Most people, when the weather gets warmer, revert to something cologne-like or citrussy for a scent. My question is, why? If you're going to eat seasonal, you may as well "scent" seasonal too, and if you like your perfumes flowery, as I do, there is an embarrassment of options - from jasmine to rose to sweet pea. But none are quite so perfect to wear in the hot weather as the gardenia.
— Read more at Gardenia's World at Vogue UK.
Some time ago, the indie brand Strange Invisible Perfumes had a Lady Day fragrance.1 It was, as you’d expect, a gardenia (Billie Holiday, aka Lady Day, was known for wearing gardenias in her hair onstage2), and it was, as you’d perhaps also expect, big, as in a BWF (big white floral). It wasn’t dark, really, or melancholy, just big and lush, and it also wasn’t the oddball take on Lady Day that you find in Serge Lutens Une Voix Noire, which Kevin found more Gaga than Holiday.3
Italian perfumer Maria Candida Gentile takes an entirely different approach, and if I can’t really connect the smell with what I know of Billie Holiday, that’s neither here nor there I suppose, and we’re always happy to have an excuse to post another image: she is shown here with The First Lady of Song, Ella Fitzgerald…
While shopping for an air mattress so I could sleep in the cool basement — it’s been a scorcher of a week so far — I wheeled my cart past the organic foods section and saw a rack of Pacifica roll-on perfumes on sale, including Tahitian Gardenia. In summer, I sometimes crave gardenia. At the same time, although I love big white flowers on other people, gardenia wears like a costume on me. It’s as if I’m wearing a fabulous hat that I love for about an hour — after which I wrench the blasted thing off my head so I can feel like myself again…
Jour d’Hermès Gardénia is new from Hermès, and since I was charmed by the original Jour d’Hermès, and even more charmed by Jour D’Hermès Absolu, (and yes, longtime readers know I am a fan of the brand in general) of course I wanted to try it. It helps, of course, that I also love gardenia.
A quick recap: Jour d’Hermès was meant to be gardenia and sweet pea, and the Absolu was gardenia and jasmine. To my untrained nose, they were both abstract bouquets, of the dewy-springtime variety, with the Absolu a bit more floral than the regular. I expected about the same of Jour d’Hermès Gardénia, which promised gardenia, rose and jasmine…
There are a few flowers that should arguably never appear in the name of a perfume. Jasmine doesn’t matter so much — you can call a fragrance Jasmin de Nuit or Jasminora or Ikat Jasmine or whatever and it’s no big deal if it’s something other than a realistic jasmine soliflore — after all, there are plenty of realistic jasmine soliflores already. If you’re developing a new jasmine fragrance, going for interesting over realistic might be the better approach.
Magnolia is more problematic. The smell, in nature, is incredible, yet really lovely (and realistic) magnolia soliflores are as hard to find as leprechauns. Some perfumistas will automatically resent a fragrance called Magnolia-something-or-another that doesn’t, in fact, smell much like magnolias. Gardenia, ditto. The first thing a perfumista wants to know is: does it really smell like gardenia? And if the answer is yes, the next question is: for how long? Gardenia perfumes that smell like real gardenia for more than say, 10 or 15 minutes, are rare indeed…