Oh how I love Frédéric Malle Carnal Flower. There’s nothing quite like its succulent gardenia and tuberose riding a magic carpet of crisp, leafy green. When I spray from my travel vial, I vow I’ll buy a real bottle soon — the big one, too.
But after an hour or so, I start to feel uncomfortable. I smell languid and romantic, bigger than life, like Elizabeth Taylor in A Place in the Sun. The thing is, I’m more like someone from a slapstick comedy. Carnal Flower just doesn’t fit me.
Thinking about it, it’s easy to match a fragrance to a persona. For instance, take aldehydic florals. Who do you see? I see someone elegant, with a profile that could be carved on a cameo. How about a mainstream fruity floral? I picture someone young with blond highlights (maybe that’s too easy). Old school green chypre? Rose oud? Classic cologne? “Concept” fragrances? They all have their types.
Perfume lovers seem to know instinctively that different fragrances go with different styles and moods…
It’s rare to smell a fragrance that seems completely new, like nothing else on the market. It’s even more rare to find something that smells not only new, but at the same time ancient, as if unearthed from an Egyptian sarcophagus. Astonishingly, 