Hermès will launch the latest fragrance in the Hermessence collection, Brin de Réglisse, this month. It is the seventh in the series, and like the others, was developed by Hermès house perfumer Jean Claude Ellena.
Ellena noted that he wanted to create an intense, dry lavender, like you would smell in the south of France in June or July…
Paprika Brasil is the latest fragrance to join the Hermessence Collection at Hermès. Like the others, it was developed by Hermès house nose Jean Claude Ellena. Paprika Brasil was reportedly inspired by the 1955 Claude Lévi-Strauss book Tristes Tropiques, which recounted his travels in the Brazilian interior. The fragrance notes include pimento, clove, paprika, iris, green leaves, reseda, ember wood (aka Brazilwood or Pernambuco) and woody notes.
My initial trials of Paprika Brasil cannot be described in any way other than disappointing, and the experience points to the dangers of building up expectations based on the fragrance name, back story and notes. I suppose what I was expecting was a deep woods scent with exotic spices, something that would evoke the jungles of Brazil before the impact of globalization, where Lévi-Strauss was said to have found “a human society reduced to its most basic expression”.
I wouldn’t necessarily know such a thing if I smelled it…
Paprika Brasil joins the Hermessence collection of fragrances (Ambre Narguile, Osmanthe Yunnan, Poivre Samarcande, Rose Ikebana, Vetiver Tonka) at Hermès this month…
Creative Scentualization has launched the “Comes From Within” trio of fragrances, including Love, Light and Peace:
Love is “designed to inspire that priceless love of self that makes one irresistible to others” and features clove, spicy carnation, rose, Tunisian amber, French vanilla…
Osmanthe Yunnan is the fifth and most recent of the Hermessence series, which debuted in 2004 with four fragrances: Vetiver Tonka, Ambre Narguile, Rose Ikebana, and Poivre Samarcande. Like the others, it was created by Hermès house nose Jean Claude Ellena and is available exclusively in Hermès boutiques. The perfume notes are tea, orange, freesia, osmanthus and apricot.
Osmanthe Yunnan opens with sharp, dry citrus; as noted in the comments last week, it is somewhat reminiscent of another Jean Claude Ellena fragrance, Divine Bergamote by The Different Company. As it dries down, Osmanthe Yunnan veers off in another direction, starting with the lightly smoky scent of dried black tea leaves and gradually allowing more of the osmanthus to shine through…