While I am almost impervious to cold, I hate the inconvenience of winter. Imagine the shock-and-awe factor of a blizzard before the urban industrial era. People must have looked out into the eerie silence of a storm, a thick, blank curtain of white dampening even the wind's whistle, and prayed to their higher being for safety and survival.1 Now, I get a snow alert on my phone and think: "Blast! If this causes me fifteen minutes of delay on the commute, I'm going to lose it!" I know, #ModernWorldProblems. In fact, after an ice storm that darkened Toronto into the new year for 2014, we've been lucky enough to avoid most of the chaos this winter. My condolences to Buffalo, Chicago, Boston and those on the East coast in Canada and the US.
The upside to darkness and inclement weather is the time I have inside to prepare an assault on two high peaks: the book pile and Mount Sample. Generally, I wear whatever fragrance I feel like at any time of year, but almost all perfumes conjure a particular season for me and the ones that evoke winter probably get less of my air time than most, merely for practical reasons. (Who will wear Guerlain Attrape-Coeur on a warm day in May? Not I.) My personal strategy for combating winter, then, is to dig out those under-loved warming, rich and sweet scents. But I do empathize with those who use the opposite approach, the denial method. If you'd rather imagine yourself on the beach in Aruba today, please read Robin's post on winter citrus scents or Robin or Angela's tropical suggestions. (In this latter vein, I do sometimes try for a fragrant "greenhouse effect"; the last scent on this list fits that bill and goes out to the dreamers.)
Please recommend your own winter favorites in the comments and check out the lists at Bois de Jasmin :: Grain de Musc :: The Non-Blonde.
Slumberhouse Ore: Waving away a blotter, a friend of mine recently dismissed this as "a very nice cocoa butter scent". I also find it a bit air-headed, but consciously and deliciously so. The Lolita angle here is that nose Josh Lobb has based the core of the fragrance on Carmex lip balm. Ore stays true to that sexy, silly spirit, but with notes of cocoa, oak, vanilla, whiskey and Balsam of Peru, it is darker and less mentholated than the famous potted salve.
Bond no. 9 Chinatown: I don't have a recognized synesthesia, but smells are very textured to me. The gloss of Chinatown feels like pearls or lacquered furniture, as if the smell is a tactile treasure from David Kidd's Peking Story. It's a masterful bit of Orientalism by Aurélien Guichard, and an ideal fragrance to set against snow.
Ralph Lauren Notorious: Ill-suited to its name and marketing campaign, this one wasn't around long. Too bad, because it's a lovely, low-key comfort scent. Robin wrote it could work as the fragrance for "'Fresh Cocoa Woods' dryer sheets" and there's definitely something about that idea that captures the snugly, familiar feel of the thing. After a bright peppercorn and bergamot opening, the middle section is very 1950s Mom, with the creamy balsamic cola notes everyone remembers from orientals like Tabu and Youth Dew. Meanwhile, the base bears some resemblance to the far dry down of Chanel Coromandel: imagine, if you can, that the latter's patchouli has dispersed and you're left with a powder poof of musky white chocolate.
Bogue Maai: Now this could be called 'Notorious'! Stand back, gentlemen, retro glamour coming through. Released in 2014, Maai is a massive resinous floral chypre, a sort of radioactive Norell,2 full of soapy aldehydes and ylang ylang and animal notes and oakmoss and everything else the contemporary perfumer must avoid. But Antonio Gardoni dared for us. Distressingly expensive, as is fitting.
Etat Libre d'Orange Rien: Another middle finger at current fragrance regulation and trends, this time by Antoine Lie. In an interview at Grain de Musc, Lie reveals he composed Rien as "revenge", using an overdose of restricted notes from classical perfumery: galbanum, aldehydes, castoreum, iris, oakmoss and patchouli. The result is a bitter, elegant leather chypre, to be worn with a sharply tailored suit and combat boots.
