Of all the fragrances crowding shelves, relatively few smell truly like “perfume” to me. I don’t mean they’re necessarily what some people consider “perfumey” — emitting sneezy aldehydes and high-pitched florals — but that these perfumes don’t try to tell a story or mimic a bouquet or evoke a place. They are, simply, abstract olfactory compositions that build something distinct and whole from their pieces, something you recognize at once. Worth Je Reviens is one of those perfumes.
Perfumer Maurice Blanchet developed Je Reviens in 1932. Je Reviens, over the years, moved from prestige to mass market status; it was reissued in the prestige category in 2004 as Je Reviens Couture.1 Susan Irvine, in Perfume: The Creation and Allure of Classic Fragrances, attributes the original name to Napoleon’s instructions to Josephine, “Je reviens en trois jours, ne te lave pas.”2 (Hardly a recommendation for a spring-like aldehydic floral fragrance, if you ask me.) Its notes include jasmine, orange blossom, ylang ylang, aldehydes, narcissus, jonquil, violet, sandalwood, vetiver and musk.
Je Reviens is plainly Je Reviens, whether it’s the drugstore variety, the Je Reviens Couture, or vintage Eau de Cologne…
