I’m recovering from last night’s sugary festivities. Let me put down my Snickers bar and tell you about a local event I went to recently featuring Ron Robinson of Apothia doing a hands-on presentation of his candles, which won the Fragrance Foundation’s 2006 Interior Scent of the Year.

I’m just dipping my nose into the wide world of scented candles, and I probably won’t go too much further. My reality is, with four kids and a certain amount of home-grown chaos, setting small, controlled fires around our house (no matter how delish they smell) is a bad idea. But Ron’s a fun guy, a delight to talk to, and I really enjoyed learning more about his candles and about the approach behind his store, which I would kill to have here in D.C.

The candle collection is designed to represent various aspects of L.A. life. My visits to the Left Coast have been pretty limited, and I’ve never been to L.A., although I figure it’s only a matter of time, and I’ll probably take a girl or two along. In the meantime, I thought the candles were a wonderful intro. I’m going to crib from the literature Ron gave me: the candles are made with “a unique, luxurious combination of soy and paraffin” with the “texture of solid perfume – rub it into your skin!” That sounds ridiculous, but it’s true – I loved how creamy the candles were (they’re in jars), they smell amazing even when they’re not burning, and you can literally run your finger across the top like a solid perfume, or dip your finger in the molten wax (it didn’t burn me) and put the fragrance on your skin.

I really appreciated the aesthetic; it seems to me that any well thought out candle line — and I’ve sniffed a few — has its own distinct feel. I can’t speak to their capturing the L.A. vibe, but the Apothia candles were interesting for their smooth, unusual combination of notes that create a targeted ambience. My favorites of the 10 candles:

Wave – “morning at the beach house. Sun, sparkle and pure salt air.” Grapefruit, mandarin, yuzu, driftwood and seagrass. A smell that’s outdoorsy but also sophisticated. Woods/citrus, not sweet, the driftwood/seagrass dynamic suggesting salty ocean air rather than a Glade room spray.

Scene – “glittering lights, electric nights … anything can happen.” Fig, peppery juniper berry and ripe pear. I don’t know about the scene part, but it’s a neat trick – he had me with the fig, but the rest of the notes create a balance between sweet and sharp.

Plush – “full service, crisp linens, deep baths, sleeping in.” Fresh milled soap, petitgrain, mandarin, lime. This gets rave reviews from me for smelling like a warm, inviting bedroom while neatly avoiding the overdone clean laundry/soap concept. Your room in an expensive spa should smell like this.

Bronzed – “groves of gold, bronzed bodies, a sun-kissed day in the City of Angels.” Orange flower, petitgrain, bergamot and jasmine. I smiled when I smelled this – it’s the beach, sand, and bods glistening with Bain de Soleil. It’s not me, but it’s a great smell.

Chrismukkah – “Christmas. Chanukkah. Kwanzaa. Friends. Family. Love. It’s all good.” Green fir, clove and crisp ocean air. Okay, the name makes me wince a little, but this is a welcome twist to the ubiquitous holiday candle – it’s a holiday at the beach, and the “crisp ocean air” smells … well, airy, and again, not like some nasty “fresh air” spray scent.

Casa – this was Ron’s suggestion for a general home fragrance (hence the name) that doesn’t, for instance, clash with food if you’re burning it in the main part of the house during a dinner party. Notes are Casablanca lilies, newly cut grass, fresh air. It didn’t win my heart, because Casablanca lilies probably never will, but you lily fans should take note. Again, an airy (no pun intended) take on a bouquet of lilies in your Neutra house with a fabulous view – that’s my fantasy, anyway. Present but not cloying.

So, after all that, what did I choose?

Velvet Rope – of course. I’ve loved Velvet Rope (the fragrance) from the first time I smelled it, but it probably smells better on anyone else on the planet than it does on me, a source of mild internal strife on my part. It doesn’t smell bad on me – but I flatten it out somehow, and all the sparkly bits disappear. Unsurprisingly, Velvet Rope smells wonderful as a room fragrance – it was originally inspired by a visit to a bar and a vanilla martini. Notes: dry vanilla martini, jasmine absolute, a twist of grapefruit. I find the smell of Velvet Rope absolutely intoxicating, and it’s been scenting my bedroom since I brought it home. It’s an unusual smell, sweet and dry, vaguely foody, but not in a way that makes you hungry. The throw (ooooh, candle-geek talk!) is excellent, the smell lingers for hours after I put the candle out, and even unlit it scents the corner of the room where I sit and read. It’s definitely there, but seamless enough not to annoy the Big Cheese, who would totally complain if I burned something really strong in the fruit or woods department. I couldn’t be happier.

Thinking about the line and writing these descriptions, the concept I keep coming back to is balance – rather than smelling mostly of fig (or tea, or hinoki wood) each candle is done with no particular dominant note. They smell interesting, and expensive (more expensive than they are, frankly) and while they’re strong, they don’t bludgeon you. None of them made me wonder if I’d have to open a window or get sick of that particular smell after a week or two, which has prevented me from buying in the past. However you want to describe his style, it certainly works for me.

I think I paid $45 (more or less), they have a 60-hour burn time, and they’re available online at Apothia and elsewhere. It’s my first grown-up candle, a milestone, and I couldn’t be happier.

Velvet Rope candle image: www.ronrobinsoninc.com

Lavender and licorice. Whilst these two alliterative notes may not exactly plunge all and sundry into scented horror, they’re unlikely to top the list of favourites for any but a handful of weirdos (and I mean that as a compliment, I guess). I know quite a few scentaholics who dislike either or both of these notes, but can’t think of anyone who appears to rave about them in the same way as say a dirty musk, smoky leather or vetiver. Lavender has unfortunately been tied up with the herbalised healthcare world - those pillows you heat in the microwave to comfort you, the bath oils to relax and destress you after an apparently long day (we’re all supposed to be stressed and need a bath or glass of wine to unwind,aren’t we?) - or as a masculine barbershoppy note in any-ole-fougeres. And licorice - well the fact that it has laxative qualities may be the least of its worries. It’s a polariser note, like its smell relative aniseed, and where it does appear, it’s often sweetened to tone down its bitter qualities. It’s there of course in the *interesting* Blue Sugar, and Lolita Lempicka. But I can’t think of many other places in which I’ve smelled it, so if you can tell me a few, I’d be pleased.

I don’t have any such associations with either note, fortunately. Lavender makes me think of that world in the photo on the left - the heat of summer, the thrum of bees collecting, a world of burnt greens and impossible mauves. Licorice takes me back to childhood. I was addicted to Licorice Allsorts, especially the round chewy ones with the blue or pink speckly coatings (do y’all know what I’m yabbering about?). Licorice is naturally pretty sweet - I’ve chewed the root enough to know that - and yes, I do have a high-fibre diet thank you very much - but we tend to sweeten it even more as a foodstuff. Not so the Dutch and the Scandinavians I think, who tend to make salty little cough candies from it, chewable as biltong, and just as savoury. They’re an acquired taste, but it’s one I found easy to get…

With the unusual character of these two ‘notes’ in mind, I made a trip to London especially to smell Un Brin de Reglisse, the latest in the Hermessence series, only available at Hermes stores. Fortunately, the haughty sales assistant (Hermes staff have hauteur down to a T) deigned to give grubby little me a sample to take away, to test at length. I wonder if she used anti-bacterial hand gel after our encounter.
Jean Claude Ellena, the Hermes nose, co-founder of the Different Company, Patty’s additional love interest, and all round scent genius, has his own signature style. He has the ability to make a whole heap of scent ingredients smell like a handful at most, and is therefore often regarded as the expert of minimalist style. However, I think it’s important to remember he also made Ambre Narguile (pretty maximalist by anybody’s standards, even if it is sheer at the same time), the intensely animalic Rose Poivree (dirty devil…), and Cartier Declaration, a sparkling but still rich update of Roudnitska’s Eau d’Hermes. Therefore, though his most recent scents may have been about sparse form rather than flourishes and curlicues, I was intrigued to see where the listed notes of lavender, licorice, orange and hay would fit into his canon.
This fragrance starts with a simulacrum of lavender. It’s lavender with all its impurities stripped out, a multiplicity of notes pretending to be a unity, leading me to think this is the best smelling lavender I’ve ever come across. It’s exceptionally real and a fiction at the same time and perhaps because of that paradox, disappears in on itself pretty quickly. It’s gone on my skin in five minutes. What overlaps with it, and then goes onto replace it, is the licorice. This starts bitter and more in the vein of those Dutch sore throat candies than my own licorice allsorts. But once again, this is a brief play of notes, and isn’t allowed to reach a stable presence for too long. Like in many of the Hermessences, this scent strikes me as a series of diaphanous veils, one lifted or completely removed to reveal more fully the next transparent layer. And so on. The ensuing juxtaposition is between licorice and orange - not a full blooded zesty aroma, but a toned down, creamy version of this soft citrus, more like a body soap than an acidic drink.