Parfumerie Generale Indochine: Benzoin scents are usually the olfactory equivalent of "Riders on the Storm" by The Doors for me: I'm lucky if I can make it through the droning without lapsing into a coma. Indochine adds cardamom and a lot of honey, and while still powdery and meditative in style, it smells more like gingerbread than an opium den. Verdict: delicious.
Amouage Fate: Fate wasn't Angie's thing. She memorably called it a Big Hot Powder Monster. A fair assessment, but I could probably dust my cleavage with the right ras el hanout, so Fate is my favorite from the brand since the relaunch of Ubar in 2009. Of the listed notes, I get mostly cinnamon, chili, narcissus, green rose, labdanum and frankincense. Fate is fresher and softer than these notes imply, though, and while a still warm perfume, there is that touch of cold incense ash that some of the recent Amouages have. Very pretty, and as pricey as all get-out.
Imaginary Authors Cape Heartache: I'd never thought to pine (ha!) for a strawberry and fir fragrance, but here it is, a perfect little puzzle of sweetness and evergreen resined together by Josh Meyer, who is apparently quite smart.
Serge Lutens Vetiver Oriental: Like Cape Heartache, this is a strange one, a velvety vetiver as gourmand. The usual forest and licorice facets of the root are set against iris, chocolate and sandalwood, making for an unusually earthy take on an oriental.
Cartier L'Heure Vertueuse III: In 2012, it seemed odd that Cartier would plan a December release for the third hour in their Les Heures de Parfum series. This is an intensely green and aromatic fragrance, full of herbs and stems and lavender. But as Persolaise and Denyse at Grain de Musc have noted (here and here), there is something wonderfully reviving about Vertueuse in the winter. A brew to cure what ails you, and as the tenth addition to an expensive and crowded collection, it's often overlooked.
1. Along these lines, a verse riddle translated from the Old English, about the spectacle of winter, which I read last night: "The wave, over the wave, a weird thing I saw / Thorough-wrought, and wonderfully ornate:/ A wonder on the wave — water become bone." Any guesses? It's ice (via Michael Alexander's translations of the Exeter Book.)
2. Interestingly, the 1997 relaunch advertisements for Norell featured Faye Dunaway, who was referenced (unwillingly, one imagines) as an inspiration for Ralph Lauren Notorious.
Note: top image is Winter is going away [cropped] by rapidfixer at flickr; some rights reserved.
Great mini reviews! I have none of these and will put several of them on my Acquire Samples list immediately. Thanks for the interesting info…
Thanks! Always glad to add to Mount Sample in other households…
Mmm, that must why I love benzoin scents so much–they remind me of “Riders on the Storm”! 🙂
Thanks for the lovely list! Another bunch of stuff to be found and tested…
I knew I’d get some Riders fans today (and bezoin fans)… My husband loves The Doors, so I get to hear a fair amount of them, and I guess they are growing on me. Have you ever seen Jimmy Fallon channeling Jim doing the “Reading Rainbow” theme song? If not, it’s on Youtube and you’re welcome 🙂
This is oh-so-fabulous!!!
I thought it was pretty amazing – all the little details are just right.
Love the benzoin comment. Doors fan here. And I need to dig out my Indochine decant. Thanks, Erin!
Ha! H, would have never guessed you were a Doors fan. Can you `ami `oniu to Riders? 🙂 You smell awesome, as usual.
* “…must be why…” Can’t spell, sorry!
Didn’t even notice until you pointed it out!
Mmmm..I treasure my decant of Fate -perfect winter scent for sure. I love Ubar and Journey for winter scents as well.
I still haven’t got to Journey yet; will have to test it, thanks for the recommendation.
Iris Ganache, Sacrebleu, Kalimantan and Black Cashmere are my favorite cozy winter scents. Intense Tiare is my happy tropical floral and Byredo Green is my hope for spring scent
I love Sacrebleu, too, so elegant and warming, but I didn’t include it for my Top 10 this year, because I think Angela had it in her list within the last two years or so. And Byredo Green – I’d kind of forgotten about that one, but it’s perfect for rushing on mentally to spring.
