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Chanel No. 5 ~ A Belated Appreciation

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Audrey Tatou Chanel No. 5 commercial still

I thought I knew Chanel No. 5, and I thought it wasn’t for me. No. 5 was too uptight with her whistling aldehydes. It was a little, well, banal. And on top of that, not particularly pretty. In 2007, I posted a tepid review.

Wow, was I ever a dummy. Last summer, I bought a bottle of vintage No. 5 Extrait at an antiques mall, and my perceptions whipsawed. I just invested in a big bottle of the Eau de Toilette. No. 5 isn’t uptight — it’s warm and welcoming. As for banal, are soft, clean cotton bed sheets banal? How about a room’s warmth on a December day, or a napping cat? To me, No. 5 is similar in that it feels both unpretentious and comforting…

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Prism Parfums Moon Drops ~ fragrance review

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Prism Parfums Moon Drops Eau de Parfum

They say that smelling a fragrance you associate with someone practically summons her spectre. With that in mind, I waited impatiently for Moon Drops to show up in my mailbox. My beloved grandmother wore Moon Drops. Over the years I’ve smelled fragrances that brought her back — Miller Harris La Pluie was one — but I was never sure. Was it Moon Drops I was smelling or simply nostalgia? And if I did smell Moon Drops, would Grandma return in all her glorious polyester-clad, pickle-making, sweet-tempered, stubborn glory?

Revlon Moon Drops came out in 19701 and eventually dropped off the market. Prism Parfums relaunched Moon Drops this year in both Eau de Toilette and Eau de Parfum. This review is of the Eau de Parfum. (Prism Parfums also resurrected a few other discontinued fragrances, including the floral leather Geminesse, which I’ll review soon.) Prism Parfums lists the notes of Moon Drops as including lily of the valley, ylang ylang, balsamic notes, woods, jasmine, and “honeyed ripe fruit…”

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Inside the Perfume Cabinet ~ Brooke

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Brooke perfume collection cubbyhole 1

After learning how Brooke approaches perfume, I’m not sure why she doesn’t run NASA. She is analytical and organized (excel spreadsheets track perfume notes); passionate (764 bottles and counting); and inquisitive (witness her tray method, explained later). She’s also generous and open, and she was game to be the subject of this month’s perfume cabinet article…

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Aroma M Voluptuous Nostalgia ~ fragrance review

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Aroma M Voluptuous Nostalgia

There’s a shop in my town that sells perfume oils. The shop is styled to the minimalist, folksy, yet highly curated “Kinfolk” vibe that’s so popular now: raw wood furniture, bleached ceramic bowls, a 1960s credenza, a bearded salesperson sipping a latte from a mason jar and wearing a Ramones tee shirt he bought on eBay for $80.

Uh oh. I feel Grouchy Angela coming on.

“Are these all oils?” I asked when I visited the shop.

“Yeah,” the sales guy said, glancing at me and probably assuming I limited my perfume consumption to Jo Malone and that crazy bottle of Nicki Minaj I picked up after one too many mimosas out with the girls at brunch…

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Deco London Loretta, Millicent & Constance ~ fragrance reviews

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Deco London perfume

Despite the fact that so many people seem to be doing it these days, it can’t be easy to launch a perfume house. Apart from having — or hiring — the actual perfume know-how, you have to think of a concept. If you don’t have a celebrity or fashion house to hang your branding on, what will set your fragrances apart?

Sophia Fannon-Howell, founder and creative director of Deco London, settled on history. London’s 1920s, to be exact. Working with Robertet, she created a collection of six fragrances — three feminines and three masculines — that she says “blends classic fragrance accords with modern wearability and fashionable design, adds a pinch of British humour and a dose of 1920s glamour and serves up an elegant cocktail of fragrances for the ‘Bright Young Things’ of today.”

Who doesn’t want to smell like an elegant cocktail? I sampled the Deco London feminines: Constance, Loretta, and Millicent…

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