And from this stage on, as far as I can tell, the perfume softens and softens and starts to play quite differently to Ellena’s recent work. The licorice slowly fades - perhaps a touch clings on - as does the orange, and what seems left is in fact another nod to Eau d’Hermes. On my skin, the latter dries down to a thick quality where the leathery notes merge with soft, near powdery, impenetrable layers of something… vanilla? Benzoin? Musk? Tonka? Fumerie Turque and Musc Ravageur also have this structure, and whilst I love it sometimes, at others it has a quality of suffocation, of unnecessary warmth. I’m surprised to find this aspect in Un Brin de Reglisse, and keep wondering if there’s something else on my skin or my sweater that’s muddling itself with the fragrance and whether the Hermessence has actually disappeared completely. Because this thick drydown (don’t get me wrong - no sillage - this is close to the skin thickness), seems unlikely. The hay listed as one of the elements in this composition might contribute to this density - it strikes me as perhaps a coumarin and vanillin blend.

Ellena wants this fragrance to represent southern France in the heat of summer: the lavender is reassuringly that - a cooling blast of scent from a burnished world. But the rest of the perfume is the heat itself, and for me, in late October, and ready as I am for the journey into winter, it seems to stifle peculiarly.

Happy Hallowe’en everyone!

Since I’ll be just arriving in Paris and barely getting around, I decided to dig up an old post from February 2006. The number of readers we have has increased greatly over the last almost two years, so it may be not new to some of you, but should be new to most of you.  It cracked me up to look at the 8 comments (four of them mine) on that post.

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Some smells in life you remember vividly and others are the stuff of legend and exist only with a story and a very sharp memory, but no smell at all except what you want it to be.

Every summer, as loyal head, heart, health, hands 4-H members, me, Shirley, Tom, Dick and Harry awaited the Sheridan County Free Fair. That was the time when we loaded up the pigs and steers and chickens and vegetables and baked goods and tea towels sewn by 8-year-old hands and took them to town, slapped an entry tag on them for judging and waited for that sweet, sweet prize money check to come in the mail. Pigs and steers, though, were our bank for the year. After judging, they went to auction, and we got the money they sold for. Even white-ribbon hogs would net over $100, sometimes 200 or 300; steers would go for closer to $1,000 and above. Our job was to look adorable when we paraded them through the auction ring, smiling into the crowd, doing a rigged trip here and there to get an “aw” and a higher bid. It was never entirely clear what was being sold here, though it appeared to be a popularity contest to see which dad was spending the most money at the elevator or borrowed the most from the bank (these were the normal bidders). Of course that wasn’t us, but what we lacked in cash and buying power, we made up for based on our charm *twinkling grin*.

This story isn’t about that. What came with the fair was the far from free carnival. Hoxie, Kansa,s was really small, and we got a very small carnival. With the carnival came the rides put together with electrical tape, the games of chance you couldn’t win and the Carnies. These were people that just scared a youngster a little, except that one swarthy teenage boy that just looked dangerous and hot as hell in his tight jeans, greased back hair and a cigarette dangling from his lips.

My dad loved the Carnies – he loved the Gypsies too, but that’s a different story. Carnival time was the one time of the year where he could fleece people unabashedly. He always had to check himself when he played poker locally because he didn’t want his friends and neighbors exiling him from the  Poker Reindeer Games. He never felt that same restraint when he schooled us in poker. He took more of my pig money than I care to talk about, until I finally realized I couldn’t win - he was too good and playing angles I didn’t even know existed. He counted cards, knew the odds, was a math genius, and poker was his game.

But the Carnies didn’t know that, at least not at first. So as we took our pigs and steers out for judging and dutifully modeled that A-line shift with the bad seams and unfinished edges in the style show, he was over playing poker, drinking whiskey and taking money from the carnies. My mother, of course, hated it.

This story isn’t about that either. Besides our hometown fair, there was the Wakeeney fair, which was the “big one” for us. More rides (and ones that weren’t put together with duct tape), car races, a thriving midway metropolis. We always traveled for one night to the Big Wakeeney Fair. This carnival had

Rat Roulette

Just wrap your mind around that concept for a second while I explain what it looks like. If you’ve ever seen a Roulette wheel, then you’ve seen The Rat. Just think bigger holes. The wheel was spun, and then they released the rat. The rat ran around the wheel as it slowed down and would finally pick a black or red or white hole, each numbered, to dive into. The person who had their money on that hole won the pot. I’m still not sure how this game managed to avoid Police involvement in Bible Belt Kansas - it was just gambling, pure and simple, though an interesting take on gambling.

Daddy had one night at the Wakeeney Carnival too, and that night was spent with The Rat as his BFF. He only had one night because they would never let him play again that year, and he had to wait until the next year with new Carnies who didn’t know him so he could play again. More than once, they made him leave midway through the night because they were out of money. Nobody ever really knew, and my Dad never told, exactly how he knew where the Rat would go, but he knew. He told my Mom it was one color of hole they always went in, but given how many holes there were available, that really doesn’t account for it, but it did eliminate a good number of the holes. He also said he knew which direction the rat would run once it came out. Being an expert on Rat turning behavior doesn’t explain it either, though I’m thinking that a seriously mad skill every woman should have when she’s in her very active dating/nightclub years. I saw the Rat run, and it would sometimes dive for a hole quick and sometimes meander around for quite a while. My best guess is, as with humans, rats have predictive behavior, and watching even a couple of times, he found the pattern in Rat Roulette. 

So every year my dad would come home with Rat Money, hundreds of dollars of it, and give it to my Mom.  My Mom hated it. She hated the smell, said she hated spending it because it just reeked of rat. But spend it she did, still complaining, but without one bit of embarrassment, because we needed it for new school clothes.

Rat Money Smell is what sin and whiskey and forbidden sex smells like. It’s the shady side of life, the smoky biker bar full of bad men that look irresistible, the dark rivers of life that nobody really wants to talk about too much because it is fun, and we all go there from time to time and hope we don’t get caught up in the Rat Money current and forget to find our way home.

I don’t remember what the Rat Money really smelled like, but it’s my phrase for every smell that I identify with that something that makes you wriggle up up your nose and look the other way while casting furtive backward glances trying to figure out what it is and if it’s as much fun as it looks and whether anyone will catch you sniffing ’round it. Amber is that smell for me. Whether it’s in Laura Tonatto Amir, Hermes Ambre Narguile (aka The Nazgul) or Parfum D’Empire Ambre Russe, it’s not the perfume itself, it’s that note that screeches “forbidden, you slut.”

Every life needs a little Rat Money smell. It is mixed in with the sweetness, the passion, the sorrow, the loss and regret. It meanders through all of our lives like cigarette smoke, clinging sometimes to what we wear, but never to who we are. My daddy understood that. He would play in the Rat Money World, but he never became part of it. He brought his Rat Money home to his wife and children so we could have a microwave or a new tv, a luxury we couldn’t otherwise afford. (Dante’s Inferno by Rodin)

I think that’s why I always keep amber perfumes around. Sometimes I open up a drawer and I smell it, and I think, ah, Rat Money, and I remember my dad and all the lessons he taught us about life - the love, the fun, the loss, and the honor.

What’s your rat money smell?

I’m still working on my fig testing for the next installment of Figmania! I am really disappointed not to be able to include the several (five?) Ava-Luxe fig scents, a couple of which were highly recommended. She’s taking a break (I pray not a permanent one) from perfumery, and is there anything like knowing you can’t have something to make you want it desperately? I wanted to try her Honey too, since I’ve been craving honey and people feel so strongly about it (love it/hate it).

Also, I got a little behind last week with the multiple posts; I think I’ve responded to everyone’s comments now, and thanks for your patience.

So, today’s post. What’s the deciding factor in whether I blog on a fragrance? Often it’s something that sticks out a little, something unexpected that grabs my attention. Here are two decidedly different takes on “sexy.”

Escada Collection – sweetlife sent me a sample (thanks!) to go in my honey post. I didn’t even know it existed; the most common set of notes I see listed is: mandarin, cola, jasmine, tuberose, sandalwood, tonka. I thought it was special enough to highlight it further. It smells sort of like honey. Or, like Vanilla Coke. Or a Coke float (made with vanilla ice cream.) It smells like tonka. Maybe a little soft woods and vanilla? With maybe some alcohol poured over the top? Or: cherry tobacco. Really, take your pick. What it doesn’t smell like is a big fat tuberose/jasmine bouquet. It’s creamy, gourmand rather than floral, but not really edible.

