Month: December 2018

Fragrance Friday: La Belle et L’Ocelot
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Fragrance Friday: La Belle et L’Ocelot

In the growing world of niche and “exclusive” perfumes, there are not many bargains. Prices seem to go up and up, into the realm of the ridiculous. And, may I say, some of the most expensive bottles of fragrance are also — if not hideous, tacky. House of Sillage, I’m looking at you, and Clive Christian, you’re not far behind (apologies to any readers who love those bottles, this is imho only!). The House of Sillage bottles look to me like demented cupcakes. I’m sorry, they do.

By contrast, some of my favorite bottles contain inexpensive but enjoyable fragrances. For instance, one of the first fragrances I blind-bought when I went down the perfume rabbit-hole was Vicky Tiel’s Sirene. Its frosted glass bottle, with a bas-relief of caryatids, is just gorgeous; and I like the scent itself very much. It is a rosy floral with a sharp opening and  soft drydown. At about $20 for 100 ml, why not take a chance on it? The bottle alone makes it worth the price.

At Christmas, my kids now ask me what fragrance I’d like them to get me that’s within their price range. I try to keep that under $25, and luckily there are some bargain fragrances out there to be had for that price. This year, my two daughters gave me Salvador Dali’s La Belle et l’Ocelot, in both the eau de toilette and eau de parfum formats. Friends, these are two of the prettiest bottles I own!

 

Bottle and box of Salvador Dali's La Belle et l'Ocelot eau de parfum.

La Belle et l’Ocelot eau de parfum; http://www.parfums-salvadordali.com

Bottle and box of Salvador Dali's La Belle et l'Ocelot eau de toilette

La Belle et l’Ocelot eau de toilette; http://www.parfums-salvadordali.com

And the fragrances themselves aren’t bad either — not strong loves for me, but definitely likeable and wearable. The EDP (2014) is a warm, balsamic, slightly spicy scent, with top notes of Sicilian bitter orange, davana (artemisia), and elemi (a resin), heart notes of osmanthus, rose, night-blooming jasmine, and tonka, and base notes of patchouli, benzoin, and incense. It reminds me a bit of a lighter, less complex Opium or Obsession. Believe it or not, many of its notes are the same as those of Chanel’s Coromandel, which was launched two years later, in 2016. It’s very appealing in this season’s colder weather, and it is light enough that I think it will still appeal even in the summer, especially on warm, balmy evenings.

The EDT is a completely different fragrance from the EDP — not, as the website says, a softer version of it. The EDT’s top notes are apple blossom, nashi pear and grapefruit; heart notes are iris, Turkish rose and Egyptian jasmine, base notes are cedar and musk. Really, the only thing these two have in common is the beautiful design of their bottles. One intriguing fact is that both fragrances are meant to evoke an olfactory recreation of Beauty and the Beast, according to the website, but one can also perceive the EDP as more animalic (“beastly”) and the EDT as more floral (“beauty”). The EDT is a light, soft floral, with some fruitiness but not so much as to make it overly sweet. I think it would wear best in late spring and throughout the summer. I tend to prefer sharper, greener florals generally but especially in the spring, so this would be more of a summer scent for me.

Salvador Dali was well-known for his eccentricities, in his life as well as his art, one of which was that he kept a pet ocelot (which is a kind of tiny leopard) named Babou. He took Babou to many places and was often photographed with the animal:

Artist Salvador Dali with pet ocelot Babou

Dali with Babou

Another fun fact is that the popular culture we most associate now with “Beauty and the Beast” is the Disney Company’s animated film — but in real life, Walt Disney and Salvador Dali not only knew each other, but collaborated briefly on a short film called “Destino.” It was shelved during WWII, and revived in the 21st century by Walt Disney’s nephew, Roy Disney.

I got interested in Dali fragrances first by reading Luca Turin’s review of the original Dali, created in 1983 by Alberto Morillas, which he gave four stars. I have a mini of the parfum, and it is beautiful as a fragrance; its bottle is also lovely, as are all the Dali perfume bottles that are based on the sculptured lips and nose of Dali’s Aphrodite in his work Apparition of the Face of Aphrodite of Knidos. (I must say, though, I think the bottles for La Belle et l’Ocelot are even more lovely). Some well-know perfumers in addition to M. Morillas have created Dali fragrances: Mark Buxton created Laguna (also awarded four stars by M. Turin) early in his career, in 1991, and Francis Kurkdjian created Purplelight in 2007. Have you tried any of the Salvador Dali fragrances? Do you think any are “discount diamonds”?

