Not too long ago Patty did a post about this. I decided to flatter her by stealing copying her idea and sharing some of my own characteristics/flaws/what have you. What does this have to do with all things scented? Who knows, but it’s fun….and I’m sure at least tuberose will show up somewhere.
- Although I am obsessed with Tuberose and all things scented with the absolute, I will also buy unsniffed anything that mentions hyacinth. I adore it almost as much….almost.
- I believe in gay rights AND I am a practicing Catholic. I may vote for Obama, I may vote for McCain. I am a person, not a party.
- I believe Vicky Tiel’s Sirene is the most disgusting perfume ever made. MPG’s Fleur d’iris is a close second. Blech!
- After florals, give me heavy, dirty, sexy musk. I am talking MKK on smack. I want skank and lots of it….although I thought Etat Libre’s Secretions Magnifique was exactly as March described it…a bloody knife. I was soooo disappointed.
- Some of my favorite movies. No order: The Color Purple, Shrek II, Kill Bill (I and II), Finding Nemo, Elizabeth, Anything Shakespeare related, The Devil Wears Prada, Death Becomes Her, Chicken Run, Queen Margot.
- Most cherished perfume: Carnal Flower, duh; Others I absolutely adore and have actually finished bottles: Serge’s Tubereuse Criminelle, Muscs Kublai Khan, Cuir Mauresque; Guerlain Apres L’ondee and Bois d’Armenie; Caron Acasiosa….
- In 9 days I will be two years sober.
- My worst fears: losing my mind, loving cautiously, ignoring God, fire and crowds.
- If I could be anything in the world…perfumer of course. Then a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company, Fashion Designer, Tenor….I can’t sing, I can’t draw….I can obviously dream though, right?
- I love and live for my Big Fat Irish Family….Aaron, my love, is included..duh.
Thanks for letting me share. Next week, I promise to include a picture of myself and something more scent related….and enough about me, I know.
Bryan,
I am brand-new to this blog and loving every minute of it. What a nice way to meet you! Your posting is lovely! Thank you for sharing.
On to Bal a Versailles: I have to admit, I wore BaV before I had any idea what the hell it was – I had access to every Patou, Caron, etc and just wore the ‘expensive’ scents because I was 20 years old and silly, with no thought to why I was wearing them – BaV, at the time, drove me mad – I couldn’t figure out why I hated it so much. Now, 30 years later, I understand…because NOW, 30years later, I’m able to actually appreciate the blasted scent…but still didn’t know why! Now I do. You and other PP’ers description of the ‘skank’ clears up a lot for me.
Thanks again for sharing your incredible expertise with us all. I think I’m going to go put on some BaV and watch Pierce Brosnan look all elegant and fabulous in Thomas Crown Affair (I know I’m flirting with danger, expressing my love for the remake). I think Thomas Crown would appreciate Bal a Versailles. I know I sure would appreciate him!
A fellow lover of BaV 😡 😡
I think your idea of BaV and watching the movie sound fantastic. Perfect.
It’s one of my ‘criterion’ fragrances…or it used to be, when I was still cattin’ around. My first husband was really taken aback by BaV on early sniffage but the drydown drove him nuts! Loved it. So I married him.
Current hub doesn’t know one from the other but somehow BaV is the only one that seems to shine through for him, too.
Weird visual: Sometimes I send him to my chichi little perfume store (warning the proprietress in advance) to try stuff. It’s a teeny-tiny, pink jewel-box of a shop, made for very delicate-type people and he is always afraid to even turn around in there. The first time we went in together he took two steps into the place, balked like a horse and backed out! He’s gotten better about going, though he still can’t discern one scent from another. Maybe some day…
How nice that you have a shop with good fragrances. We used to have one, once upon a time….. I think it’s neat the BaV is one that both men appreciate(d). Mine never complains about anything, although once when I asked him about one in which I’d bathed, he said something about gas masks. 8-| :d
That particular shop is 2 hours away, LOL! I live in the middle of nowhere now, with cows about 1000 yards from my front AND back doors and chickens who come into my garden (well, they did – but I have Rottweilers…)
I usually get my really niche frags when I travel to New York or LA or Paris …but that doesn’t happen that often anymore. Now it’s online (thank the Universe for samples!)