It’s in the vanilla/comfort scent category, and you people who are into vanilla/gourmand stuff seriously need to check it out. I’m fascinated by it. It’s a WYSIWYG scent – it’s one straight smell, and you either like it or you don’t. I’m not even that into this type of scent – I can really hate me some artificial vanillin-type-deal. But we’re not talking cake batter here; it’s actually sort of … weird, in a really friendly, cuddly way. I think it’s the cola-tonka combo, which suggests vanilla tobacco, spices and bootleg hootch all together, rather than a cupcake. The humorous part: I had a few dabs on the back of one hand, and during my errand running I had three different men tell me how delicious I smelled, one in a particularly friendly way. Which demonstrates: a) maybe this is stronger than I realized; b) the back of the hand is a great location for fragrance, since (unlike my neck) my hands tend to be more up in people’s faces; c) it is true that men think vanilla is sexy.

There are 104 reviews of Escada Collection on MakeupAlley (with high overall and re-buy ratings), so I guess maybe I am the last person to know about it. It’s the 1997/98 version and has apparently been discontinued; do the later versions in different LE bottles smell differently? (This is the one on the purple card). Someone chime in here and set me straight.

Versace Crystal Noir – notes I see most frequently are: gardenia, amber, orange blossom, peony, sandalwood, and musk, created for Donatella Versace, gardenia being allegedly her favorite flower. An SA who knows what I like chased me around with the tester; I’m glad she did, because I’m not sure when (or if) I’d have smelled it on my own. It’s essentially a truckload of amber with some peppered gardenia and a hint of woods. It’s strong, as you’d expect; I dab. If Escada Collection is subtly sexy, this is, uh, more direct — fragrance-wise, it’s saying, (in Italian) lay me down and take me right here, in front of the roaring fireplace!! Its lack of subtlety – the brazen, almost RuPaul obviousness of its proposition – is both humorous and part of its charm. So yes, I expected it to be “sexxxy.” I just didn’t expect it to be quite so wearable. It’s comforting, and I am not Your Queen of Amber. It’s as rich and satisfying as a glass of barolo after that liaison in front of the fireplace, and yet I’m perfectly capable of wearing it to Trader Joe’s, although I doubt that’s what Donatella had in mind.

image: RuPaul (reminding me a bit of Donatella), thebudgetfasionista.com

It’s that time of year again — when your friends at the Posse (along with several other blogs) name our Top Ten Scents of Autumn.

These can be old or new scents — whatever’s getting our special attention this time of year.

We figured we’d divide up the booty and give Patty, March, Lee and Bryan each four slots … that adds up to ten, right?

Patty - My list are the four things that I find myself wearing a lot this year, not the fall/winter scents that I think are the best of all time, just for this year. Top on the list that I’m doting on are two from Guerlain - Quend Vient La Pluie parfum and Spirituese Double Vanille. La Pluie is just plush and rich, sweeter than the edp, and perfect. Double Vanille is smoky and dry with that Guerlain vanilla base. I shouldn’t love it, but I do. Fifi Chachnil in EDP makes my list too. It’s perfect for this part of the winter, dramatic, nothing understated, and beautiful. Last, but not least, Serge Lutens Sarrasins. While there’s nothing groundbreaking about this jasmine, the composition of it suits me to a T. It’s not too fecal, not too sweet, it falls right in the perfect middle. P.S. everyone needs to root for the Rockies to win the World Series. If they win, I’ll be in such a great mood and will have awesome giveaways when I get back from Paris. If they lose…. well, let’s just don’t think about that.

March - well, I screwed up. I was supposed to tell everyone three scents each, but it’s too late now, isn’t it? This fall (and every fall) I’m focusing on the three C’s. First: classic — time to break out the Guerlain Mitsouko, baby! Who doesn’t love that cornucopia of chic, all oriental and aloof and mysterious? Well, lots of people don’t. But they should. The EdP is good; the extrait is mind-altering. Second, a comfort scent — I have a million of those, but if the weather ever cools off I’m ready for the tasty, smoky lapsang goodness that is L’Artisan Tea for Two. Finally, there’s cult — the weirdness I can’t deal with in the heat, but feels so right in cooler weather. Again, I have many choices, but I picked up my bottle of Versace The Dreamer the other day and remembered that fantabulous unisex combo of tobacco, tootsie rolls and turpentine (and I believe I owe Robin at Now Smell This a shout-out for the tootsie-roll reference.) It’s freaky, and yet totally wearable and mesmerizing. I almost put this as my comfort scent.

Lee - When I did my spiel about man scents the other day, I forgot my first fall favourite: Burberry London - the 2006 version. If you’re one of the few people who doesn’t love this scent, what the heckypeck is wrong with you? And it lasts too, in spite of what some may say. It’s the smell of a lithe young waiter in an old fashioned gentleman’s club - he’s been standing by the fire, serving port. The smells of tobacco - not tobacco smoke - seem to have been trapped in his hair, and he catches your eye, beckoning you towards the empty library. You follow him, of course. You know serving port isn’t on his mind.. You open the heavy double doors and he’s lying on a worn chaise longue, those chocolate eyes mischievous beneath heavy lashes… Next up should be a cold shower, but I’m going with Penhaligon’s Endymion. I never wear it, but can I tell you again how incredible it smells on Matt? Pure cold weather delight. Third, and unsurprisingly, is recent acquisition Fougere Bengale - this chameleonic number is perfect for the October days we’re having - chill frosty starts followed by almost summer sunshine. I still haven’t worked it out, but am enjoying the journey. And my final pick is a scent of which I have nary a drop - and I’m trying to delay bottle purchase. I know I’ll succumb. Back in January, I said this, right here, on this blog: ‘This has notes of cognac, leather, orris and vetiver, a deliciously rich combination… It’s very much a reading by the fire sort of smell – in an old fashioned sepia world where everything is a shade of brown and the flames flicker caramel colours in the glass of brandy warming in your hand. In fact, this combination of notes smells most like rich pipe tobacco and for that reason alone this brings me comfort.’ Bois d’Ombrie. I’m in London in the next coupla days…. just sayin’. I wonder if I can track down a gentlemen’s club with lithe young waiters…

Bryan - I will exclude Carnal Flower only because I included it for the Summer faves. Truth be told, and I’m sure everyone is just plain sick of “hearing” about it, I wear CF year round. ’nuff said. My first Fall love is Ambre Narguile by the esteemed House of Hermes. This is Mr. Ellena’s amber opus and it is divine. I can’t believe that this so-called water color of a scent wafts fabulously throughout the halls I have wandered, hours after application. Truly a scrumptious scent…without being noxious. Perhaps I am choosing the next scent because I haven’t reached for it of late…meaning I plan to this fall. Une Fleur de Cassie is a remarkably chic perfume that simply exudes class and refinement. I just feel like I should be a guest on Dirty Sexy Money when I wear it….granted that’s a recent insight….guess what I’m hooked on. Next, I plan on spritzing a large amount of Coromandel by Chanel Les Exclusifs. I absolutely love the gourmand quality of the patchouli here….not overly “woodsy” nor “hippy”. Two words I truly despise. This is a scent that lives up to its brand….unlike so many sad and forgetable scents…Escada I’m looking at you. Finally, I have a new love…and yes it’s a big bad Tuberose…..Beyond Love By Kilian. I ordered a decant and the full bottle within hours of each other. There was one bottle left and it had my name on it! This is a dirty Tuberose and I plan to need a refill by Halloween…ok, that’s pushing it a little bit, but I been known to overspray.

Check out the Top 10 posts on our fellow fragrance blogs: Aromascope, Bois de Jasmin, Now Smell This, Perfume-Smellin’ Things, and Scentzilla.

For anyone interested, Chandler Burr wrote a hilarious/fascinating article about civet in the style supplement to last Sunday’s New York Times, which contains an anecdote about civet cream that’s so disgusting I’m not even going to quote it here. He also reviewed three fragrances with civet: YSL Kouros (two stars for smelling like “a French trucker’s Jockey shorts”); Malle Musc Ravageur (three stars, “animalic yet crystalline… the body odor of a beautiful stranger”); and TDC’s Rose Poivree, which receives the rare and coveted five stars for smelling “mesmerizing … akin to breathing in the warm, slightly fetid breath of some immense, fur-covered animal.” I don’t always agree with Burr, but I think that’s a magnificent description of a fragrance I adore.

On to today’s topic:

Not long ago I posted my adventures in the land of honey, having discovered that Miel de Bois is actually wearable.

I got together a few more honey scents:

Ginestet Botrytis (notes: honey, candied fruits, quince, pain d’epice, white flowers). All I remember was something wine-y when I tried it a year or so ago, so I thought I’d retry it. I’m glad I did so at home, because it was the first honest-to-God run-to-the-sink scrubber I’ve had in some time. It starts off promising – a really amped-up honey with that furzy beeswax note – and then goes deeply, desperately wrong on me in some way I’m unwilling to revisit without therapy. Or possibly an exorcist. A combination of wine, mold and … ack, nooooooo. I felt repulsed by this the way some people feel repulsed by CB Musk. I had high hopes; my apologies to all of you who worship this scent.

