French house Annick Goutal makes charming scents in charming bottles, the sorts of bottles you want to wrap up and give as gifts. Among the hardcore perfume fans, Hadrian, Duel and Sables are among the most popular, and even the hardest of hearts might be melted by a spray of Gardenia Passion or Petite Cherie.

So when it was announced that the house had released Les Orientalistes – and they were developed by Camille Goutal and Isabelle Doyen – we were pretty darn excited. Here´s Patty and March´s take on this new line from the boutique in Paris.

When testing Ambre Fetiche, Myrrhe Ardente, and Encens Flamboyant we did some reading and saw comparisons of an incense or amber or myrrh to something similar in another line, but we’re both fangirls of Annick Goutal, so we also looked at these in terms of how they fit in with the other AG scents. You will find other myrrh, incense and amber scents better in some cases, or less, or just different, but you will be hard pressed to find three scents perfectly matched to fit like a tailored Hermes glove into the Goutal line.

Ambre Fetiche has notes of amber, frankincense, labdanum, styrax, benzoin, iris.

Patty: It’s fairly fierce on going on, not a subtle amber in the least, but not beastly (looking at Ambre Russe). Not being an amber groupie, this is a wearable amber on me, tempered by the incense in its base and feeling just a little on the sweetish side of amber, but not so much that it teeters off the sugar cliffs. Want to have some real fun with it? Spray it on over Sables. The dance between pancake syrup and incense has had my nose twitching in glee for hours this morning. Eau de Fier with this one or any of the incensi (?) is pure bliss.

March: Lord, what is it with me and amber? I’m sorry, but amber is one of those solo notes I’m completely unable to assess fairly. Smelling a dominant amber is like drinking a bottle of cough syrup — my stomach starts doing flip flops. The only ambers I really like are dirty things like Ambre Russe. Having said that, this isn’t as cloying as the Hermessence Nazgul. The frankincense and labdanum give a nice sharp edge to the otherwise too-sweet amber-benzoin combination; the “iris” registers more as a spicy adjunct to the frankincense than its own rooty-orris note (which on this occasion is too bad.) Would I wear this on its own? No, but amber lovers would, and it layers beautifully with the other two.

Myrrhe Ardente has notes of myrrh, benzoin, vanilla, tonka, gaiac wood, and honeyed beeswax.

Patty: Alone, this is probably not as easy/fun to wear — or at least not for me. I just don’t get a love or hate on it, it’s just, well, myrrh but combined with either the Amber or Encens makes this one come alive on my skin, takes some of the vanilla and sweet out of it. I can think of a ton of combinations I’d love to try it with.

March: This is my second favorite of the Orientalistes. There´s the medicinal note of myrrh in the opening, but it´s not overwhelming, much warmer and easier to wear than, say, Lutens´ La Myrhhe. If you like vanilla and benzoin – you´ll love this. If you don´t: look out. Between those notes, the tonka and the honey, this thing is sweet. Layered with the Encens, though, it´s nicely balanced.

Encens Flamboyant has notes of frankincense, black pepper, cardamom, nutmeg, fir and “pure extract of lentisque. Drawn from arid vegetation, it is also used in Kiphi, the prized Pharaonic perfume.” (All notes via The Perfumed Court.)

Patty: Encens Flamboyant isn’t really flamboyant. That name makes me think of incense trussed up in a coochie girl outfit and pink hair. It’s pretty much a straight-up frankincense scent, along the lines of Avignon, with the warm Goutal’ish feel to it, but definitely my favorite of the three. Would happily wear this 8 days of the week, it goes with everything. So if you put on Sables one morning and go… huh… too much syrup, not enough pancake, throw some Encens over the top of it and have your breakfast in a monastery courtyard.

March: Having failed to be entranced by Jubilation XXV (what are you people smelling?), I was worried about whether I´d lost my lust for incense. Hah. I have no doubt that any number of you could provide me with explanations of why Amouage is a superior scent, but the Annick is my sort of incense. Incense scents are like black sweaters: I can´t have too many, and they´re all slightly different in their details. Flamboyant distinguishes itself by being neither churchy nor ethnic. It´s not cold and aloof. It´s … well, it´s very Annick. Peppery and spicy, with that fir note, I think it´s incense as a walk in the cold, clean outdoor air. It´s got excellent sillage – strong but transparent.

An aside: I don´t know whether the company ever said expressly that they were meant to be layered, but they seem designed that way. The Encens isn´t even a bit sweet, making it the perfect layering companion with the other two. The smell of the samples together when I ripped my package open was wonderful.

Patty: While none of these three will win prizes for breakthrough perfuming or some bold new take on incense, Goutal did what all perfume lines should do when they can’t make The Next Big Thing - tailor scents to fit their image, with their unique base, and that will complement many of the other perfumes in their line. So for me, this is the perfect addition to this line, and very well done.

Would that they would bring out a less expensive coffret of all three of these scents (we couldn’t find a great photo, but the existing coffret, a LE of the trio in 50 ml parfum strength in a white leather coffret) is 500 euros. Individual square 100ml EdP bottles are also available for 120 euros. Available only in Europe for right now, their availability in the United States has been pegged so far for mid to late 2008.