Gas mask, eh? You must’ve really put it on….or else you were wearing (cue spooky music)…..BOD!!!!!
:d For the life of me, I can’t remember what I was wearing. But I enjoyed his politeness in not saying anything until I asked.
Two hours? I would consider that decent. I live in Columbus, OH, and you can absolutely forget about niche fragrances here. Well, okay, Nordstroms has Miller Harris and Annick Goutal, but that’s it as far as I can tell. Sigh.
My grandparents were farmers. I think your scenario sounds fantastic. I’m waxing nostalgic for it these days. And I love Rotties. My BIL has one and he is such a huge lovebug.
Anyway, I am horribly OT. It sounds like you’ve made up for your locale with fantastic connections, and I can’t wait to hear which scents you try (or have tried) and what you think about them.
To
Debbie –
Lately I’ve been thinking about Miss Joni Mitchell and her taxi.
:(( Early in my adulthood I had access to perfume houses like you wouldn’t believe!…..but I hadn’t a clue about anything ‘perfume’ at the time – it was just a job. Then later, when I developed my daily relationships with my SAs (cosmetics/treatment junkie) I would get dozens of perfume samples at a time…and would give all of them away!now I’m stuck down in the hinterlands, like Eva Gabor…and NOW I decide to explore the world of perfume? Fate is a weasel sometimes… I am beginning to enjoy living down here a little more, as long as I can get out of here on a regular basis. I’m pretty urban and this is decidedly NOT urban!LOL!
..so glad you love Rotts! They are smoochy, aren’t they? You can come down here and smooch my boys anytime you want to get a Rott/Cow fix! 🙂
ps. I’m wearing Tea for Two this morning. HUGE leap of faith for me – trialed it last night, first blast smelled like a cigarette butt soaked in organic flea spray…but it settled down to something really intriguing. I’m thinking cashmere jacket and vintage fur stole (the loooong furs, not the little wrap). Wearing it over some honey and orange body cream…helping to tone down the ash but not kill it completely (I’m stunned to find that I LIKE the ash!)..this sample was one DH picked up from Odalisque, the little pink perfume shop. He’s pretending I don’t have it on, as I don’t think he’s quite ready to take that leap with me, LOL!~:>
A cow and rott fix? That sounds great. Now if I can only go and get fresh eggs from the hen house… 🙂
I didn’t appreciate my one opportunity for niche perfumery while had it either. A little store, in the City Center mall. It was one of the first stores to leave the mall, and now the whole mall is closing. It should have been a sign….
I’m wearing Montale’s Oriental Rose. It’s a sweet, spicy, rose scent…comforting with a cold. I tried Tea for Two years ago. I wasn’t impressed with it because I got….nothing. Those L’Artisans are just so weak. Yeah, I know they’re EDT’s. However, I am tempted by Bois Farine because it’s just so different. Back to Tea42…I didn’t get ash out of it. That’s amazing. I do want to try it again, now that I’ve tried more things.
You can, my dear, you can….the hens are right around the corner. The seamstress-cum-antiques lady-cum UPS dropoff place “in town” has fresh eggs every week – her son is a farmer. In the spring he grows fresh spring garlic and littl pea pods for me…I’ve been doing recipes for him to showcase his stuff. I’m very much into Slow Food so living down here has its advantages…but not quite enough for me to want to be here overlong.
T42 is holding up quite nicely, I’m surprised to learn. I wore it to bed last night and it was still there this morning, albeit faint. I sometimes wear L’eau d’Artisan in the warmer weather – that doesn’t hold as well. I confess to not liking that many rose fragrances – I prefer the scent of roses in their natural state – but Oriental Rose sounds like it has some interesting properties. Glad it’s comforting you~o) Sorry about the cold, btw (that’s a virtual cup of mint tea for you). My hub and I were sneezing up a storm this morning but it was more in response to dust in the garage than a cold (she says, knocking on wood like a fiend). I think T42 is really weirding him out – he just came into the office, bent down to hug me and sort of backed up, like a spooked cat!