Demeter Honey – My hopes for this were pretty low; I figured it would smell synthetic and/or too sweet, like honey-flavored jelly beans or something. I was delighted to find a pure honey-like note with just that perfect touch of pollen and beeswax to keep it from being dull. And it lasted for five hours on me, which I loved. Not cloying, not fakey, just rich golden honey with a tiny little dusting of pollen funkiness to keep things interesting. Perfect.

Santa Maria Novella Acqua di Cuba – honey and boyjuice. No, I am not insane; a couple other commenters got the same thing. I have no idea what the problem is, but our relationship is not going to work out.

Speziali Fiorentini Te Nero Body Mist – I’m sticking this in here because it’s a possible alternative for those of you who keep trying to love honey but hate that weird, waxy/furry part. The body mist starts off black tea and honey (very nice); then a suede note chimes in (still very nice); then the tea and the suede drop out and I’m pretty much left with honey – for several hours. And the stuff’s dirt cheap – maybe $20?

I’m off on a preschool field trip to the apple orchard this morning with Hecate and Buckethead; I’ll see you this afternoon.

Illustration from Slovenly Betsy, by Heinrich Hoffman, Illustrated by Walter Hayn, gutenburg.org

LAYdeez and GENulMEN! Roll up! Roll up! It’s take down time! Who’s gonna be the winnaah of the department store dust up? Which scent’s got the cojones to KO the other fumes with a quick one-two of the ole atomiser? Which of these here puppies’ll be loving you long time, and if you’re lucky, stick around to see the dawn in widya? Sit back, get comfortable and we’ll begin.

Kenzo Tokyo vs. Diesel Fuel for Life. Who cares, right? Call that a fight? More like a friggin’ ballet dance. Diesel limps thru on his ’smelled it all before’ legs.

Creed Bois de Portugal (standing in as Epicea was unavailable) vs. Armani Code. The boardroom bruiser bounces the flouncy newcomer out of the ring in ten seconds. It’s all over; the fat lady’s doin’ her number.

Comme des Garcons 2 Man vs. Comme des Garcons 2. A curious pair this one. The plain 2 tries to use the sheen of his bottle to outfox the canny 2 Man. To no avail folks. Smoky vetiver campfire craziness eventually wins through.

Marc Jacobs for Men vs. Bulgari Aqua. These two summer beauties would prefer to parade in their speedos than slug it out in the ring, but no matter. It’s the synthetic fig and coconut ladyboy against the best of the flipperfooted marine men. Aqua makes some good moves towards the end of the round, even suggesting a Fahrenheit finale, but, in spite of exhausting his initial beauty early on, Marc Jacobs wins the judge’s verdict in a close-fought match.

Paul Smith Story vs. Lalique Encre Noire. The Lalique’s might and beauty’s been talked up by the cognoscenti; how the hell will lightboy vetiver match up? You know, surprisingly well. Encre Noire’s menacing moves are no match for the fleet-footed fancydance of Story, who tells a tale or two, but not the one you’d imagine (this match is also known as the ‘I don’t do dark vetiver’ revelation dust-up).

Eau de Cartier vs. Must de Cartier. Must is too smooth to fight. He doesn’t want his spiced ambery goodness ruffled by a punch-up with an asexual green-around-the-gills (but oh so lovely) lightweight. Santos would’ve kicked the pair of em in the knackers, dusted down his tux, and had done with it.

Gaultier Fleurs du Male vs. Fahrenheit 32. I ain’t watchin’ this one;the thought of these two duking it out with their manbags has me reaching for my sicksack. Whoever wins, they’ll only make it through to the next round anyway. No use crying over spilled milk and orange flower.

Prada Amber pour Homme vs. Gucci II pour Homme. Though the terrific tea opening moves of Gucci makes him seem like a winner, he rapidly descends into a watered down version of his daddy’s schtick - woodlite ™ - and who wants to see that done badly? Prada may be a little barbershop and lacking in his eponymous characteristics, but style and quality win out in the end…

You know, I’ve got the quarter- and semi-finals mapped out, and know the the final outcome, but I’m thinking I’ll cut to the chase, if that’s okay. I’m not sure I can force you lovely people to sit through 8 more matches…

The surprise winner was Paul Smith Story. There was plenty I loved in many of the others (though hardly anything in a handful), but for me, this one came tops for a couple of reasons. First of all, it’s one I overlooked for my usual snobbish reasons. Blinking Paul Smith, lame-ass narrative - ha! - that has no link to product, und so weiter… Resniffing it several months later has allowed me to reassess it, sans blinkers (you’ll notice the language play here - please forgive my pretensions). Second, it really is darn good. It’s one of those easy to wear, crisp summer scents that whilst not hugely innovative, does do something quite different with vetiver. Yes, it’s initially citric, but from the midnotes onwards it develops a wonderfully savoury, smoky aspect that puts it up there with my other favourite in this category, the Different Company’s Sel de Vetiver. Third, you can get it for pennies (well, nearly) unlike the aforementioned spendy number, which makes it as close to must have as anything. Buy it.
Quick aside on candles, seeing as it seems the season. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: there’s no beating Patricia de Nicolai. I’m sitting here, a candle unlit on the other side of the room, and the scent has filled this high-ceilinged space. Resine de Pin, seeing as you’re asking. Too early for this one, I know, but I just thought I’d test it out.

Next week: a review of the seventh Hermessence, Un Brin de Reglisse.

Who do you think should’ve won the dust ‘em up, and why?

Y’all heard that rumor? Sniffa attendees report that there were two bell jars at Bergdorf Goodman this last weekend — Un Bois Sepia and Bois et Fruits.  The other part of the rumor was that they won’t be sold in the bell jars, but will be in the square bottles with black labels, like the LE’s they send over, and they will run more than the LEs, like $180 for 50 ml.  No real news on whether it will eventually be all of them or a few at a time or what.  So what have y’all heard? And what do you hope for? 

Also, to all of you that recommended the Mariage Freres red tea candle… I should could will kiss you!  Perfection. Wonderful throw, perfect dry tea scent, not sweet, just perfect for fall.  I’m stocking up on all of their candles and burny things when I’m in Paris. My new favorite line. ♥

Anyone know where in the world Serena Franco of Ava-Luxe has gone?  I assume she’s either doing a site re-design and catching up on orders or she’s vamoosed, and it better not be the latter, just when things were getting interesting.  I’m hoping site re-design and back open for her annual sale.

Sin, with notes of black opium, amber, musk, and vanilla. This appears to be pretty much her signature musk scent, but she’s given it an interesting twist.  I’m not sure I know what black opium smells like — well, I’m pretty positive I don’t know what opium, black or otherwise, smells like. If I did, y’all may be reading a different blog like “How I escaped the opium dens of Five Points.”  Well, that’s the title I might use, even though there are no opium dens, that I’m aware of, in Denver – just your standard crack corners.  Regardless, this has another quality in it from the other notes that change her musk into something else, and the word “sin” fits it well enough, but it is sin that feels the pang of regret.  There’s a slightly seamy or wicked feel to it on the open, while staying beautiful, just something hurt and slightly raw rolling around beneath the surface.  It never settles into her creamy musk smell that I’ve come to expect of her perfumes centered around musk.  It’s interesting without being too weird, and I can see myself wearing this one quite a lot, even though my days and opportunities to sin, with or without regret, have decreased to almost nothing. 

She also has a Limited Edition for the holiday Season, Madeline, with notes of musk, woods, vanilla, fig, liquorice, milk, brandy, and spices.  This is definitely a holiday scent –  very gourmandy on the open, with a slightly figgy/musky backdrop.  March, you might include this in your fig obsession, it’s the sweet fig angle that I’m not sure you’ve covered yet.  This is really quite perfect for the holidays, which is one of the few times when I do appreciate something more gourmandy, but the drydown on this could work year-round.  It ends as a lovely musk with a liquorice tonality to it, sprinkled with just some spices. Once you get past the more foody aspects of the open, it’s got a very addictive quality that keeps you coming back to sniff.  This isn’t a masterpiece, like I think some of her perfumes are or are becoming, but it’s pretty great for holidays and is a very well done gourmand.

As I said when I reviewed Shisha a while back, Ava-Luxe is becoming an interesting perfumer, moving from the more basic body scents/smells into much more sophisticated fare that stands up on its own just as a perfume, with no “buts.”  While I won’t go into it in any depth in this post, Madame X is another interested scent she’s done recently -  sultry, naughty thing that really does scream slut with a heart.   If you have never tried something from her because you thought she was just doing lotion scents, I encourage you to give her a try.  She should be open again shortly, I would think, and the price point on her perfumes are great and even better if she’s doing a sale.

Last one for today is my personal favorite of everything she’s done – including the addictive Love’s True Bluish Light, which is a staple for me in body cream — Midnight Violet.  I am a total violet freak, and this comes the closest in feel to the original Caron Violette Precieuse.  Dry and smoky, with the ethereal sweetish violet smell floating all around it, but never taking it into a sweet scent. Notes of Violet, Blue iris,Orris, Earth, Black hemlock, Galbanum, Pink pepper, Cinnamon, Cedar, Sandalwood, Incense, Wood balsam, Moss, Civet, Cashmere musk.  It is dark and beautiful, and I need her to open back up so I can get it in the parfum too! I already have it in shower scrub, lotion and edp.  I NEED MORE!!!