Lovely piece. Thanks Erin! I think I will drain my Indochine decant today.
Thank *you*. Hope you enjoy the Indochine sillage. (I need a new decant, too.)
Great post! What I enjoyed about your writing was the idea of scents as texture. Chinatown does have a lacquer/shellac scent and hard shell at first; I associated it with the woman in my office who wore it. It becomes more textured with spice and incense as it progresses.
I love your idea of benzoin as the texture of Riders on the Storm. Yesterday Myrrh et Delires hit me as plush, and that was the only word I could think to describe it. Textural synesthesia may be a thing 😉 Thanks for your post. Be well!
While I like the peachy sweetness and white florals of Chinatown, I do appreciate that they fade with time, and the cardamom, incense and cedar come to the forefront.
I just read my first article on lexical-gustatory synesthesia recently: it was about a gentleman who viscerally associated every subway station name in our system with a taste! Some of the flavours were disturbing – I think our olfactory-tactility synesthesia is much nicer. 🙂
Articles on lexical-gustatory synesthesia, whoa! You have fascinating reading territory there. Was that work or pleasure? I am fascinated to learn about most anything. The sound of certain names having a taste? Priceless. Sounds like something out of Oliver Sacks’ neurology writings, only more academic 😉
Lovely image! It captures all I love about winter, the quiet and the solitude and the peace. I spent years and worked hard to move from the tropics my family moved to when I was a child to get back to four seasons and most of all my beloved winter. Every day of fresh snow I look out the window and devour the sight, savoring it and saving it in my mind’s eye for those awful hot dry days of summer.
Days when all of my lovely winter perfect scents have to wait until they can return along with my joy in watching clear cold starry nights. So as spring approaches I’m rotating through Dries Van Noten, Noir Epices, Russian Tea, Violette Fumee, and gorgeous ouds.
~sigh~ if no one else loves you Winter, I always shall 🙂
Yes, Robin always does a lovely job with picking images. (I can’t take credit.) And I have several friends here, all from Australia and South America, who claimed they moved to my area for the snow. So, you’re not alone… and you smell lovely. I picked Noir Epices for my Winter 2009 Top Ten, it’s just perfect for this time of year. And I thought about Masque Montecristo for this list, but the Russian Tea is very nice and season-appropriate, too.
Wearing Indochine today; it’s a bit chilly (for Florida) and its snuggly comfort seemed just right this morning.
Ambre Russe is my usual go-to for winter perfume. All that booze and spice and tea wrapped up in all that amber – perfection!
My parents are currently in Florida and mentioned it might be the coldest weekend of the year there. Stay warm! (It was -9 F here this morning, with the wind chill, which might be our daytime low this year.) Ambre Russe is a wonderful amber, one of my very favorites.
CK One Shock is fun and wintery to me.
I don’t think I’ve tried that one, will have to catch up with it.
For winter scents, I love:
Fendi: Original vintage Fendi (this is time-travel in a bottle for me, brings me back to winter of 1989, FL State football games and shenanigans);
Guerlain: vintage Samsara perfume (like a heavy velvet blanket);
Chanel: vintage Coco perfume ;
SL: Un Bois Vanille, Diam Blonde, Ambre Sultan;
Lancome: Vintage Sikkim or Magie Noire (va voom for date night);
Diptique: L’ Eau Trois (it’s great in summer or winter);
Jean Despriz: Sheherazade or Bal a Versailles (both are fuzzy sweaters, but Sheherazade pairs it with red lips, stiletto heels and a plunging neckline;
Tom Ford: Moss Breches or Youth Dew Ambre Nude;
YSL: vintage Opium perfume
Oh yes!!!!!! vintage Coco and vintage Magie Noire (the current reformulations smell nothing like the originals to my nose). I so wish I had not drained every last drop from my bottles all those years ago!
Now we’re talking!