We’ll be taking tomorrow off, so we want to wish each of you the very best in the New year!!!

image: Edwin Long, Love’s Labor Lost, 1885, Dahesh Museum of Art, New York

Patty

It is once again that time of year when we look back over 2007 and put on our magical perfume sorting hats and declare which scents are the best of the 2007 entries.

• Amouage XXV Men – Lee says: you get those perfumes that you sniff and instantly you know – it’s a bang! whee! Ka-pow! moment. There aren’t many. But this one did it. Fruity incense drying down to a smoulder of exquisite velvetty richness, like the warm afterburn of a casked single malt. Duchaufour has done a marvellous job here with the best naturals, probably shaped, polished and refined by an exceptional palette of synthetic tones.
• Amouage 25 Women – Patty says: “What the world needs now is skank, cedary skank.”  Lovely and dirty.
• Bellissima Perfect Night – Lee says: On Louise, it smells hot. Nuff said.
• Bond No. 9 Silver Factory – March says: easily the best of the Bonds to my nose; who knew incense could smell so fun and lighthearted and trippy? I wonder what Andy would think.
• CB I Hate Perfume Wild Hunt Water Perfume  — Patty says: forest on the best day of your life
• Chanel 31 Rue Cambon  Patty says: reinvented chypre, as if needed it.  Well, maybe it did.
• Estee Lauder Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia  — Patty says:  Just pretty, and there’s plenty of room on this list for pretty
• Guerlain Spirituese Double Vanille – March says: and Guerlain does it again with a scent that sounds sooo not me but has enough smoke and heart to win me over.
• Guerlain Iris Ganache – March says: another surprise success for me; I seem to have killed off the sweet notes. It’s true, iris and ganache can smell good together.
• Juliette Has a Gun Lady Vengeance – Patty says:  Who cares about the juice?  Good enough, not groundbreaking but kudos on the name, which puts it on the list.
• Hermes Kelly Caleche – Patty says:  Again, just a pretty perfume, and JCE did it.  JCE will always be on any list of mine. 
• Lostmarc’h Lann-ael – March says: okay, maybe not Perfume Genius, but it’s warm and cuddly vanilla and cereals. The sort of thing I’d hate if you described it to me. Smelling it brought me around.
• MDCI Enlevement au Serail (formerly FK3) — Patty says:  All of the MDCIs could have made this list, but limiting it to one, this has to be it
• Micallef Note Vanillee — Patty says:  A  beautiful vanilla, very different from the Guerlain one. But no less deserving.
• Serge Lutens Rousse – Lee says: still a cinnamon dream, an autumnal reverie, a Keats poem bottled.
• Miller Harris L’air de Rien – Lee says: a wonderful oakmoss drydown, though for some reason that bran accord at the opening keeps making me think of Coke…? (March says: smells like something died in the barn. Don’t go in there, man, it’s fierce.)
• Narciso Rodriguez Musc for Him – Lee says: Patty pointed out that the oil is a superior beast, and so it is. The middle structure of the scent is pretty much the same as the edt, but the first ten minutes dazzle, and the drydown is delightful.
• Parfum D’Empire Fougere Bengale – Lee says: take Sables or Eau Noire; strip out the sweetness; add a playful tarragon / anise ‘wtf is going on?’ mobility that drifts off, unanchored, in all directions, and weld all this onto an animalic beast that lasts for days. Glorious. There’s been a lot of fuss about the marketing schtick that goes with this scent, and I admit that I find all the tiger hunt imagery distasteful. But no more so, perhaps, than the same line’s idealisation of Napoleon, the Ottoman empire and so on. Perfume names are rife with the blood, sweat and tears of culture – I always find it odd that people get more worked up over animal cruelty than war and the massacring of innocents, but there you go.
• Vero Profumo Onda – Patty says:  Djedi is dead, long live the new Djedi. 
• Les Parfumes de Rosine Rose Kashmirie – Patty says:  saffron, rose, gorgeous, probably one of the best things Rosine has done in years
• Roja Dove Unspoken – March says: wow, where did the love go for this one? Or this line? Are we just buried in releases?
• Serge Lutens Sarrasins – Patty says:  Okay, maybe just on my list, but this is a great jasmine and I think will get more love as the years go by
• Tom Ford Private Blend Moss Breches – Patty says: A couple of the Tom Fords could have made this list, and others may be more popular, but this one is the most inventive of the line. 
• Worth Courtesan – March says: I have almost killed a bottle of this, which for me is, let’s face it, unheard of. Its very very slight cumin-y note is sensual rather than in-your-face. In fairness, I’ve now been teased by folks who smell a pleasant fruit salad scent and cannot figure out what I love about this.

Join other perfume blogs as they weigh in with their thoughts on perfume in 2007.  Aromascope :: Bois de Jasmin :: Now Smell This :: Perfume Posse :: PerfumeSmellin’ Things ::

Helg at Perfume Shrine also has some thoughts on 2007 in Perfume

Patty

Here´s an abbreviated post from me today (bet you thought you´d never see the day, huh?) We´re still in the thick of holiday family festivities and the kids are underfoot, which is messing with my powers of concentration.