So what’s your favorite Ava-Luxe scent, or have you not tried any?

It’s still in the mid-80s here, which is really interfering with my efforts to prepare a Best of Fall post. So instead, join me on one of my new obsessions — fig.

I’ve always been indifferent to fig, in fragrance and in food. Other than hoovering down the occasional plastic sleeve of Fig Newtons (or my preferred alternative, the figgier organic Fig Newmans) I’ve … well, never given a fig about figs. I’m sure at some point in my past I smelled, say, Diptyque Philosykos and L’Artisan Premier Figuier, thought meh, and moved on.

Several weeks ago, I happened to smell Slatkin Black Fig and Absinthe on Louise, and I was charmed. The following week, picking up my soap supply, I paused over the Pacifica Mediterranean Fig and (across the aisle) the Speziali Fiorentini Fig and Poppy.

Before I really understood what was happening, a minor interest developed into a full-blown case of figmania. I spent hours on MakeupAlley, Amazon and elsewhere looking for (and reading reviews of) fig products – lotions, shampoos, liquid soaps, candles, room sprays. I got online and bought some things (and what is the internet for, if not a tool to waste time and money on some new, weird passion?) including some discontinued fig-scented products people raved about. Hey, which do you find more pathetic – buying discontinued fragrance, or discontinued shower gel? I’m trying not to think about it.

Anyway, consider this a cautionary tale of how your fragrance addiction can spin out of control suddenly, in a direction you hadn’t even considered – or, if you’d prefer, an introduction to the fruits of my labor. Remember, as always, mileage may vary; what I consider “too green” or “sugary” might be very different for you. Lasting power generally isn’t a problem on my skin, so unless it disappears in 10 minutes I tend not to do a lot of evaluation of that aspect. Finally, due to length I’m going to drop this fig nonsense into more than one post. Stay tuned.

Fig seems to be deployed in four major styles – there are those with additional green/earthy notes (fig leaves, twigs, bark, what have you – hints of galbanum and/or LOTV are common). At the other end of the spectrum: figs that are sweet/creamy. Third, there is what I came to think of as “Fig Plus” – where fig is only one player in an ensemble fragrance, and while those can be great, they aren’t the fix I want right now. I was looking for what I think of as Fig Neutral – a figgy fig, ripe and macerated but not too sweet, and not too much earth/green notes.

Here in no particular order, is my Fig Walk of Shame:

Acqua di Parma Blu Mediterraneo Fico di Amalfi — can I say I hate that name? Yes, I know, it’s Italian, but it sounds like “fecal” and I wish it didn’t. Anyway, nicer fragrance than I expected. This is Fig Plus – like fig sitting in the middle of your regular AdP cologne — a little woods, some citrobergamot. I feel like there’s maybe a touch of anise in there? Better lasting power than you’d expect from something that goes on so light and fresh.

Speziali Fiorentini Fig and Poppy (body spray, lotion, soap, etc.) — Fig Plus. The soap doesn’t smell figgy at all, just like nice soap. The body spray has a nice figgy smell, but it’s too floral and it doesn’t hang around long. I love the packaging, though. My favorite from the line is Te Nero, which is black tea with an excellent honeyed drydown.

Bath & Body Works Brown Sugar and Fig – Now that BBW’s doing a lot of home fragrances, you can smell the store at the other end of the mall corridor, a complaint I used to reserve for Yankee Candle. I almost can’t stand to go in there. Anyway – if you held a gun to my head and said, pick one, I’d probably go with Brown Sugar and Fig. It’s a fairly low-key, soft comfort fragrance that smells more of brown sugar than fig, but doesn’t smell of either to the point that you want to die. It’s subtle, and subtle is not a quality BBW is known for. I embrace it. If you’re looking for more fig, the body lotion smells figgier than the body cream, and the Body Mist is figgier than the EDT. I think the body mist would be really nice under a too-green fig you were trying to mellow.

Diptyque Figuier Room Spray – Okay, now we’re talkin’. Less green and woody than their fragrance Philosykos, the Figuier Room Spray (which, yes, I cheerfully applied to my person, and nothing dropped off, although it’s meant for rooms and laundry) raises the interesting question of fig vs. coconut. I’m looking for a “creamy” fig, and if you read enough reviews of fig scents you’ll read x number of complaints regarding “coconut,” which is (so far as I know) not a note that is officially listed in whatever fragrance they’re discussing. I wonder – just as there’s a cat pee/boxwood dynamic with honey, so is there a coconut note in fig? I’m not a perfumer, but I can see it – fig’s creamy sweetness, if that’s where you’re going with your scent, does have an element of something coconutty. Figuier Room Spray is close to my ideal – figgy, a little green, creamy (with that coconut undertone.) For the record, I’m not a fan of coconut in my frags, so don’t let it be a deal-killer for you, either.

L’Artisan Premier Figuier. Can’t smell it. No, seriously. Can Not Smell It. Bill can’t smell it on me either. I tried a different bottle and a different day – nothing. Faint hit of greens, leaves, then nothing. Weird.

L’Artisan’s Premier Figuier Extreme – this one I can smell. Category: Creamy/Fig Plus. It’s supposed to be figgier, more floral and creamier than the regular, and while all that is true, I can’t make up my mind whether I like it. Sometimes it smells lovely, if a bit too “floral;” other times there’s a soapy note that bothers me. Also (and this is odd) it either smells good up close or at a distance, depending; but not both at once.

Bendel Wild Fig Eau de Toilette – they still have six bottles at Bendel in NYC, but they’re discontinuing the fig scent (I think they used to have ancillary products like candles and bath gel). I was worried I’d fall in love with a d/c’d scent and was prepared to stock up … but no. This has gotten some great reviews on MUA, and I think maybe I’m anosmic to some part of it. I get twigs and leaves and a little bit of fig, but it’s pretty tentative no matter how much I put on. So I’m happy to let this one go.

Memoire Liquide Bois de Figuier and Figuer at Bendel. The Bois was a total bust – macerated leaves and spices, and it’s interesting, but no. The Figuier (these are fragrance oils) went on pretty rough – bitter and not very figgy. After 20 minutes on my skin, though, it really bloomed. A delicious fig, woody but still very figgy without random fruitiness. I think you can get a bottle for $40ish. I can see buying this, maybe even blended into their body lotion or shower gel.

Hautes de Provence Fig Shower Gel (Feuille de Figuier) This is supposed to be L’Occitane’s commercial line, I am assuming for hotels. It’s okay. It’s got light, green fig on a woody, gender-neutral base. If I used this in a hotel I’d be fine with it. But I wouldn’t steal the extra bottle to take with me, because it also introduced me to the other less attractive (to me, anyway) direction fig can go: soapy.

L’Occitane Fig Shower Cream with Shea Milk – This was part of their shea butter line, and it smells delicious, an excellent, rich fig that manages to be creamy and woody but not overly sweet. If I could buy it at L’Occitane I’d run over there right now. But it’s been discontinued (why why why?) and as lovely as it is, I’m not going to stalk it on eBay.

That’s enough for this go-round. Stay tuned for Figmania! Part Deux, in which I discuss:

Diptyque Philosykos
Slatkin Wild Fig and Absinthe
CB I Hate Perfume Revelation
Pacifica Mediterranean Fig
Wen Fig Oil
Satellite A La Figue!
Bendel Fig Scentport scents from Bath and Body Works
Heeley Figuier
Parfumerie Generale Jardins de Kerylos
Demeter Fig
Hermes Un Jardin en Mediterranee

and whatever I might dig up. Have I overlooked anything? (probably) Also, I tried (and totally failed) to get ahold of the famed Mathias Figue. Anyone have 1ml they’d like to part with, so I can see what I missed?

Also — who’s tried the fig candles? How about the Burn Fig? L’Artisan? Pacifica? Recommendations?

fig botanical drawing: herbdatanz.com

First, Parfums Raffy is having a 10% off sale.  Use code RAFFY07PP. The sale runs through 10/24/07 and is only valid for internet orders.

Second, my unabated and unrequited crush on Christian Bale continues.  Made “Reign of Fire” watchable.

Montale White Musk, got some of this in the Montale Swedish sale, and I was shocked at how good it is. I did find a bottle of it listed on the Parfums Raffy site, but not seeing it anywhere else.  Does anyone know if they discontinued it?  No listing of notes that I can find, but it is a slightly sweetish, well-behaved musk, closer to Soleil de Capri in feel than to CB’s Musk.  The drydown is a little sweet, a little musky, though the sweet starts drying off and a hint of something oudish comes out the longer it is on.  A very nice musk for those that like their musks to not veer off into raunch.