It spooked him like a cat? :d Too funny.
really am so glad you’re going to be doing this regularly, but now must train myself to check for posts on Sunday.
Love your list. I think it is always in the tensons of life that living gets interesting. xoxox
I didn’t see this earlier. Hows come? We’re SCARY alike.
Sharing in your love for TC and CF and Tuberose in general. Love Noix de Tubereuse by Miller Harris, too! But I’m really an Iris lover at heart. In the end, though – I rarely meet a flower I don’t like.
I think if I could be anything, I might be a tenor also. I can sing, but it would be too late for me, now. I was a boy soprano, however. I open my mouth now and I think “What the hell happened?” I haven’t trained in years.
And if I could go back and change something, I would have said YES to my mother when she wanted me to take piano lessons. *bashes head against wall* stupid stupid stupid stupid…
It was all about rebellion at age 7, you see.
Movies – Elizabeth and Death Becomes Her are both in my immediate-access DVD collection instead of in the 12 boxes of DVDs in the basement, so that should tell you something.
Bullets over Broadway and Steel Magnolias are 2 more of my absolute favorites.
I keep forgetting to check PP on Sundays! I’m so happy there’s another male voice out there in the fragrance world–and an Irish Catholic! You don’t see that every day, which is what makes me so excited.
I’m still searching for the scent that I can use up whole bottles of. Iris is like what tuberose is for you, so Iris Silver Mist may be my next purchase. I feel like I need something a little lighter and woodier though for spring–hopefully the new Chanel rocks me.
Have you tried the Le Labo Tuberose 40? It’s probably the prettiest tuberose I’ve ever smelled, though not skanky at all.
Great to hear from you again B. Cuz we were away for the weekend, and I told Matt I’d live without internet for three days or so, I didn’t see this til now.
Bois d’Armenie is one of the loveliest smells in the known universe…:d
Hehl!
Maad!
Ok, you’re creeping me out with your fave flicks — most of those are MY faves too! I could watch DBH every single day without ever tiring of it. Quick question: which perfumes best befit Maddie and Helen? 🙂
Hey, congrats on being clean for this long! I wish I could follow your example and quit smoking. And that I could wear skank and florals with your confidence and grace…
One random thing you should know about me is I’m chronically late — for work, to meet deadlines and yes, to reply to my emails — a trait which I’m truly ashamed of! 😀
P.S. Can’t wait for next Sunday’s post, this is fun! 😉
congrats on being dry – hope it brings you peace. tuberose and skank are two of my faves, as well. though carnal flower didn’t have enough ooomph for me to fall in love with it. i would love to snag a full bottle of mkk – i want to revel in this golden elixir and instead am hoarding the decant i have. i love the kill bill movies, too – they’re are so stylish and tongue in cheek for something so violent. and honey, you just haven’t smelled sirene on moi. her first scent, l’originale, is full of skank, btw. fun post!
Bryan,
Welcome back! It’s been too long. We who love tuberose scents never tire of a fellow Carnal Flower devotee. In fact, I have been wanting to ask someone this, and I’m sure you are the perfect person who would know: how does Caron Tubereuse compare to some of your favorite tuberose scents? I guess what I’m really wondering is whether it is worth seeking out if one already owns Carnal Flower and Fracas. I’ve heard its exceptional, but I’d like to know a little more.
Great to see a list of some of your other loves, too. Thanks for sharing these with us!
Wonderful post! I share your love for serious skank and tuberose. I’m not quite there on the hyacinth, but, given time, probably will be. And I’m going to have to try Sirene now just out of curiosity.
My father was gay and never could come out due to anxieties about losing his job (his best friend came out and lost his job in the same field), so I feel *very* strongly about gay rights. Shattered my heart that he died w/out ever feeling free to leave my mother and live the life he would have liked to have w/ his lover. I’m afraid, though, that he dropped religion and became an atheist due to the excessive condemnation he felt from the church – a shame, but I absolutely understand how he felt. Anyway, it was my father who taught me to love perfume and from an early age we bonded over constant perfume shopping and sniffing – great times!