Featured image: model Donyale Luna with Dali’s pet ocelot Babou.

Merry Christmas!
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Merry Christmas!

To all who celebrate Christmas — a very merry one to you! Thank you for reading my random thoughts this year! May your scents be many and your troubles few. Merry Christmas!

perfume bottle ornament on Christmas tree

Fragrance Friday: RIP, David Austin
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Fragrance Friday: RIP, David Austin

One of the giants of horticulture died this week: David Austin, OBE, creator of the “English Roses.” What does this have to do with fragrance, you ask? One of Mr. Austin’s major goals in hybridizing roses was to reinstate the powerful fragrances of “old roses” into modern roses with some of the best traits of newer rose hybrids: disease resistance, repeat bloom, a wider range of colors. And he succeeded, probably even beyond his own dreams, in creating “the perfect garden worthy rose that combines beauty, fragrance, repeat-flowering ability and good disease resistance with great charm – the quality his English Roses are most renowned for.” As he wrote in his book The English Roses, he had one preeminent objective, “… that we should strive to develop the rose’s beauty in flower, growth and leaf.” Of fragrance: “[It] may be said to be the other half of the beauty of a rose”.

Mr. Austin’s English Roses won 24 gold medals at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, the greatest flower show on earth. I’ve been privileged to visit that show twice, and the David Austin Roses display was always glorious!

David Austin Roses display at RHS Chelsea Flower Show, 2018

David Austin Roses display at RHS Chelsea Flower Show, 2018

When he was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 2007 for his services to horticulture, he said “Every day, I marvel at my good fortune to have been able to make a life out of breeding roses. My greatest satisfaction is to see the pleasure my roses give to gardeners and rose lovers around the world”. What a legacy to leave! Legions of lovers of the English Roses included H.M. Queen Elizabeth II, who visited his displays at Chelsea:

David Austin and Queen Elizabeth II, display of English Roses at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show

David Austin showing Queen Elizabeth his English Roses at Chelsea; image http://www.davidaustinroses.com.

I grow some of his roses, although I have to choose carefully which ones, as my gardening climate is more hot and humid than they prefer. But I have had some gorgeous blossoms from them, and whenever I cut a few and bring them indoors, they scent an entire room with true, beautiful rose fragrance. The company’s website says:

The English Roses are famous for the diversity and strength of their fragrances, with many varieties having won awards, both nationally and internationally, for their delicious fragrances which can be Old Rose, Tea, fruity, myrrh, musky or almost any mixture of these elements.

The website and catalog describe each rose’s fragrance in specific detail: one has a scent that is a mix of “tea, myrrh, and fruit”; another has a “strong, delicious Old Rose fragrance, often with overtones of strawberry.” There is an entire chapter in his book devoted to fragrance.

Nearly all the basic scents of the rose are to be found somewhere among English Roses and, as a rose of one scent is hybridised with a rose of another, new scent combinations become evident. So it is that we find one scent merging into another, as we move through the varieties of English Roses. I regard this as one of the greatest pleasures they have to offer us. One problem arising out of this great diversity of fragrances is the difficulty in describing them. It is rather like writing about wines; in fact, taste is, as we all know, very close to the sense of smell. We can but do our best, by means of classification and reference to other scents that most of us know. As with wines, there is the danger of sounding pretentious.