 Olivier Durbano has launched his third perfume, Black Tourmaline.  Notes of Cardamom, coriander, cumin, frankincense, pepper, smoked wood, oud, leather, precious woods, musk, amber, moss, patchouli.  I wanted to love this since I love the other two jewel perfumes he has done, and there’s part of it that I do love, and I certainly don’t hate it — it has a lot to recommend it. There’s plenty of smoky incense, woods and leather here on the open, but the patchouli is just a little more dominant than I’d like, and it takes the whole composition into too pungent a territory. Yeah, I know, this from the girl that adores SMN Nostalgia and Bvlgari Black, but those two have a drydown that gets tamer, and this one just gets fiercer, which will work well for those of you that are into that sort of thing.  The cumin isn’t too overpowering, but it and musk do give you a bit of a sexual tumble.  Sorta like sex in church with that guy on Rome — you know, that one over there with lots of leather on… the, um, choir boy.  Well, it is Hottie Friday, so there’s plenty of cheesecake for everyone!

While the patch and cumin aren’t a deal-breaker for me, those who aren’t big fans of heavy patch or are sensitive to that note when it is a little heavy in a perfume, like you get in Borneo and Prada, you may not find this to your liking, so tread carefully.  Why I love Borneo as mindlessly as I do is a mystery. If you were fans of the less patchy first two perfumes Durbano did, make sure to sample Black Tourmaline first.  Luckyscent has samples and full bottles.

Lastly, before we get to the winners of the two drawings I had, was I a cruel person to send March some of the Donna Karan Chaos pure parfum? Or was I being a true friend?  y/y?

Winner of the sample grabbag, and you will get a little taste of the Bond Andy Warhol Silver Factory thing - it’s my pennance for all the mean things I’ve done this week - 2scents.  Winner of the Posse Scent Club sample pack is - Tessa.  Congrats to both of you!  Just click on Contact Us over there to the left and send me your address, and I’ll get those in the mail.

I do have one other drawing I haven’t forgotten about, the new Roja Dove scent sample pack. I’m waiting because they sent two of the same bottle, and it was missing one, so we’re waiting for the third bottle.

First off I want to say thanks for the excellent suggestions you folks made on my Little Pleasers post. Some of the items (e.g., wine stoppers, pepper grinder, keychain flashlight) I’m happy to say I already own, and others are now on the way to the house. The Big Cheese is really thrilled with the tsunami of boxes arriving daily (hey, bud, at least it’s not perfume!) Anyway, if you’ll recall I said the first person to guess my New Serge Lutens Crush would win my Barbara Bui tee-shirt ‘n stuff giveaway, and that goes to Camille – for naming Santal Blanc. Camille, send me your address (and I love my new Longaberger mugs! I got the berry ones.)

I’ve been ragging on Serge Lutens lately. When I was getting into fragrance it took me awhile to warm up to the Lutens concept, and the base in some of them is so syrupy sweet I can’t stomach it. But as a line, there is really nothing like Lutens. Some of my favorites are grand gestures, like Fleurs d’Oranger. Others have more subtle charms, like Clair de Musc. Some of the scents are outrageous, like Miel de Bois. What I think Lutens does really well is fragrances that are both delightful and a little odd, and that quirkiness is conspicuously absent in the line’s most recent releases.

Today’s scent topic, Santal Blanc, is on the highly-wearable end of the Serge Spectrum, but that doesn’t mean it’s lacking its own peculiar charms. I must have smelled this scent a number of times at the local boutique that sells it, and somehow I never got around to putting it on and giving it a chance to register. (Notes are white sandalwood, musk, cinnamon bark, fenugreek, balsam, pink pepper, iris, wood.)

I was surprised there are so many negative reviews of Santal Blanc on Basenotes, but after further consideration it makes sense; anyone looking for a manly payload of sandalwood is bound for disappointment. There is sandalwood, sure, but it’s gentle and creamy and melts into the general woodsiness of the base. Santal Blanc is also missing that signature dark-fruit Lutens note, which is fine with me; in its place is fenugreek. Here’s a weird quote from Wikipedia (so you know it’s true!):

“A side effect of consuming even small amounts of fenugreek (even as just an infusion in water) is a maple syrup or curry smell in the eater’s sweat and urine, which is caused by the potent aroma compound sotolone. Fenugreek is frequently used in the production of flavoring for artificial syrups. The taste of toasted fenugreek is additionally based on substituted pyrazines, as is cumin. By itself, it has a somewhat bitter taste.”

Santal Blanc is fairly quiet and semi-gourmand – a faint sugar note in the opening, then a brief hint of something like mustard or cumin that fades quickly, and then the main body of the scent– mostly bark and woods, something milky, a light dusting of pepper. Santal Blanc is one of those fragrances I wish I had a new vocabulary to describe, creamy and peppery and gourmand being pretty played out at this point. It’s wonderful – it’s a little weird, falling between dessert spices and a sandalwood box. It’s certainly subtle by Lutens standards, and oddly sexy. It’s a comfort scent par excellence, as well. It’s quite unisex, and it seems to me like the sort of unobtrusive scent you would wear to the office, but that people would still inquire about enthusiastically. I’m thrilled to have finally noticed its charms.

sandalwood mala beads: saranam.com

I don’t make a secret of it: I’m a crap shopper. Unless I’m with a fellow fragnatic and can talk and explore, I don’t much get the idea of wandering from store to store, perusing product. Shopping’s only good with company, and then only for smells. If I’m in a clothes store, I’ll only be able to cope if I’ve gone in with an express plan to buy. And sometimes, even that fails me. Revoke my gay card, if you must.

Take last week. I had some time to kill and so thought I’d wander up to my local high street and consider getting a black jacket I’d had my eye on for a while. It was a quiet time of day - convenient for worried shoppers like me, as I manage crowds as well as I do the shopping experience itself. Funny how I can switch all this off in a ‘proper’ city, but that’s by-the-by. So, I tried the jacket on, and a sweater, and a pair of trousers. I bought nothing. It seems that all trousers this year are designed for men with the thighs of Kate Moss - seeing as mine are a little more rugby player sized, I have difficulty pulling them up. They fit my waist and butt fine, but my legs feel like they’re constricted enough to survive several sequential transatlantic flights. I don’t imagine fashion is currently being dictated to by fears of DVT, but that’s how it seems. I also decided the sweater and jacket were superfluous and not quite me, and like so often, left empty handed (well, I did buy a couple of books, but that’s not quite included by me in shopping…).

I decided to spend the rest of the shopping trip time in town at my local high end department store, where they seem to be amassing more and more niche brands, alongside selected designer stuff. I had an idea to explore.

Last week on Basenotes, there was a thread about listing your three favourite unisex scents. Well, actually it was worded a little differently to that, but I can’t exactly remember how. But anyway, it got me thinking. Y’see, I wear more unisex than I do men’s stuff, and for me the question seemed a bit, well, wonky. Now I’m not casting aspersions about the post, and we all know the daftness of gender distinction in perfume, but it struck me once again how I find it next to impossible to define my masculinity through perfume.The very idea is replete with effete surfeit. Or something. And besides that, so many supposed unisex perfumes smell fantastic, whilst so many men’s smell substandard. All in my opinion of course (*humbly genuflects*).
There are some men’s fragrances I love - Dior Jules, Hermes Bel Ami, and the more unisexual brethren of the recent past, Dior Homme and Terre d’Hermes. But most men’s stuff I sniff, especially if recently produced, leaves me cold. And this was the idea I wanted to explore - am I being simply prejudiced in my scented likes and dislikes and just going for the more obscure chichi stuff just cos I can? Not that I can necessarily step outside my head and find out, but I thought sniffing a fair few men’s things might help me one way or another.

And a delightful sales assistant came to assist (she lived up to the second part of her job title, even if she failed on the first - as you’ll see), and I played dumb. We went through a whack of stuff - the new Kenzo (ho hum side of humdrum), Narciso Rodriguez for him (better than most new releases but I’d only consider it in the overpriced oil), and a plethora of others that failed to make it into my cache for the day. So many of them did have something in common though - there’s an aromachemical with a raspy nature that rears its head time and time again in so many of these and seems like a replacement for the comic 70s chestwig, now most young blokes are waxing and preening their torsos into a parody of pre-pubescence. It machos up a scent, it gives it testicular bite. It says, ‘I am man, smell me, then feel me, then notice how well coiffed my hair is’. It’s there in Tokyo, Paco Rabanne Black XS and most other things I sniffed (it’s in Clinique’s Happy too). If anyone can tell me what this is, or what combination of chemicals it is, I’ll be delighted to have a name to place on my horror. (Shameful confession - I don’t mind it in the dumbly cheerful Happy, much as I enjoyed watching Keanu Reeves when I was in my 20s.)
My dislike of most contemporary men’s scents is best summed up by one I had the misfortune to sniff - Vera Wang for men. Dear lord - it’s a wailing cacophany of a perfume, hitting you over the head with its plascticised artificiality; a testament to where the wonders of chemistry can go wrong, wrong, wrong; a bag of messy notes into which someone stirred several heaping of fruit and puke and pubes. Don’t ask me for the notes - I just know they were awful and that it OD’ed on the ingredients I hate in so much other men’s stuff.