I did consider both Coco and Un Bois Vanille for the post. I have an older bottle of Coco EdP and it just glows like stained glass… so beautiful. Magie Noir I included on one of my fall lists, I think. It feels witchy and autumn-appropriate to me, but of course would work in winter, as well (at least in vintage).
Yes indeed, I’m in vintage MN today. It is almost autumn here now, nice and cool but a bit humid as well.
All these lists, mostly of things I don’t own, are making me depressed. But I am intrigued by your link to Peking Story. It sounds lovely, and I’ve added that to my wish list at Book Depository and that cheers me up. (Although that list is six pages long … sigh … ).
Anyway, a shower with Lush’s Twilight Shower gel, and I’ll be right as rain. 🙂
Erin should get a commission on sales of the book; I just downloaded a copy. 😉
I’m delighted! I think you’ll like it, it’s such a sad story full of vivid and beautiful description.
annemarie, I’m sorry. 🙁 I have never tried at least half of any of Denyse’s lists either, if it makes you feel any better, but I do like to dream about the descriptions. Peking Story should be a much more affordable luxury – those NYRB classics are wonderfully cheap!
Oh no worries, just feeling a bit down today. I recently sold/gave away a lot of stuff and felt great afterwards, especially because it opened up my collection and drew my attention towards stuff I have left which I had been neglecting. And I love those NYRB classics! (I’ve bought quite a few of their kids books too. Jenny and the Cat Club, I remember, was a great favourite of my daughter.) I get their emails but don’t always buy , but use the website as a way of learning about books I would not have heard of, and then getting them from the library. My library does not have Peking Story, so I will buy it. Not expensive. 🙂
I use the website (and the library) in the very same way! But I do try to support NYRB when I see one for a good price in a store. Everybody around here is quite sick of me always exclaiming over how they have so many of my favorites: A Legacy, Turtle Diary, Cassandra at the Wedding, The Siege of Krishnapur, The World As I Found It, A High Wind in Jamaica, The Door, etc, etc., etc.
Jenny and the Cat Club goes on my daughter’s list…
Oooh! If Bogue’s Maai comes anywhere close to the gloriousness of Norell in the 1970s, I’ve GOT to try it!! I was too young–never mind not having any money–for it, but I never failed to sniff deeply whenever I found a bottle in a department store…
It definitely has the style of one of those Josephine Catapano scents, Norell and/or vintage Fidji, maybe. Very bosomy, but still elegant.
Lol. I feel the same way about “Riders”! Great post. My winter go-tos are Coromandel and Profumum Fiore D’Ambre, though the latter can drone a scosh if over applied.
I slid in my Notorious instead of Coromandel, but of course the latter is beautiful. I see what people mean about the reformulation, though. I was into the Chanel boutique the other day, and unless those ceramic sticks only put out the dry down, the patchouli has been tamed considerably since the original version.
I like to wear ” summer perfumes” during winter,and vice versa.We are having one HELL of a heatwave in South Africa currently,and I find comfort in unexpected scents.L’Eau d’Hiver comes first to mind.Such a cooling effect in the heat!My other favorites for summer-that’s supposed to be for colder weather-:
1.Portrait of a Lady
2.Borneo 1834
3.Shalimar pure parfum
4.Samsara Edp
5.Rien
Nice mini-reviews!
Borneo, wow, you must get some cold weather in summer! And Portrait — those are the big guns. Where do you live in SA? Thanks for the kind words about the post. I’m loving your Rien. Have you tried the Incense Intense version? Not any more intense, I find, other than in having the longevity of bismuth-209, and it’s a wee smidge darker. And of course, more incense (surprise!)
Thank you for this fantastic, thought-provoking article-it’s so rich with information and ideas.
I had the luxury of discovering the Aedes de Venustas perfume shop in New York’s West Village the other day and was completely seduced by Serge Lutens’ La Fille de Berlin with rose and violet. For me, it’s a rich, bold winter scent.