Wonderful! Mr. Austin also wrote with gratitude of benefiting from the expertise of Robert Calkin as a fragrance consultant. Mr. Calkin is the author of a classic text on perfumery, Perfumery: Practice and Principles, and apparently “a great lover of roses.” With his guidance, the English Roses are loosely grouped into these categories of fragrance: Old Rose, Tea Rose, Myrrh, Musk, Fruit, and “Myriad.” The latter prompted the following description:

Sometimes it seems as though the fragrance of all the flowers are to be found somewhere in English Roses. The scent of lilac is found in ‘Heather Austin’ and ‘Barbara Austin’; that of lily of the valley in ‘Miss Alice.’ The scent of peach blossom is found in a number of roses. Sometimes, as we cast hither and thither for a name for our fragrances, we refer to them in terms of the bouquet of wine or the fragrance of honey. Clove scent occurs in certain varieties, as, for example, in ‘Heritage’. Seldom are these comparisons exact. Not always can any two people agree on the right term, but this only adds to the many charms of English Roses.

Mr. Austin was clearly a gifted writer, and some of the tributes to him have noted his deep love of books. I’ve always been charmed by the names of the English Roses, so many drawn from English literature (“William Shakespeare”), places (“Winchester Cathedral”), history (“Fighting Temeraire”), and even horticulture (“Gertrude Jekyll”).

Online tributes are flooding in; this obituary aptly describes his contributions. I will just say that although I never had the pleasure of meeting him or being in communication with him, Mr. David Austin brought much joy to me through the beauty AND fragrance of his lovely roses. I hope that heaven had bouquets of them awaiting his arrival. May “flights of angels sing thee to thy rest,” Mr. Austin.

Beds of English Roses at David Austin Roses display, RHS Chelsea Flower Show 2018.

David Austin English Roses at Chelsea, 2018.

 

 

Scent Sample Sunday: Iris Rebelle
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Scent Sample Sunday: Iris Rebelle

Iris Rebelle is a 2018 launch from Atelier Cologne, which I’ve just tried as part of their Advent Calendar for this year. Fragrantica lists the following notes: top notes — calabrian bergamot, orange blossom and black pepper; middle notes — iris, lavender and may rose; base notes — guaiac wood, patchouli and white musk. And sure enough, as soon as I applied some on my wrist from the mini-dabber that comes in the calendar, my first reaction (without having yet read the notes list) was “bright iris.” I like it very much, but if you don’t enjoy carroty iris notes, this is not for you. Iris Rebelle is worth your attention if you like iris notes in fragrance. It will not last for hours on end, but it will last long enough for you to experience the progression of its notes.

The opening combines a bright, strong citrus note from the bergamot with a lightly earthy iris, right from the start. I don’t really smell any pepper that I can pick out separately, but a light spiciness underlies the citrus and iris. The middle phase is mostly about the iris, fittingly. It is an earthy iris, but it also has a transparency that seems to be typical of Atelier Cologne. Iris Rebelle is also part of the line’s “Chic Absolu” collection, which is described on the website as “clean, transparent, and elegant.” The bright citrus opening is also one of their signatures, as the line was founded to feature the kind of citrus notes found in colognes, combining them with a wide range of other notes:

Inspired by the legendary Eau de Cologne, the Cologne Absolue is a new olfactive family created in 2009 by Sylvie Ganter and Christophe Cervasel, Atelier Cologne Creators and Founders. Genuine pure perfume exalting the magical freshness and elegance of citruses with exceptional lasting power thanks to very high concentrations of essential oils.

I haven’t tried many of Atelier Cologne’s scents, so the Advent calendar was a nice opportunity to do so. They also sell a discovery set online, which comes with a voucher to apply its purchase price to a future order of a bottle. I like this company’s considerate treatment of its customers, from the discovery set voucher to the small sizes they make available (down to 10 ml). Sometimes you just want to play with a fragrance, not commit to 100 ml at great expense! Atelier Cologne is also very conscientious with the ingredients they use, which do not include any paraben, paraffinum liquidum, GMO, animal-derived ingredients, colorants, or sulfates.

Each Atelier fragrance comes with a little slice of backstory, which seems to be de rigueur for modern niche fragrances. The moments assigned to Iris Rebelle are:

He was drawing obsessively, invading her space as if he were alone. But when she changed her seat he could not stop staring at her… Days later backstage, she was nervously breathing as the crowd was waiting for the ballet to start. At that moment, she unexpectedly saw him in the front row. All at once, she felt strong and calm, as if they were alone.