Finally, the SA secretly sprayed a scent strip and I breathed in happily. It was interesting, quirky, strange - and somehow comfortingly soft at the same time. What was it? Comme des Garcons 2, the one in the silver lie-me-down bottle. She had bloody well unisexed me, hadn’t she? I’d forgotten what a great scent this was, and though I don’t like every element of it (that sumi ink note has a tendency to go acrid on my skin) it was the nearest I was going to get to a perfume purchase that day. Well, tell a lie - I was also taken, momentarily, with Richard James’ Pink Pepper and Cardamom cologne - it had the purest note of the eponymous spice I’ve ever come across, though the lasting quality of the cologne (I mean - duh - it’s meant to be sporty…) was a big zilch.

So help me out here, people - recommend me some men’s stuff that I should try, to help change my mind or alternatively confirm it in its trenchant, erm, trench. Avoid the classics and go for recent stuff that you think is interesting, appalling or, hell, both. I’ll test em and do some mini-reviews next week.

Lovely image of man with testicle chin from http://monsters.co.uk. Check out the work there - tis great. Patty, March, Bryan - sorry about the singular possessive determiner - I liked the image more than I felt a grammatical worry…

I’ve had Belle en Rykiel from Sonya Rykiel sitting around for a while because it just seemed much too heavy to test or wear in the summer, so I thought I’d take another run at it now that the weather is getting all crisp and the Rockies are…. IN THE WORLD SERIES!!!! Well, maybe. At the time I’m writing this, we don’t know yet, and I may be retracting it late tonight or early tomorrow morning.

Also, today will be a sample grabbag giveaway. I have tons of them - Shilo, Bois 1920 Sutra Ylang, some Il Profumos, Cristina Fissore Rapsodia in Blu. So just leave a comment and let me know if you’d like to be in the draw, and the winner will receive a bunch of samples that I need to get rid of before it is impossible to wade out of my office. I’ll even toss in a bit of my Bond No. 9 Andy Warhol sample :cries:. I’m trying to let go of little samples I love, and it’s really, really hard on this one, but I keep telling myself a full bottle will be mines, mines, all mines!!! in December. Lord, I’m just a ‘orrible, selfish wretch. I can’t let go of it. Instead, I’ll be giving away a set of the November Posse Scent Club samples in addition to the grabbag. Two separate drawings for one post, so just indicate if you want in the drawing for one or the other or both. If I can convince myself to have some dignity, the Andy Warhol bit may still make it in one of these.

Belle en Rykiel has top notes of mandarin, red currant, and lavender flowers; heart notes are heliotrope, coffee blossom, and frankincese; base notes are patchouli, amber, vanilla, and Mahogany wood. This reminds me of a creamier, more floral Bond No. 9 New Haarlem. New Haarlem is my favorite coffee fragrance of all time. NH is stronger, more pungent than Belle. Belle is a little softer, it doesn’t have that coffee bitterness, or it is tempered by the other notes. The longer it is on, next to NH, the closer together they start to come, but Belle never quite has that coffee pungency that NH has and veers off away from the coffee midway through the drydown, retaining only a trace of the coffee on me.

For those of you that like your coffee softer and surrounded by flowers and perhaps a teensy bit of some sweets, and that in the open and going to almost nothing in the drydown, and you find New Haarlem to be too Starbucks Burnt Coffee, Belle en Rykiel is very pretty and appealing, and it works far better in colder weather than in summer. I’m still preferring New Haarlem, but I suspect the price point, once it gets to discounters, will make Belle en Rykiel the more attractive of the two.

So ya’ll remember the expensive candle from last week? The Santuario di Bellezza Roma Modern Candle for $120? It smells great in the jar! Unfortunately, that’s where the beauty ends. I tried burning it and I tried melting it, and the result was the same — almost nonexistent throw. ‘Tis a shame because it’s a beauty and should have a way to get out and perfume my house. The only way I could have wound up more irritated by this purchase is if I had bought the bigger $180 version of this “no smell unless you stick your nose in the jar” candle. Why would they spend this much time and effort to make this beautiful fragrance wrapped up in wax in a beautiful 24% leaded jar, tied up with a beautiful bow, just to have the fragrance be a big zero?

Two questions for today. What’s your favorite coffee fragrance? I find myself in need of sampling some more. And what’s the candle you have that has the best throw?

Today’s the Posse Scent Club, Part II (October) – this month we’re visiting Grandma’s house via virtual reality scents. But first, two public service announcements:

1) D.C.-area residents: Art With Flowers in Tysons is hosting Ron Robinson of Apothia this Sunday, October 21 from noon to 6 p.m. They’ll have food and drinks and discounts on items in their store (which in addition to niche lines like Santa Maria Novella, Serge Lutens, Ineke, L’Artisan, etc., sells flowers, an interesting selection of home accessories, candles and other fun goodies.) They’re in Tysons Galleria, where Saks and Neiman Marcus are, their telephone # is 703-903-6837. They’re outside the top-floor entrance to Macy’s, next to the Grooming Lounge. I’ll be stopping by on the early side to check it out!

2) There will be an informal D.C.-area sniffa on Saturday, November 10, starting in the morning at Friendship Heights/Chevy Chase DC area, strolling from Saks on down to NM and the various boutiques in the Great Wall of Bling, tentatively breaking for lunch at Maggiano’s. That’s my understanding of the rough plan, I’ll keep you posted. Any of you D.C. readers/lurkers: sniffing with new friends is fun. Don’t be shy! Come join us! Co-hosted by Louise (a regular poster here) and Nancy/Fishbone of The Perfumed Court, both D.C. area residents and all-around great gals.

On with today’s post. In the last episode we traveled outdoors to Grandma’s house (which must be in the big, bad woods in a Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale) via CB I Hate Perfume’s Wild Hunt, Burning Leaves and Gathering Apples.

Today we’re exploring the interior with the other three scents of the month:

Malle En Passant – one of the creations of Olivia Giacobetti and inspired by her memory of rain and lilacs outside a bakery, En Passant evokes wet pavement, bread, lilacs and cucumber. I’ve always been interested in people’s reactions to the fragrance; some folks find it cheerful and uplifting, and some find it wistful, even sad. I think the wet lilac note is particularly brilliant – it’s haunting, nearby and far away simultaneously. I can almost feel the damp blossoms brushing my skin. While En Passant is technically wrong for this time of year (lilacs are a spring flower), we’re also thinking about Grandma’s lilac eau de cologne, and how it reminds her of those long-ago springs when she and Grandpa used to sneak out to the barn and … well, never you mind.

Serge Lutens Fumerie Turque – here we are in the library, where Grandpa smokes his pipe daily while reading and perhaps napping in a comfortable leather armchair before the fire. Fumerie Turque is, by Lutens’ standards, a fairly linear, accessible scent with no particular oddities. To me it conjures up an old, slightly dusty, warm room full of books, comfortable furnishings, pipe tobacco (cherry, perhaps?) and fond memories.

Santa Maria Novella Nostalgia – this is the weirdo of today’s group, a cult-favorite offering from the generally staid, venerable Italian company. Nostalgia is a vehicle to take you where you want to go – it could be that GTO muscle car you rode in as a teenager, but it could just as easily be Grandpa’s ’55 Ford or even a Model A. With hints of gasoline, rubber, leather, car parts, asphalt and what have you, Nostalgia’s topnotes are an assortment of odd bits, but if you wait with a little patience for the rubber salvo to die down, you’re left with a lovely, rather smoky tobacco/leather drydown with surprising tenacity.

So, the floor’s open – do you think En Passant’s all that, or is it overrated? Did someone put hallucinogens in the tea of the folks at SMN, prompting them to come up with something so out of character? If you divorce Nostalgia from its background information and it’s just Scent X, is it appealing? Is it even wearable? Am I the only person to find Fumerie Turque more homebody-ish than the name implies?

Next month’s scent club – Foody! We’re sniffing Bois 1920 Sushi Imperiale, Serge Lutens Arabie and Rahat Loukoum, Guerlain Iris Ganache, L’Artisan Fou d’Absinthe and Bois Farine. You can join in the fun on any/all of them; look for a sample set on the Perfumed Court. Tentative dates are November 15 and 16.

SPECIAL NOTE: the November Scent Club scents are available now in The Perfumed Court if you need any/all, the discount code is POSSE for 30% off, but get your orders in EARLY since Patty will be gone the very end of October and first week of November.

vintage kitchen: ciaowinnipeg.com (it was a finalist in a new kitchen design competition, and how great is that?)