Haven’t seen Queen Margot. Will have to check it out.
i can totally understand your dad’s dropping out of the church – i left my parents’ baptist church when i was a teenager because of the feeling of condemnation you spoke of – now i’m a very spiritual person, but am not comfortable with organized religion.
when i lived in florida, there was a nondenominational protestant church there that supported gay rights – one of my friends had a commitment ceremony there with his partner, and the vibe i felt there was very loving and inclusive … as a church should be. every person should be free to be themselves. >:d< 8-x
Bryan:
Great post today. It made me think of a funny bit from the off-Broadway musical “Altar Boyz”, the satire about a Christian boy band. One of the pop band members is clearly gay, and “Mark” sings a song towards the end called “Epiphany” which implies he’s finally ready to come out to his friends; but at the key moment, he reveals _instead_ “I am Catholic and I’m proud… your posse may not think it’s dope, to confess your sins and like the Pope, but this is who you are, it’s not a choice”… My teenage daughter, her friend, and I just saw the show last weekend and thought it was a hoot.
Thanks for “borrowing” Patty’s idea and introducing yourself to your readers! I do not care for tuberose one bit myself, but enjoy reading about your favorites.
On that same trip to NYC, we bought a bottle of Apothia’s Velvet Rope at Bendel’s (mostly for my daughter. While I like the open, the musky drydown isn’t really my thing). The friendly SA gave us a bag filled with Etat Libre d’Orange samples from their Rossy De Palma launch party recently (see Sniffapalooza.com ). I’m still working my way through the line, and can’t wait to test out V et T. Despite the salacious marketing, so far I’m finding mostly sweetish florals. (Rossy’s “Eau de Protection” is a rose-dominant, soft fragrance, and I didn’t find much of the ginger listed in the notes, unfortunately, as I love ginger.) My favorite weekend purchase was Aftelier’s Tango. Love it! The miniature 2 ml bottle I bought won’t last long…
🙂 Gail
Dear Brian–it is so good to see (read) you again, and I love how you’ve told us so much more about you as a second opening salvo! I have finally and completely become a tuberose sl*t this winter–in no small part to your endless arias over CF. For some reason, every time I smelled a Tuberose fragrance, all I could think of was my childhood and Tinkerbell (not the perfume–Tinkerbell herself). So Carnal Flower, Shalini, TC, Caron’s Tuberose–*all* of them–smelled so innocent that I wondered why I wasn’t getting it. Then, by sheer dumb luck, someone sent me Fragonard’s Arielle. I wore this when a kid. My husband’s dumbfounded reaction to that piece of information was: Your mother let you out of the house wearing *that*? He said it was one of the sexiest scent he’d smelled so far. Well, I just saw butterflies and running through the grass barefoot while licking ice cream!
At that moment, I finally got that Tuberose perfumes are simply (beautifully!) my ray of sweetest light. A big, big bottle of Carnal Flower sits on my shelf–and I spray it *very* liberally. I’m arranging for more Shalini, and I am hoping to acquire Tubereuse Criminelle someday, somehow, this year. Now, I need to smell Kilian’s Beyond Love again (gave away that sample far too quickly) as well as try the new Dior tuberose. I’m afraid I will bypass V et T, however, because *all* of the EL’s scents make me very sick. I’ve learned in the past months that not every tuberose is created equal on my skin….But thank goodness Fracas is one that works!
All of this is to say: I’m so glad you’re back!!! I cannot wait to hear you speak of tuberose…and of all other matters as well.
Hi Bryan,
Thank you, thank you, thank you!! I just sent you an email.
I’m glad you left it in; it’s an accomplishment and definitely something to be proud of. 🙂
I’d love to chat too.
Molly
Hi Bryan,
Thanks for telling us a bit about you. I definitely share your love for tuberose…and I’m ashamed to say that I’ve never smelled Carnal Flower.
And congratulations on two years sober (in 9 days)! I’ll be two years sober on July 7th, so I’m a bit behind you there.