But I’m also very partial to winter citrus scents like Robin describes. I don’t think of it as escaping so much as going more deeply into winter and embracing the season. Brighter citrus and lighter, more ethereal scents call up winter and the crystalline, sparkling quality of pure ice and snow for me and dreamy winter landscapes. Right now, I like Atelier Cologne’s Sud Magnolia with bitter orange which feels like a festive winter scent to me. I was also interested to discover this description from Bois de Jasmin about bitter orange in winter. http://boisdejasmin.com/2011/03/perfume-vocabulary-and-fragrance-notes-bitter-seville-orange-family.html
Thanks again for sparking these conversations and discoveries in such a thoughtful way.
Hey, thanks. And I appreciate your very thoughtful discussion of citrus scents, too. The press release on Atelier Sud Magnolia intrigued me – guess I will have to hunt down a sample. I love Seville orange, and not just in perfumery, but in marmalade, which I love at this time of year.
Lucky you, visiting Aedes recently! I’ve only been once, but I had a wonderful smelling session with Karl Bradl. It’s a beautiful jewel box of a store, in a cool area. (I love that the Stonewall Inn is a block up the street.)
Like Iggy Pop, Rien does not care what you think.
Too true. And funny, because two co-workers have recently told me they think Rien should be my signature scent. I’m more punk then I knew!
I’m always chuffed to discover Rien in any list as I’ve become very attached to it. Someone at work once commented that she found it rather odd but that it really suited me. As we get on very well I took it as a compliment.
I’m sure it is well suited to contrarians which I’m most certainly one of.
Apart from Rien the only other one I’ve tried is the Cartier which I would own in shot if it were a lot less expensive. I can see why people would find it bracing. A bit like Bénédictine.
You used “chuffed”! I love that word. (Not a very punk word, but there you go.) I’m glad Rien suits you, too, and in a work environment. Maybe it has an unusual, noticeable sillage in an office, which makes it compliment-worthy with the coworkers.
Yes, like Bénédictine or Chartreuse! Those are the liqueurs it reminds me of. The Cartier exclusive line is terribly expensive for what it is. Of all ten so far, I would only ever contemplate getting a decant or bottle of Brilliante or Vertueuse.
I picked it up on the Beeb somewhere. I think it was during an interview with a comedian. I love it’s sound, it somehow suits it’s meaning if that makes any sense.
I’ve only sniffed the Cartiers in a shop and for what they are I find them too expensive.
I sort of want killer sillage for that price and a bit more of a story.
I’ve been thinking and thinking about my winter list… I do really love using a “rotation” of my perfumes and switching them when the weather changes, so I suppose that might be why my seasonal lists don’t shift very much over time.
Things I love in winter:
Teo Cabanel Alahine. Always for Christmas, especially. Such a joyous scent. I’m also using up the last of my decant of Attrape-Coeur. I like my ambers with lots of florals. 🙂
PdN Vanille Tonka, vintage Emeraude, Shalimar Light. Sometimes you just need some vanilla.
Balenciaga Rumba, Bal a Versailles, Soivohle Centennial. I often find the animalic stuff difficult to wear, unless the weather is very cold, and then I love them. Centennial in particular can get addictive for me. OH, and Memoir Woman too.
L’Arte di Gucci. Because the time is rarely wrong for a ginormous, in your face rose chypre.
And aldehydes, of course. Because when the weather is icy and dry, they sparkle more. No. 5, Mariella Burani, Iris Poudre, Arpege, Vega – wonderful in the cold.
I seriously considered putting vintage Emeraude in this post. Or Vanille Tonka, which I hear has tragically lost its lime top note in recent incarnations. My list is certainly lacking a vanilla, but while I like vanilla as an accent, I’m generally not fond of it as a solinote. The three you mention have lovely bits of relief (mint/florals, frankincense and lemon). And straight-up ambers don’t usually work for me either. I do like MPG Ambre Precieux, but I almost never wear it, and Armani Ambre Soie is lovely, but light enough to get away with in other seasons. Do you like PdN Sacrebleu?