Three Fierce Green Chypres: Sisley Eau du Soir, Parfumerie Generale Corps et Ames, and Niki de Saint Phalle

Posted by Angela on 23 October 2007 70 Comments

Niki de Saint Phalle perfume

When people talk about big, knock-‘em-out scents, they often mean white florals like Robert Piguet Fracas or Annick Goutal Passion or heady 1980s orientals like Yves Saint Laurent Opium and Chanel Coco. I’d like to add another category of perfume to this list: the fierce green chypre. I’m not talking about a moody green chypre like Jacomo Silences or a modulated green chypre like Estée Lauder Private Collection. I mean a no-apologies, cuts-like-a-knife, love-it-or-loathe-it green chypre. At the top of the list of fierce green chypres are Sisley Eau du Soir, Parfumerie Générale Corps et Ames, and Niki de Saint Phalle.

A fierce green chypre isn’t easy to wear…

Read the rest of this article »

Becoming a perfumista

Posted by Angela on 19 October 2007 117 Comments

Chanel no. 5 perfume ad I was at a department store perfume counter and saw a woman mesmerized by the Chanel Eau Première display. “Could I try this?” she asked. A sales associate sprayed one of her wrists. “You know,” the customer said, “I’ve never tried the real Chanel No. 5. Could I try that, too?” When No. 5 was on her other arm she excitedly sniffed one wrist and then the other. I thought, I have just seen the birth of a perfumista.

As people become involved with perfume, they seem to go through certain stages — at least, I know I have. I’m going to take a stab a laying them out. How do they match your experience?

Stage one: Strong Interest. This phase, where you like perfume enough to own a few bottles and follow new releases, can last for years. You probably smell whatever comes through the department stores and have tried a few of the classics like Patou Joy and Chanel No. 5. You sniff perfume from bottles on other people’s dressers and compliment coworkers on how they smell. You probably like perfume more than most people you know, and you hope one day to find your signature scent…

Read the rest of this article »

Lorenzo Villoresi Alamut ~ perfume review

Posted by Angela on 2 October 2007 8 Comments

Lorenzo Villoresi Alamut fragrance

Every once in a while a perfume feels less like a mélange of scents than like a “thing”. Lorenzo Villoresi Alamut is an example. When Alamut has settled on my skin, I don’t think about flowers or fruit or wood — I think of a slice of warm brioche.

Alamut’s notes include osmanthus, aldehydes, rose, jasmine, powder, rosewood, narcissus, tuberose, ylang ylang, labdanum, amber, sandalwood, musk, patchouli, and leather, but they are so meltingly blended that teasing out any one note is difficult. I do smell a gentle powdery suede and maybe ylang ylang and rose, but this is not the sort of perfume that gives off occasional puffs of sandalwood or jasmine that separate from the total formula before blending in again. I want to call Alamut spicy, animalic, and oriental, but these descriptors give Alamut an edge that it doesn’t have…

Read the rest of this article »

Scent and Hair Color

Posted by Angela on 27 September 2007 54 Comments

Claudine stamp In one of the Claudine novels, Colette unflatteringly described a character as having the feral, civet-like smell of a redhead. In the 1920s, Jean Patou released a trio of fragrances, each reflecting a different stage of love and a different hair color. Adieu Sagesse (Goodbye Wisdom) is the scent for redheads, for instance. I remembered both Colette and Patou when I came across a copy of Best Hairdos, a drugstore book published by Fawcett in 1965. Besides charting curler diagrams for elaborate bouffants, the book suggests types of perfume depending on what color of hair you have. Below, I’ve culled some of the highlights for you.

If you were to follow the Best Hairdos rules, you’d best be a blonde since you’d have the most leeway:

Your perfume depends on your likes and dislikes, body chemistry, and general type. The scents that seem to go best with blonde hair, however, are light and clear. A floral compound or single floral scent, or one of the more modern fragrances for the more sophisticated blonde, are good choices.

It adds some general beauty advice for blondes, too…

Read the rest of this article »

Armani Prive Eclat de Jasmin by Giorgio Armani ~ fragrance review

Posted by Angela on 18 September 2007 33 Comments

Armani Prive Eclat de Jasmin by Giorgio Armani

When Now Smell This first announced the release of Armani Privé Eclat de Jasmin, the blog quoted the Giorgio Armani website, saying “Eclat de Jasmin was created to represent dawn – the particular time of the day when jasmine flowers are warmed by the sun, releasing their deep, rich scent.” From this description I imagined a dew-like, non-indolic jasmine: fresh, liquid, and quiet.

Maybe because I don’t live where dawn is ever warm enough to draw the scent from jasmine, but Eclat de Jasmin feels like the late afternoon of a summer day to me…

Read the rest of this article »

« Newer articles

Older articles »