Molly 🙂
Molly,
Congratulations to you too. I would love to chat with you more about this. Anytime. I thought about leaving it out, but it is such a part of who I am.
You have to get a decant of CF. If you give me your address, I’ll send some your way.
bryanmgarwood@gmail.com
Take care, Molly
Loves Skanky perfume AND “Death Becomes Her”?
If you weren’t already taken…:d
T,
Now a warning…NOW a warning?! Gotta love it. I have got to sign up for an L.A. sniffapalooza so we can hang out and laugh, ’cause I have a feeling we’d get along just fine.:d
Hallelujah! Glad to see that someone else likes the V et T; I was shocked at how much I liked, having no experience with the line other than what I’d read online. I was even more shocked that my dad bought me this bottle while in London; he’s a Baptist minister but I’m sure he had no idea what any of the names meant. He said he just smelled the tester and thought it smelled like something I’d wear. Hooray for Dad! At least he didn’t buy Don’t Get Me Wrong…:”>
Hooray for Dad, indeed! I think I would actually die of surprise if my father bought me V & T. It is my fave of the line, for sure, and I’m not wild about the name or imagery, but it’s a really interesting scent. Thanks for bringing it up…
My pleasure…between you, Bryan, and myself, we’ll spread the love for Vierges et Toreros…although, just typing the name out makes me giggle…it reminds me of an old Tyrone Power movie about a bullfighter called the Blood and the Sand. I should get out more often…
Matt,
You are too funny. Wouldn’t you just die if he showed up with the Don’t get me wrong scent….like he just didn’t really look at the name or something. That would be too funny. Matt, I am not kidding when I say I thought of Blood and Sand too! I guess we both need to get out more. Nah, we just have an eclectic taste aesthetic, right?
Bryan: I really enjoyed learning about you! I love that list of bottles you’ve used up; we share a lot of loves, and I’m super-impressed you actually use things up. (I’m terrible at that. The closest I’ve ever come is getting down to about 1/3 of my bottles of Tocade and OJ Champaca. What I need to do is send more decants to people, I think, so I will try to follow your generous example.) And good for you on the politics: I’m all for public personhood. I won’t be voting, of course, as a Canadian, and I’m fairly liberal, but I have to admit that I kind of like McCain and always have. He seems so *genuine* for a politician. My brother is gay and he commented the other day: “Since he’s a Republican, I’d like to dislike him and I find I’m having trouble.” Obama is interesing, too, though. Yay for Finding Nemo! Congratulations on soberness, of course. And finally, glad to see that comment from MattS on Vierges et Toreros – I really like that one and I was beginning to wonder if I was a freak, since it (as well as the line) seemed to get dismissed by a lot of people. Have you tried it?
Tigs,
I think your brother sounds cool. I am totally stealing that line. LOL. I love OJ Frangipani and Champaca. I wish it were easier to get the full OJ line in the states. The candles are gorgeous as well as the bath oils and lotions. I love that the Perfumed Court sells practically everything…I got some pure parfums for these and they last and last. Fabulous.
I enjoy some of the Etat Libre perfumes, and I just roll my eyes at the names. Some are beautiful, like V et T and some are just too synthetic smelling on me. I get a headache. I think they’re fun, though.
Now I feel like I can say hi, Bryan, and have an idea of whom I’m speaking to; thanks for making this list.:) I share your love of skank, hyacinth (in perfume and in person) and I think The Color Purple is one of the best movies, ever. Why haven’t we gotten to experience Whoopie and Oprah in full-on acting mode like this more often over the years? (A rhetorical question.) Non rhetorical: What are some of your favorite musks? I’m searching for, not necessarily my musk HG, but one to really love, both by itself and layered. Maybe that needs to be two musks? Haven’t tried MKK yet, but it’s on the endless *to try* list.
Rosarita,
You must bump the MKK to the front of the list. If you crave musk, this is where you’ll find it. I agree that it becomes a gorgeous skin scent, but it is raw animalic beauty.
CB I hate perfume’s Musc is dirrrrty. On me it becomes sweeter than expected, so it is a fabulous layering option.