(I’ve had this in my drafts for awhile as a writing exercise, I’m sticking it up. It’s not about perfume… back to perfume on Monday, I promise.)

It’s official: I’m going to hell. I bought Diva her first skank dress – three of them, actually – for her last round of bar/bat mitzvah parties.

How did this come to pass? Well, it was easy. First off, I’d like to thank all the designers of dresses in size 12/14 (girls) and the junior department, and tell them I look forward to seeing them in the circles below me in hell, along with aggressive telemarketers and people who don’t clean up after their dogs.

There are six types of dresses available for 13-year-old girls:

1) The stiff, Easter-egg-colored satin affairs I’d bully her into if she were a junior bridesmaid at a wedding;

2) The tasteful, floral, dressy dresses from, say, Talbots Kids and The Wooden Soldier that work well for brunch or dinner at the country club;

3) The dresses that come size 7-16 in the girls department. I could write a book about everything wrong with those dresses, but instead I’ll state the obvious: if you take a particular dress design and make it in sizes 7 to 16, it will only be appropriate for a small segment of that actual age group. A dress that looks right on a 7-year-old looks absurd in a size 16, and vice versa. Also, they make the larger sizes without any accompanying darts, neckline changes or other adjustments that would accommodate the shape of an adolescent girl’s body;

4) Big, froufrou Scarlett O’Hara tulle-meringue-like confections, which are apparently bought by some girls for proms and quinceaneras (I was so mystified I asked);

5) The petite section of the woman’s department – all of which are too staid, too structured, too weird or otherwise too “adult” looking to appeal to a tweener, and are often quite expensive;

6) Hence the skank dresses. I have held firm on the Skank Line. This has not been easy, in an age where the fashion-forward girls in Diva’s school are now wearing micro-minis with thongs so that (I kid you not) their peers can see their business when they walk up the stairs of their junior high. I am insanely grateful that Diva mostly wants to dress in jeans, flip-flops and cute, belly-covering tops. But jeans don’t cut it for the bar mitzvahs, and her church outfits aren’t going to work, either.

For the past two years, as most of her friends have held onto their Olive Oyl little-girl bodies, sliding into size 0 jeans and then wailing that their butts look big, Diva has morphed into a curvy girl in a Mary-Kate world. She routinely gets mistaken for a 15- or 16-year-old, and not because she’s dressed or made up inappropriately. Like her father she has the big-boned, muscular arms of an athlete, the legs and thighs of a field-hockey player, and she’s bootylicious like Serena and J-Lo. (I am still thanking God for the day we discovered JLo Jeans, because there’s a woman who understands curves). I am quietly stunned when I watch her move with a raw, graceful power I will never have. I am from the land of the bird-boned women, with wrists (and legs and fingers and pick almost any other measurable dimension) smaller than hers, though she’s still several inches shorter than I am.

Sometimes I meet other mothers, mothers of boys from school, and they say to me, oh. Oh. You’re Diva’s mom. They look at me speculatively. Their sons have been in love with her forever. Because she’s funny. And kind. And sensitive. And she’s grown into the quirky, strong planes of her face and those Liv Tyler lips. But that’s not what she sees when she looks in the mirror.

In hell, all the designers of all the dresses we tried on over the last two years will get to watch, every day, for an eternity, as my beautiful girl tries on yet another dress (my back is turned to preserve her modesty, if she even lets me in the dressing room) and then I watch as she studies herself in the mirror, fighting back tears, until eventually she cries and we go home. I can tell her, I have told her, in every combination of words I can think of: you are beautiful. But it’s not enough.

So. There we were, parties looming, with her having outgrown her perfect Nordstrom dress we bought in November, now Yet Another Thing That Is Too Small. Perusing the rack of sleazy poly-chiffon dresses on sale at deep discount in the junior department at Macy’s, I watched her poke through them uncertainly, biting her lip. I took a deep breath and started grabbing. I said, we will try on ten dresses, and you will look amazing in one of them.

The first dress she tried on was a halter-strap disco confection of brown chiffon, gold sparkles, beads and sequins, and a handkerchief hem (its only saving grace, in Diva’s eyes.) She was already giving up. I stuffed her into that thing, made her take her bra off, ratcheted up the ties behind her neck as high as I could yank them, and lo! The thickest, prettiest 17-year-old you have ever seen was gazing at herself, rapt, in the mirror. I had two thoughts, simultaneously: 1) her father will strangle me with his bare hands if I buy her this dress; and 2) she absolutely slays in that thing, who knew? Maybe Amazon girls need dresses they can work – stuff with dangles and ruches and booty-darts. She stared at herself, in disbelief, thinking her own thoughts, which I imagine ran something like this: 1) I look so great! And 2) mom will never buy me this skank dress. She looked at me expectantly, head tilted down a little, waiting for the bad news.

Do you know what it’s like to look at yourself in the mirror when you’re 13, and every outfit is ugly and wrong? I do. Because my funny little twist on this story is: I had an older sister, who was teeny-tiny and hot and rocked the waist-length hair and the brocade maxi-coat and I always felt like Quasimodo in her presence. I, who grew up into a hulking size 4/6, have always, always been at war with that image of myself as freak. I have a particular photo of me – at 14, wearing a Dorothy Hamill wedge haircut, braces, and exactly the wrong shade of peach – I trot out whenever I want to pinpoint the precise moment I never felt uglier. And here I was, Living The Dream all over again with my daughter, who happens to be blessed with a body she can’t quite appreciate. Yet.

So shoot me. I bought her that skanky dress, and a similar one with no sparkles but a faux-grecian-cross-wrapped top that would break your heart, and another one – in exactly the right shade of red for her (that’s her up there on the right, with one of her friends). We had the silly chiffon-nightie hemline on the red dress removed and the neckline tightened up, and then it was perfect. In the ladies’ shoe department (she is still barely clinging to my size, and I tease her that I’m looking forward to her outgrowing them) I found the perfect brown, sparkly, mid-heel, strappy glitter Disco Princess dressy bow-toe sandals to go with that ridiculous dress.

She wore those dresses over and over, and it’s a good thing summer’s almost done, because she’s almost outgrown them. That woman-child rocks my world, all 5′2 ” of her, and I hope that, some day, she can see how beautiful she is, the way I see her.

March is away today, so we swapped places, but I am wearing one of the aprons she recommended, so just pretend I look like her, but she might be horrified at what I did to her slot today.

Back when I was a kid, my sister and I would play Barbies all the time. You’ve heard some of my Barbie stories, and much as I hate to beat a plastic doll and lead you to believe that I spent all of my childhood with the barbies, too many of my critical life lessons were with my Barbies by my side to ignore that I did spend a lot of my childhood with my barbies by my side.

We didn’t have a boy doll - normally named Ken - and he didn’t look that interested in Barbie anyway, so we made our own boy by cutting off the hair into a Beatles bob and smooshing the boobage down and drawing a pair of glasses on him/her with a blue ink pen.  Yeah, that’s right, he was totally hot. Well, as all things go when you are pre-pubescent, the Barbies would inevitably go out on a date with the boy-ish Barbie, they’d make out, us moving their heads back and forth and making all the appropriate mm-mmm sounds.  Before you knew it, their little homemade clothes were off and they were rubbing all up on each other.

Things got much worse, though. We had some rectangular wire hanger things, and we went out on the porch and used clothespins to pin them together until we had a fairly spectacular Barbie flying trapeze. We’d change their little homemade clothes into the two strips of cloth that were tied around them to be their circus bikini, bling not included, and “Ken-kinda” would be the tosser and flip them around on the trapeze. Of course, we were doing all of their moving, flipping them through the air at each other — there were a number of horrible accidents at the barbie circus — but it was quite a show… until the Barbies would get into a bitch-fight over who Ken-kinda lused  for most.  Then one of the Barbies would back Ken up on the trapeze and start coming on to him to show the other Barbies what was what, and before you know it, they were hanging upside down rubbing up on each other.  Trapeze Barbie booty call.

From Aftelier Tango’s promotional blurb:  “by the dance of love, sexy and smoky with roasted seashells and champaca; a heady floral with spice and honey notes.” This starts off pungent, slightly sharp, and this rubbery smell shows up, smoky rubber, almost a little Nostalgia’ish, but veers off into a floral’ish rubber. Tuberose responsible for that rubber?  Not sure.  Then it drifts along as this slightly freaky thing that I keep sniffing. 

And then it hits me: This is what Trapeze Barbie booty call would smell like. Ken-kinda and Barbie all rubber-sweaty from their exertions, but there is not really a funky smell, just roasted and odd, like something a little rubbery and/or plastic just tore it up. Is that a bad thing? Frankly, no.  I’m fascinated by this thing, just trying to figure out what is the roasted seashell smell in there.  It’s vaguely sexless, while not being unsexy. Am I going to wear it? Only when I want to sniff odd things that fascinate me, which happens more days than I care to admit to. 

Recommended sniff for:  Experienced perfumistas looking f