and a wonderful contrast with the sweet fluff found beneath.  What I’ve decided after many years is that Lalique Le Parfum is unusual because it showcases a beautiful tension between two seemingly contrasting accords, the minty-pepper top over the sweet, fluffy base.  For me, the top notes stick around throughout and never leave the vanilla all by itself.   There is a touch of patchouli in the base, which I don’t think of as especially noticeable, but I know it’s there because it tempers the sweetness of the frothy vanilla and almondy heliotropin.

I normally can’t wear vanilla-centric fragrances so you know if I love this there must be something different about it.  Lalique Le Parfum is not an edible gourmand.  Even though I’ve described it as smelling like fluffy vanilla and marshmallows it’s still an abstract oriental and not a foodie creation.  Lalique Le Parfum makes me think of candy canes and powdery snow.  There’s a chilly effect and I imagine myself peering through a frosty window from the outside as a wintry wind swirls snowflakes around me as I gaze into an elegant dining room decorated in white and gold with a centerpiece made of peppermint candies. 

Dominique Ropion is the nose behind this wonderful fragrance.  It was released in 2005.  When it was first released it was expensive, but now it can be found for a fraction of it's retail price.

Other reviews of Lalique Le Parufm:

Bois de Jasmin

Perfume Smellin' Things

Kenzo Jungle L'Elephant: Perfume Review

About four years ago, Brian sent me a decant of Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant with the idea that I’d fall head over heels in love.  I tried it and I was confused.  Jungle L’Elephant wasn’t awful, but I just couldn’t understand this fragrance in the least.  This doesn’t happen to me often.  In fact, I think this is the first time I ever experienced a fragrance in an entirely new way several years later.  The first several tries (and I definitely tried this stuff at least a half dozen times) on skin I found it to be oddly fuzzy, blurry, almost hazy and wiggly.  I remember it tickled my nose and made it feel twitchy.  Jungle L’Elephant seemed a little gamey and very, very murky.  I could never get past this furry murkiness to evaluate the fragrance.  Back then, I thought this strange sensation was the sum total of the fragrance and I just didn’t get it.  I never disliked it; I just found it to be an unusual olfactory experience.  So many reviews described Jungle L’Elephant as spicy, cozy and wonderful but I just felt left out of all the fun.

Fast forward almost 4 years to Monday of this week. Orders for The Posh Peasant were being filled by my part-time helper as I walked into the room.  The air was filled with this amazing smell. I stopped in my tracks.  Normally, I can identify what has been sprayed fairly accurately.  I’m familiar with almost every fragrance we have in stock.  But this…this amazing smell…was completely new to me.  It was spicy and warm but not foodie.  The aroma lingering in the air wasn’t dense but diffuse, it was clearly an oriental with gorgeous spice notes but not one I was familiar with.  At that moment, if I had to guess I would have suggested it was something like Amouage Epic…but without certainty.  I knew this totally new-to-me perfume was something spicy and slightly sweet but very unusual.  I considered maybe it was something new that I hadn't smelled yet.  Finally I just asked what it was that had just been sprayed and was told “Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant.”  I was shocked.

So now that I had smelled Jungle L’Elephant in the air, not concentrated on my skin, I was able to smell the spicy cinnamon-clove-fruity goodness that everyone else had been enjoying all these years.  It was as if I was only able to smell the table of contents in the past and never engage with the main story.   It was amazing.  This unknown scent lingering in the air was something I had been longing for, for quite some time.  I’ve always wanted an oriental gourmand which is spicy and cozy, potent yet not headache-inducing, gourmand but not edible/foodie and most of all, Abstract.  Jungle L’Elephant has recognizable spices like cinnamon, clove, cumin and cardamom with some unrecognizable fruity sweetness (if I had to guess I’d say the fruity quality smelled slightly of raisin) all set against this very furry cashmeran-type backdrop giving it an overall abstract style instead of smelling like any of these particular notes.   

Two similar fragrances are Serge Lutens Feminite de Bois and Dior Dolce Vita.  I’ve never been a fan of Feminite de Bois, it’s always registered as stewed fruits over too-much cedar on me.  I have enjoyed Dolce Vita in the past.  A former colleague of mine wore Dolce Vita in the late 90’s and it smelled stunning on her.  The difference is that Dolce Vita has a much stronger white floral quality while Jungle L’Elephant doesn’t have anything recognizably floral to me.

The perfumer behind this abstract spicy gem called Jungle L’Elephant is Dominique Ropion.  Ropion is one of my absolute favorite perfumers since he created some of my (nostalgic) 90’s favorites, Givenchy Amarige and Ysatis as well as my favorite tuberose, Frederic Malle Carnal Flower and a mid-2000’s favorite which nobody talks about these days, Lalique Le Parfum.  Now that I’m IN LOVE with Jungle L’Elephant I’m wondering if there’s also a chance for me to love Frederic Malle Une Fleur de Cassie.  Une Fleur de Cassie is another Ropion creation I’ve never understood.  Similar to Jungle L’Elephant, Une Fleur de Cassie also has a blurry/murky/furry/fuzzy quality I just can’t get past.  Perhaps I ought to have someone spray Une Fleur de Cassie in the air so I can smell its aroma, diffusely about the room?  Frederic Malle Portrait of a Lady, another Ropion creation, also has a similar furry/blurry quality…hmmm…I’m seeing a pattern here.