Have you tried Bal a Vers.?
I can’t wait for the Hyacinths to start popping up. Winter is just dragging on.
Hi, Bryan, just checking back in and saw your comment about Bal a Versailles. Love it! Adore it, actually, and a fabulous member at MUA sent me some of the parfum, which is phenomenal. Might wear it today, actually, since you are so right, winter is dragging on endlessly…..I’ll take warmth wherever I can find it.
Thank you for sharing. I have a fondness/facination/craving for MKK also. I am halfway through a wonderful book called A Scented Palace. It’s the story of how Jean-Louis Fargeon becomes the perfumer to the young Queen Marie Antoinette. It’s written by Elisabeth De Feydeau who is a PhD in the history of perfume (Sorbonne) and a professor at the Versailles School of Perfumers and also a cultural adviser to some of France’s great perfume houses, including Guerlain and Chanel. She goes into exquisite detail of the notes and processes used. In the chapter “The Queen’s favorite perfumes” she writes “For Marie Antoinette, Fargeon especially created rose, violet, jonquil or tuberose scents obtained by distillation in spirites of wine after prolonged infusion. He intensified them with musk, amber or opopanax. This is my idea of a page turner!!!
Joan,
I have that on my “to read” list. I will now make an actual effort to run and pick it up today. That is my idea of a page-turner too. Did you like Perfume: the story of a Murderer? I loved the book and the movie. I thought both were done well, for the medium.
What other scents do you crave?
Perfume: Story of a Murderer – loved the book and the movie. That part where he is going to be executed then takes out the cloth and wafts it over the crowd; I wanted to be in that crowd! Then I was, the first time I sprayed Musc Ravageur.
Tuberose! I love it too. I haven’t smelled enough scents with it, although since I’ve found two I absolutely love, I’m not sure I should even venture further. Is there really any need to go beyond Narcotic Venus?
Is Sirene even worse than White Diamonds? I can’t believe it.
Skank? MKK is just a nice skin scent. I find it….boring. Give me things with tons of castoreum and civet. Give me Bal a Versailles, NM’s Midnight Tryst,Dark Season, and Parfum d’Ida. DSH’s recreation of Scandal is fantastic too. I have just puchased TPC’s Animalic Sampler and can’t want to try them all.
What are your most favorite animalics? Sex in a bottle?
I hope I can work through full bottles before they turn or I get tired of them. I have nine FBs now. I may have to stop buying any more because I’m worried about their turning before I work through them. Although Ghandahar and Summer of Love (NM) are calling me……
Debbie,
I agree with the animal scents. I guess I place dirty musks with the other animal notes. I love Bal. I have it in every formulation and I think the parfum is the dirtiest, though March prefers the parfum de toilette.
White Diamonds is nasty, truly terrible. I just get sick with the Sirene, but it is a pretty bottle….blah blah blah right?
Dumb question…what is NM Midnight Tryst? Sounds good. Do tell.
Yum, Midnight Tryst. Well, let me tell you about it. It is one of Neil Morris’ vault scents. The notes are:
top: clove bud, magnolia flowers
heart: rose, narcissus, gardenia
base: dark musk, benzoin, cinnamon, patchouli, amber, civet, castoreum and dark vanilla
This scent is so deep and rich–just perfection from beginning to end. It sweeps me off my feet. Sensual, erotic. That’s how it is for me. :”>
The BaV is the dirtest formulation of the bunch? That’s the only formulation that I’ve had since the beginnintg. I guess that’s what I’ll stick with!
damn, girl! MKK a skin scent? you BEAST!!! :d
i am newly fascinated with all things skank, and bow to your superior animalic tastes. i’m also putting all the perfumes you just mentioned on my ever-expanding “samples to buy” list!
lead me, skank sensei. ^:)^
8-x
I’m a BEAST? Bwhahaha!! :d
Not a sensei of anything, but yes–if you’re interesting in that, you need to try all of those mentioned. (Ghandahar and Summer of Love aren’t unremittingly animalic, though.) I also tried Caron’s Yatagan this morning. It may be intense, but it does stay close to the skin. I didn’t care for Fougere Bengal…although it was pretty yummy on my husband.