Who is the artist? Who is the dancer? I think this is a romanticized reference to the artist Edgar Degas and one of his many models among the ballet corps of the Paris Opera, whom he did draw “obsessively.” And indeed, Iris Rebelle does evoke some of that world, from the cologne of the “abonnes”, the male patrons of the ballet, to the wood of the stage flooring, surrounding the flowers that may represent Degas’ “danseuses“, to the transparency it displays, not unlike Degas’ works in pastel. Degas was himself a rebel artistically, one of the Impressionists who overturned the received notions of art, drawing, and painting, in 19th century France. The backstory for this fragrance is highly idealized, however, as the ballet world Degas portrayed was much harsher than his pastels suggested; and it seems that Degas himself was something of a misogynist even for that time.

Painting and pastel by Edgar Degas of Paris Opera ballet dancers rehearsing.

Edgar Degas, The Rehearsal of the Ballet Onstage, http://www.metmuseum.org

One aspect of Iris Rebelle that I like is the persistence of the citrus note, especially since it comes from bergamot, a green and astringent citrus note that I love. I have never eaten an actual bergamot fruit, but the scent is very familiar to me from the famous Earl Grey tea, which is flavored with the bergamot that lends its distinctive fragrance to the tea. Usually citrus notes in perfume fade away very quickly, but this bergamot lasts a while longer, and weaves together with the lavender note to evoke a hint of a gentleman’s cologne insinuating itself into the floralcy of the heart notes. Even the earthiness of the iris may refer to the lower origins of most of the dancers, while the orange blossom and rose notes evoke the pastel fantasy world they worked so hard to embody onstage.

Pastel of ballerina tilting onstage, by Edgar Degas

Ballerina, by Edgar Degas

Have you tried Iris Rebelle? What other Atelier Colognes do you recommend?

Pastel of ballet dancers in blue, by Edgar Degas
Dancers in Blue, by Edgar Degas
Scent Sample Sunday: Tiffany & Co. Intense
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Scent Sample Sunday: Tiffany & Co. Intense

Last Christmas, my husband surprised me with a bottle of 2017’s new Tiffany & Co. eau de parfum, and I loved it! I have been on something of an iris kick for a while, and Tiffany & Co. is mainly an iris scent, brightened by a citrusy opening and softened by a musk base. The only notes listed on the Tiffany website are: top — “vert de mandarine”, middle — noble iris, and base — patchouli and musk. Fragrantica lists its notes as follows: top notes are mandarin orange, bergamot and lemon; middle notes are iris, black currant, peach and rose; base notes are patchouli and musk.

Bottle of Tiffany & Co. eau de parfum with jewelry

Tiffany & Co. eau de parfum; http://www.tiffany.com

2018 has brought a new version, and it is one of those fragrances that save the good name of “flankers”, as I think it is an improvement on an already excellent original: Tiffany & Co. Intense. Again, the Tiffany website lists fewer notes: top note: vert de mandarine and pink peppercorn; heart: noble iris; base notes: amber and benzoin. Although Fragrantica doesn’t provide a separate list of notes, its graphic shows the following: top — pear, mandarin leaf, pink pepper; heart — iris, jasmine, rose; base — amber, benzoin, musk, carrot, cashmeran, and vanilla.

Blue bottle of Tiffany & Co. Intense eau de parfum, 2018.

Tiffany & Co. Intense eau de parfum; http://www.tiffany.com

The opening is a pleasantly citrusy burst of light green, which lasts only minutes until the iris takes center stage. The iris remains strong throughout the scent’s progression, which I enjoy. Good thing I do, because this flanker lasts a long time! Although it becomes more of a skin scent after a few hours, I can still easily smell it on my wrist several hours after application, and the base that remains is delicious: a warm, musky floral.

The nose behind both fragrances is Daniela Andrier, who knows her iris: she was the creator of Prada’s Infusion d’Iris and its many flankers. I found a fascinating article on a marketing website about Tiffany’s strategy and brief: Brandwatch: Tiffany & Co. Intense. Much of the story begins with the launch of Tiffany & Co. in 2017:

To understand Intense, it’s necessary to view it in the context of the original 2017 launch. This saw a completely new approach to the category for the famed US jewellery house, which sought not simply to put its name to a product, but to create a perfume that was as much a part of the brand (and a reflection of it) as any of its diamond rings.

