Happy Hump Day, and happy National Chocolate Cupcake Day! What fragrance are you wearing?
I seem to be doing an iris week. Today, Prada Infusion d’Iris Absolue, because Elisa P mentioned it yesterday. To reek just a tiny little bit of havoc, I’ve put a bit of Prada Candy on my other arm.
Reminder: 10/20 will be Reeking Havoc Friday…
Oooh, pretty. From Fragonard: "Enjoy this Fleur d'Oranger Intense perfumed soap 5.3 oz with this beautifully designed soap dish. Perfect of [sic] any kitchen or bathroom. Get it as a gift or for yourself." $26 at Beautyhabit.
It’s invention run amok, marketing gone mad, the odoriferous emblem of commercialism without compunction or bounds. It’s the transformation of an illusion — there isn’t any spice called pumpkin, nor any pumpkin this spicy — into a reality.
— Frank Bruni of The New York Times turns his attention from politics to pumpkin spice (although be warned he does also talk politics) in Will Pumpkin Spice Destroy Us All?
tl;dr a decent middle of the road vanilla.
If you wanted a good illustration of the muddy distinction between niche and mainstream perfumery, you could hardly find a better example than Annick Goutal. The house mostly made its name with classic colognes like Eau d’Hadrien and Eau du Sud, and a handful of pretty feminine florals. When I reviewed Eau de Camille and Eau de Charlotte back in 2007, I noted that…
The Annick Goutal line occupies a rather in-between place among perfume fans — the company probably qualifies as niche based on their size and their limited distribution; still, they are available in a number of mainstream stores (three department stores in my local mall carry them),1 and the line doesn’t feel niche. The feminine perfumes are emphatically pretty, romantic even; they don’t, like so many niche perfumes, challenge traditional notions of what a woman ought to smell like.
What I perhaps didn’t emphasize enough was how few mainstream brands were making nicely done yet emphatically pretty fragrances at the time…