The other NM’s that are just flat-out must-tries if you want beautiful, erotic things are Dark Season and Midnight Sea. I am just starting to go through the animalic sampler from The Perfumed Court. Can’t wait to see what discoveries are in there!
So, you skull lover you, you’ve got some wonderful scents waiting for you….
Erin! Am just trying Guerlain Mouchoir de Monsieur and Piguet’s Bandit from the Animalic Sampler. Both are beautiful! The very top notes of both aren’t so great–too masculine, too overwhelming. But then….
In Monsieur, you start to smell the flowers, vanilla and tonka bean. The oakmoss and patch make it animalic, but it is definitely not civet or castoreum. It IS beautiful, deep and rounded.
The Bandit starts out with something that smells very much like whisky to me in the beginning, although it doesn’t list that. It lightly continues into the heart. It must be the citrus. This one is beautiful and rounded too, a little more animalic then the Monsieur. Probably due to the leather.
Aaaah….inhaling deeply……
Aaaaack! The Bandit has turned sharp, the oakmoss is closing my nose, and I. Can’t. Get. It. Off!!!
you know, i’ve had Bandit on my list for awhile, but i’ve been afraid of it – not the skanky leather, but the galbanum. sometimes the sharp green smells make me feel ill. so is Bandit green or bitter to you?
the Guerlain sounds yummy – i don’t think i’ve heard of that one, either. Midnight Tryst also sounds out of this world!
and Yatagan … oh my. it sounded so incredible, but to me it smelled like a big pine tree made of celery sticks. it was the first perfume i ever scrubbed off. (tried to, anyway, it didn’t want to come off!). BUT – i’ve only tried it once, and i don’t give up that easily – after all, it took me 2-3 times to fall in love with Mitsouko and MKK.
8-x
It definitely wasn’t bitter. It didn’t strike me as green either. “Sharp” would be the closest choice.
The Monsieur is pretty refinded by this point. Not a heavy animalic at all. Someone on Basenotes called it “Jicky Light.” Yeah, I can see it.
I agree – MKK is a mild, rather unexciting skin scent on me. I WANT a bit of skank, but MKK just doesn’t deliver. *sob*
Hooray! Something to read on Sundays now! I’m with you on your love of skank, my friend, and feeling you on the MKK. I got it for Christmas as my first SL bell jar. I’ve yet to smell Magnificent Secretions; by all accounts, it’s disgusting, but there’s a sick, dirty boy inside of me that wants to sniff it out of morbid curiosity. The whole Etat Libre line gets little love online, but I got a surprise birthday gift of a full bottle of Vierges et Toreros from my dad (he had no clue what he was buying) and I actually kind of like it. Much more than the bottle of Aomassai he brought with it. The V et T is a dirty, skanky leather, not deep-down filthy or over-the-top, but user-friendly while still being naughty. If you wanna be a freak at the office, it’s a good scent to go with.
I know nothing about tuberose, really, but it’s been on my mind recently. I just placed an order with LuckyScent and, for samples, asked them to throw in some tuberose surprises, just to familiarize myself with the note. I’m intrigued by both CF and TC; not sure how they’d fly with me.
But you bring up an interesting point…what are scents that people actually finish full bottles of and reorder more? Being in an earlier stage of my obsession, I’ve stockpiled a good bit this year, but the forerunners for full bottle replacement for me seem to be CB Musk and Lonestar Memories. That CB Musk gets a lot of playing time…
Enjoyed the post, glad you’re on on Sundays now.
Well, what do you know? I just checked the notes for the V et T on Basenotes, and they list, among other things, “Leather, Tuberose, and Animalic Notes.” You might really like this, Bryan. 🙂
Matt,
I Love VetT. I think your dad is so amazing to actually try to give you a scent that is outside the box and beautiful at the same time. He sounds amazing. As I was reading your post, I kept yelling (yeah I’m odd that way), “it’s tuberose, it’s tuberose.”:d
It is rare for me to go through a bottle. I have done it with CF so many times because I go crazy and overspray it. I couldn’t leave the house once simply because I couldn’t do that to strangers. I would have choked them with the sillage. But I didn’t scrub it off either…NEVER. I just hung out. Now tell me that’s not psychotic.:”>
That’s not psychotic; that’s the perfect day, staying home and smelling great without the interference of the outside world.