Every element of the product – from the packaging to the ingredients – was to be inspired by the history and heritage of Tiffany.

From the very beginning, every element of The Fragrance was chosen for its intrinsic ‘Tiffany-ness’, from what the scent reflects to what it contains, to the flacon and the box that contains it, and of course the name itself. Tiffany knows its brand, and both the debut and follow-up fragrances are authentically Tiffany.

Apparently, the brief was to create “a fragrance that would evoke the touch of jewellery on bare skin; a scent (and sensation) that Tiffany no doubt knows well.” Weaving both fragrances around a strong presence of iris was a brilliant choice. As the article notes:

Tiffany has a long association with the iris, says the brand, noting the flower’s appearance in some of the house’s earliest sketches. In 1900, Tiffany won the grand prize at the Paris Exposition with an iris-shaped brooch, and the motif has continued to be a frequent reference in the century since.

The founder of Tiffany & Co., Louis Comfort Tiffany, was not only a brilliant jeweler but one of the greatest creators of stained glass in the world. Iris flowers blossomed in some of his most iconic images, such as this portion of the great “Magnolias and Irises” window he created as a memorial to the Frank family of New York. It was originally installed in a mausoleum of a Brooklyn cemetery but now resides at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.

Memorial stained glass window, 1908, Louis Comfort Tiffany; Magnolias and Irises, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Stained glass window, Louis Comfort Tiffany; Magnolias and Irises, Metropolitan Museum of Art.

This view of the window perfectly captures Tiffany & Co. Intense. It retains the cool blues of the original fragrance’s iris notes, but deepens them and adds the warmth of amber and benzoin, evoking the soft sunset shading into twilight that the Tiffany studio captured so brilliantly in stained glass. Or is it dawn? Only the artist knows.

The bottle for both Tiffany & Co. and Tiffany & Co. Intense is gorgeous. The Brandwatch article describes it:

Diamonds proved the perfect inspiration for the flacon of a house world-famous for its work with such stones. The base of the bottle features faceting inspired by the Tiffany Diamond, one of the largest yellow diamonds ever discovered. The shoulders recall the geometric lines of the Lucida diamond, a signature cut of the house that adorns many solitaire engagement rings.

The first fragrance’s bottle was clear, with a “Tiffany blue” collar. As beautiful as it is, the new bottle is even more gorgeous — its glass is itself “Tiffany blue” and the collar is silver, another material for which Tiffany & Co. is famous, especially in its long collaboration with designer Elsa Peretti, whose designs in sterling silver have become as iconic as the founder’s stained glass. Needless to say, both fragrances come in the legendary Tiffany blue gift box; their packaging is lined in silver. So, so pretty!

Blue bottle of Tiffany & Co. Intense eau de parfum

Tiffany & Co. Intense; http://www.tiffany.com

Every aspect of these fragrances and their launches has been carefully considered and rendered as beautifully as possible, from the creation of the iris butter — said to be “an extraction method exclusive to Tiffany”, in which French-grown blooms were chosen and harvested only in July and August, to the ad campaign using a cover of one of the Beatles’ most famous songs as its soundtrack:

One final, perfect detail: the Tiffany website includes a special link on each product page to “Drop A Hint.” Genius! You click on the link, choose one of a few designs, fill in the email for the intended recipient, and this is what s/he gets, with a link to the desired item:

Tiffany Drop A Hint ecard

TIffany’s “Drop A Hint”; http://www.tiffany.com

Subtle, right? Honey, if you’re reading this …

Readers, what’s on your holiday wish list? Have you dropped any hints?

Scent Sample Sunday: Christmas Roses
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Scent Sample Sunday: Christmas Roses

Some of my favorite bloggers are posting about favorite holiday fragrances, and several have created their own fragrance Advent calendars, so clearly ’tis the season! I love Advent, but I was too slow off the mark to organize my own Advent calendar in time, and this is a very busy time of year for me at work, so I’ll just enjoy reading about theirs — although I might get my act together for a few “scents of Advent” or even a fragrance Twelve Days of Christmas, so stay tuned!

