Dawn Spencer Hurwitz recently launched several new fall fragrances, and my personal favorite of the bunch is Souvenir de Malmaison, “a new twist on a romantic classic: spicy carnation and rose meet in an ambery, wood fragrance.” Souvenir de la Malmaison is a floriental with notes of lemon, bergamot, black pepper, ylang ylang, rose, carnation, jasmine, cinnamon, clove, labdanum, ambergris, sandalwood, cedar, patchouli, tolu balsam and vanilla.

I have a weakness for good historical references in perfumery, and this scent has a few. First: Malmaison was the elegant residence of Napoleon Bonaparte and his consort Joséphine de Beauharnais, a château with a legendary rose garden overseen by Joséphine herself. Second: Souvenir de Malmaison is a rose cultivar created in 1843 and named in honor of the rose-loving Empress and her gardens. And in a related bit of recent perfume history, as perfume aficionados may wistfully recall, there used to be a carnation fragrance named Floris Malmaison…

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