First, welcome to our new look! Which you all saw on Monday before I did because I couldn’t figure out how to clear my cache! It´s kind of finished, but we´re still tweaking, and as I said in the comments on Monday, please please please let us know if you´re having any issues navigating the site, any suggestions for improvement, anything broken, etc. I am not sure whether Contact Us is working properly, and we´ve had some other glitches. So. Be patient, but please don´t assume we´re aware of a problem – go ahead and complain! Also, I’m learning to navigate a system with new bells and whistles, so bear with me while I learn the format.

Today´s review is of Comme des Garcons 888, which I have been enjoying for the past several days. Cribbing almost verbatim from The Perfumed Court: “Comme des Garcons 888 was released for one week in London and won’t be available again until March of 2008. Perfumer Antoine Lie created 888, which was intended to capture the smell of gold. They settled on Safraline, a molecular derivative of saffron, created by Givaudan. Other notes are pepperwood, curcuma, coriander, geranium and amber.”

I am fond of the CdG line in general, and I admire the audacity of some of their scents even if/when I find them bordering on unwearable. I look to CdG for interesting ideas, and I can think of favorites from most of their series, including Incense, Red, Leaves and Synthetic. There´s been lively debate on the blogs recently regarding How We Feel About CdG Getting into The Luxe Game. Separate from the price, though, Luxe Champaca and (even more so) Patchouli certainly have their fans. Play, another recent offering, I am pretending does not exist. It´s like a spoof of a boring mainstream scent – and congrats, guys, you hit that ho-hum note right on the nose.

So I was a little worried about 888, with its LE rigmarole and eau-de-gold blather. Here’s what I got: 888 opens with a huge blast of pepper and coriander, but there´s also a strong, old-fashioned classic cologne note. The effect together is effervescent and really, really appealing. Right away the tone is set: okay, we´re going to have fun here. If anything, I´d have named this one Play. I don´t get much metal, for those of you avoiding 888 because of the m-word. “Curcuma” suggests either ginger or turmeric, and I´m going with the latter – along with the amber and saffron that begins to dominate as the cologne fades, there´s a mustard-like note.

888 is a wearable scent, while at the same time retaining its quirky, arid strangeness. The drydown is dry and bitter, like bancha tea leaves, with only a touch of amber. My favorite part (which doesn´t work very well in public) is sniffing it up very close on my skin, when I get the geranium too.

Verdict? It is not hitting me over the head with its astonishing virtuosity, and I didn´t Have A Moment (like I did, for example, with Palisander) where I sniffed it once and then reached into my wallet in a fugue state for my credit card. Having said that, I´m enjoying it, I don’t have five other things that it reminds me of, and 888 deserves its place in the CdG lineup.

glitter image: galaxyplastic.net

March

(Sung to the tune of ‘Once in Royal David’s City’)

Once at Patty’s Perfume Posse
arrived a silly chap named Lee,
where two women, wise and gifted
wrote on perfume, all for free:
Patty was the first of these,
March joined in, composed with ease.

He admired their words and writings,
grew to love their tastes and all.
‘Til one day, as if by magic,
he received their call, in thrall:
“Dearest boyo, will you write?
We do like you and hope you might.”

And, through all the following year,
he would honour and obey,
write, then read the welcome comments,
living scent the Posse way:
Everybody who loves perfume
Must enjoy the PP institution.

And the commenters all were special,
in their individual ways;
whether first-time, old hands, newbies,
regulars or chief mainstays.
Those responding, I do know,
we love you all, don’t ever go.

Whether Mitsouko, Shalimar or L’Heure Bleue
or a handful of Carons,
New releases, vintage extraits,
At the Posse, you can’t go wrong.
Cos those girls in all their choices,
Thrill me, fill me, with their voices.

Therefore Patty, and dear March:
I really have to be sincere,
Thanks to both for letting me join you
for nearly all of the past year.
For I’ve never felt less lonely,
Than with you all, my perfume homies.

Sincere apologies to Cecil Frances Alexander for my sacrilegious rendition. Here’s how it should be. I hope you all had (and are, if possible, continuing to have) a wonderful and perfectly scented holiday. Much love to you all.

Lee

Whether you celebrate the religious side of Christmas or just the holiday or do not celebrate it at all, it is my most deepest wish for each of you to always have the hope Christmas represents and all of your fragrant wishes for gifts come true. 

“Any one thinking of the Holy Child as born in December would mean by it exactly what we mean by it; that Christ is not merely a summer sun of the prosperous but a winter fire for the unfortunate.”  G.K. Chesterton

Next week I’ll be talking about New Year’s and running and discipline and asking y’all to join me in a little running program. Well…  think about it, it will be fun!  Listen, if my sorry, well-padded, 48-year-old peri-menopausal butt that hasn’t run since high school can start logging running time, and I started this last week, anyone can.  Be there, Aloha, and…

♥♥ Merry Christmas ♥♥

P.S. — winner of the Annick Goutal and Dior samples is — Elizabeth S.

Patty