As some of you know, I’m an enthusiastic amateur gardener. One of the plants I love most is the hellebore, sometimes called the “Christmas Rose” or “Lenten Rose” because it blooms in the winter. I love it so much that the special china we bring out for the holidays from now through February has hellebores on it.

Spode Christmas Rose

So for my “scents of Advent” post today, I’m going to write about a few of the rose scents that I especially enjoy in the fall and winter, although real hellebores have little fragrance. Actual roses can emphasize so many different facets of their natural fragrance, and then perfumers focus on a few of those, and choose companion notes to heighten that emphasis; this is undoubtedly why there are hundreds, if not thousands, of rose-centric fragrances. I know some perfume-lovers dislike rose, but I’m inclined to think that may be because they haven’t found the right rose for them, or because they have unhappy associations with bad rose scents like poorly made soap.

I love fresh, citrusy, green roses in the spring and summer, but I’m just not drawn to them when the weather turns colder. Luckily, many perfume houses have created scents that emphasize the spicier, darker, warmer aspects of rose, and those are the ones I enjoy at this time of year. I’ve written before about some of them: Aramis’ Calligraphy Rose, Montale’s Intense Cafe, Gres’ Cabaret. Here are a few more:

Tauerville’s Rose Flash: this is one of the best fragrance buys on the market, imho. It is the first of Andy Tauer’s “Tauerville” line, fragrances that are deliberately more experimental (and more affordable) than his main line but still artfully crafted and multi-faceted. Rose Flash comes in a 20% concentration; in other words, parfum extrait strength. At $63 for a 30 ml bottle, and given its high quality, it’s at the top of my list. Here is the description from the website: “A shamelessly diffusive, tenacious, extrait-strength creation, overflowing with the greens, spices, citruses, woods and creamy intimacies which enter your very soul when you stick your nose into a bona fide, scented, living rose.” Be still, my heart! Yes, it really is that good.

Bottle of Andy Tauer's Tauerville Rose Flash parfum

Tauerville Rose Flash; image from www.theredolentmermaid.com.

Penhaligon’s Elisabethan Rose 2018: an update of a former Penhaligon’s classic, Elisabethan Rose, its notes are: Hazelnut Leaf, Almond Oil, Cinnamon, Red Lily, Rose Centifolia Oil, Rose Absolute, Vetyver, Musk, Wood. The unusual opening is just spicy enough to make it clear that this is a deep red rose, nothing pale. The cinnamon note makes it right for this season, but it isn’t strong. The rose notes, which appear right away, are fruity and deep, with wonderful undertones of spices and light wood. This is rapidly becoming one of my favorite rose fragrances — and what’s not to love about a bottle with a white ruff around its neck?

Bottle of Penhaligon's Elisabethan Rose eau de parfum with roses

Penhaligon’s Elisabethan Rose 2018; http://www.penhaligons.com.

Jo Malone’s Tudor Rose & Amber: one of the limited edition “Rock the Ages” set of 2015, Tudor Rose & Amber is meant to embody one of the most notable periods of English history. From Fragrantica: “Tudor Rose & Amber evokes the bloody and turbulent Tudor era. The fragrance contains Damask and Tudor rose as well as ginger in the heart, spicy beginning of pink pepper and clove and the base of golden amber, patchouli and white musk.” The ginger and clove make this a warm, dark rose for winter. Many commenters talk about a boozy or winelike impression; if so, it’s a mulled wine. Even Luca Turin likes this; in “Perfumes: The Guide 2018”, he gave it four stars and wrote:

The distinguished Grasse house of Mane must have been gutted to see Christine Nagel move to Hermes, because she was a priceless treasure. It’s not as if the rose-amber accord hadn’t occurred to anyone before, but Nagel inserts her trademark slug of biblical spices and woods smack in the center, as she did in Theorema (Fendi, 1998) and rescues it from heaviness and banality. Very fine work.

Rock the Ages collection of five fragrances from Jo Malone London

Jo Malone Rock the Ages Collection 2015; http://www.jomalone.com

Do you have any favorite cold-weather rose fragrances? Any fragrances that particularly say “holidays” to you? Please share!

Featured image from www.neillstrain.com.