In sum, it took 4 years but I am smitten with Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant.  It is gorgeous and I will never be without it. Others have found Jungle L’Elephant to be overly strong.  Maybe I have fume-eating-skin but I don’t find it to be terribly strong at all.  It’s potent for the first 30 minutes but after that it mellows and doesn’t have mega-watt sillage.  I only need 2 sprays, but it ain’t no Angel on me.

Top notes: Mandarin, Cardamom, Cumin, Clove
Middle notes: Ylang-Ylang, Licorice, Mango, Heliotrope
Base notes : Patchouli, Vanilla, Amber, Cashmeran

As far as it’s having been discontinued, I can still see it on the Kenzo USA website, so all is not lost (yet).

Other reviews (here are 5, but there are many more reviews of Jungle L’Elephant):

The Non-Blonde

Perfume Posse

Brian’s review here on ISTIA

Eiderdown Press

Sorcery of Scent

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?

2012: Ringing It In

It's been a strange, eventful year.  I haven't always had time to write.  I haven't usually, I should say.  And in many ways my feelings about blogging have shifted; whether or not permanently, I don't know.  I started out with a real joy for blogging here, and a genuine enthusiasm for the things I was learning, not just on the shelf but from other bloggers.  The last two years, especially, brought quite a shift.  What seemed like a big happy family showed signs of strain and competitiveness I'd never noticed before, and after ranting about it for a while (some called it ranting, I called it satire, meaning I felt it was worth writing about, and poking fun seemed hopeful, indicating things could change) I went quiet.

I also got very busy.  Andy Tauer and I started working on the Tableau de Parfums line more than a year ago, but all of our behind the scenes efforts were made public in 2011, and that involved more work.  I enjoyed that work, and continue to, but it's given me less time to write and a very different perspective.  I was less interested in what was going on outside my workspace, because my desk was so full, and felt too that I Smell shouldn't simply be used as a broken record voice box for my pursuits and adventures or even setbacks with Tableau.

At the same time, several months ago, I started to worry that my enthusiasm for perfume in general was gone for good.  I'm happy to say that it's not.  At least I think not.  Yesterday, driving back from rural Mississippi, I spotted an independent, mom/pop drugstore I'd never seen before.  I got excited, knowing they'd probably have perfume, and that among their inventory might possibly be older bottles.  You won't necessarily be thrilled by what I walked out with - old version Cinnabar and Anais Anais, and a bottle of Bill Blass Hot - but here's the thing: I realized that we don't need to be excited by the same things.  Being excited at all, still having that capacity, is good enough for me.

It's an important distinction for me, because as I say, for whatever reason, I haven't been excited about mainstream or even niche perfumery in quite a while.  And I've been bummed out about that.  Walking into that drugstore and discovering those surprises reminds me that the fragrance industry, and even the fragrance community, however that's defined, aren't the reasons I'm into perfume, nor are they my sole outlets in pursuing this interest.

Most of my year was spent with my old favorites.  I found myself seeing them in new ways, enjoying them into different seasons, noticing how they changed in different climates or with a shift of personal perspective.  It's nothing thrilling, probably, to write yet again about Chanel Coco, when I've written about it before, particularly when the Chanel talking points are Beige and Jersey (if ever two words summed up the state of the industry...).  Yet I kept seeing Coco and so many other old favorites in new light.  They kept feeling new to me.

This year more than any other so far made me feel it was pointless to talk about even these old favorites, even were I to find something new about them, because reformulations are so frequently conducted at this point that to talk about one version only is some sort of mistruth.

The barometer is gone, or at least I have trouble figuring out how to find one in my conversation.  This was illuminated pretty baldly for me during a trip to Chicago several months ago.  Oh how they were stirring and shaking and spinning in the Lush department at Macy's.  Such a commotion.  You'd think perfume had been created a year ago.  It was scary but touching, somehow.  Yet beyond Lush, a ghost town.  I wandered the counters of Macy's without ever seeing a sales associate.  And why should they be there?  Smelling the perfumes only confirmed for me that there was nothing really to talk about anyway; certainly nothing to explain.

The Estee Lauder counter was represented, but all the juices in the tester bottles looked different.  Even Private Collection, usually rich gold in color, was pale, like somebody had refilled it with water.  The perfumes I love and recognize instantly smelled only generally like themselves.  Though I knew that Estee Lauder, like everyone else, practices reformulation as a matter of routine, I'd foolishly held them up as some basically unchanging entity in a sea of otherwise constantly shifting marketplace priorities.  The versions I smelled of Cinnabar, Beautiful, Azuree, and Youth Dew there at Macy's made it clear that Lauder has as much contempt for me as any other manufacturer.  Which is why this old bottle of Cinnabar in a forgotten drugstore was such a visceral thrill.

Another key factor in my relationship to perfume in 2011 had to do with watching perfumers work.  seeing Andy Tauer in action, how much care and concern and imagination he puts into what he does, set a high bar for me.  I felt the same about Olfacta, who sent me a wonderful fougere she'd been working on for a while.  These insights and experiences were so personal and meaningful that they inevitably spoiled me when it came to perfume packaged impersonally and without much imagination beyond their heartfelt labs.

What I wish for everyone in 2012 is probably perspective.  My trip yesterday to the drugstore reminded me how important it is, and how hard to come by.  People are still out there doing wonderful things, truly unique, meaningful things.  The ubiquitous reach of mass media and online outlets lead us to believe that we know every corner, deadening our perspectives.  I'm telling you: I believe these little proverbial drugstores of surprise are out there in the world, waiting for us to discover them when we least expect it.