I’m gonna make it a goal to explore tuberose, just for you. And, yeah, my dad IS great, thanks for reminding me. Whenever I start to forget or take him for granted, he somehow manages to catch me off guard with something unexpected. He’s becoming a budding perfumista, he spent an hour with James Craven at Les Senteurs in London and he’s hooked now.
cool dad!
and y’all have both hooked me on the V et T – i mean, tuberose, leather, and drrty too? what more can anyone want?
*addstohugesamplelist*
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Things I know about you… [AHA- the plot thickens..!]
You are incredibly generous
You are exceptionally loyal
You are NOW part of my family, officially. Will ‘son’ do ?
Just because the principals change, the RULES don’t [ as we’ve discussed Chez Meister] !
1) Don’t mess with anyone’s head;
2) Be emotionally and sexually responsible;
3) MY job, as mother, is to send my boys out into the world, ready, able, and willing to give love and receive it.
Who can afford to throw true love out the window-
Just because it didn’t come wrapped the way you thought it would ?
Apart from the CF and TC, we can probably share everything else.
I loved your post.
Kisses, dear man.
Chaya,
I am absolutely honored by your comments. I will walk around today with a stupid grin on my face simply because of them. Thank you.
I think your boys have an exceptional mother. They are blessed.
I have noticed we tend to like the same things…..you’ll come around to the CF, I know it.
Kisses back to you.:”>
do you take in girls? 🙂
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Absolutely !
I’m completely riddled with daughter- and sister-lust.
yay! LOLOL!!!
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ah, kill bill! the bills are my favorite love story in a movie. for some reason, whenever i say this, people think i’m strange. can’t imagine why. /:)
you have wonderful taste and interesting thoughts. i’d like to second you on gay rights. even though there’s been some progress on tolerance in recent years, that’s exactly my problem with the way many people view homosexuality – they “tolerate” it. as in, “i don’t like it, but THEY can do whatever they want.” in my utopia, love is beautiful, no matter who’s doing the lovin’!
my utopia also includes your beloved tubereuse criminelle – discounted, and easily purchased online no matter where you live. come on, ‘fume friends, join me in PARADISE!!!
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Erin,
Love me some Bill. I think, “You and I have UNfinished business,” is the coolest line ever.
On another note, I think it would just be wrong for me to turn my back on love simply because it is unconventional. Though, these days, it’s a lot more conventional, i.e. accepted.
I love the criminal tuberose, but I have to be in the mood. CF is more about the pure shockingly beautiful flower and it’s magnificent power. mmmmm.
What else do you adore?:)
my perfume adventure began only recently, but so far i adore:
* all of Lutens’ Boisees that i’ve tried, plus Feminite du Bois (which kicked off my obsession with cedar)
* weird, big florals like TC, Black Orchid, and Fracas
* tobacco notes like Chergui, Tabac Blond, Fumerie Turque
* classic Guerlains like Mitsouko, L’Heure Bleue, Apres l’Ondee, Chamade
* and MOST of all, classic Carons like Nuit de Noel, En Avion, Narcisse Noir, Poivre, N’Aimez Que Moi.
Mitsouko, Nuit de noel and En Avion are tied for my top favorite fragrance spot – Mitsouko took 3 tries for me to finally “get it” and fall hopelessly in love, but Daltroff’s Carons grabbed my heart from the very first sniff. that dark, mysterious undercurrent is just … me.
i’m also about to order a sample of Cuir Mauresque, which i see is on your list – i also adore leather accords, so i’m very excited!
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YAY! I finally found my Evil Fragrance Twin — Erin K.! Be sure to keep an eye out for things I say I like, Erin — so you can avoid them like the plague… :d –Ellen
LOL! thanks for the heads-up, EFT! >:)
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