March threw down the gauntlet the other day in the comments section of her “Blu Mediterraneo” post. Her mention of the “pitiful” L’Artisan Parfumeur selection at the newly opened branch of Bluemercury she visited sparked a bit of Vanilia bashing. I will make it clear right from the start that Vanilia is one of my all-time favorite scents. I could give a toss about what anyone else thinks of this beauty, especially Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez. March suggested that maybe I write about some of the scents out there that are beloved by many and reviled by few. And, to stay true to my contrarian mindset, I will also discuss a few that should be getting their fair share of love, but don’t. Of course, these are based on my opinions and not influenced by any fragrance industry payola, or a hunting rifle pointed at my head. Here goes:

Overloved

Chanel No. 5: I’ve made no bones about how much I cannot stand this scent. Regardless of how much it is universally loved, I want it to be universally reviled. It never smelled good on me, or my mom for that matter, nor anyone else I’ve ever encountered who wears it. Yet, women are impelled to wear it because it is deemed a classic; especially when you read things like, “No. 5 is still the world’s most popular scent because, like the Chanel jacket, it radiates sophistication.” Frederic Malle weighs in and says, “It’s soft and warm like an oriental fragrance but has crisp, clean notes, so it’s sexy but not overwhelming” (from the October 2007 issue of Allure). So if a major magazine and a perfumer of stature are telling you this is what you should be wearing, why wouldn’t you? Who doesn’t want to “radiate sophistication” and be “sexy but not overwhelming”? Let me clue you in on something: it smells awful on just about everyone! Never have I encountered a single soul who I could say with complete honesty, smells terrific when they wear No. 5. Instead, it is stale, powdery and completely overwhelming. The fact that anyone can walk around in a cloud of No. 5 without succumbing to an epic migraine or asphyxiation is ponderous. Ponderous, man…

Thierry Mugler Angel: This is another ubiquitous scent that thrills the masses. And I will confess that I became somewhat obsessed with it when it first came out. That I wasn’t banished from my cubicle at work still amazes me. Now, when I smell it on someone, I want to tell them to stay far, far away from me – like three or four States away. Patchouli does funny things on peoples’ skin, including mine. Yes, I did mention that I wore head shop patchouli in my younger days, but this combo of chocolate, patchouli, vanilla, fruit and whatever else is in this noxious scent, now reminds me of a cess pool. How can a scent like Serge’s Borneo 1834, which lists cacao and patchouli in its notes, smell so right and Angel so wrong? Another enduring mystery…

Estée Lauder Pleasures: I have always found this one to be quite inoffensive, but I think it is the generic inoffensiveness of it that annoys me. I know it was groundbreaking at the time of its release because of the pink pepper note, and again, I sheepishly admit that I wore it for a time. What put me off Pleasures was being outed at a rest stop along the New Jersey Turnpike on my way home from a business trip during the summer of 1998. My co-worker and I stopped rather late in the evening for some food and gas, and while our Whoppers and fries were being rung up, the cashier looked at me and enthusiastically asked, “Are you wearing Pleasures?”  My male colleague shot me a strange look, and I responded, “Why yes, yes I am.” The rest of the way home he kept snickering, “Pleasures, huh?” I never wore it again.

Clinique Happy: Ah, the grande dame of fruity florals; the Helen of Troy of the fragrance industry. Actually, I think Trojan horse is more fitting, since who hasn’t been fruity-floral bombed by all the countless imitators? Every time I either smell this or see a bottle of it, the theme from “The Partridge Family” starts up in my head, and I get a visual of the bird wiggling its butt out of the eggshell. And, it is a “happy” scent. I guess the Lauder corporation was never able to license “C’mon get Happy!” as the tag line for their hugely popular fragrance. By the way, what’s the deal with all the flankers? Happy Heart, Happy in Bloom; just how many are there? Has anyone else noticed that they all smell exactly the same? Put me down for a bottle of “Happy to Be Alive” or “I’m Just So Happy to Be Here” if and when they are ever released.

Underappreciated

L’Artisan Parfumeur Vanilia (You knew I’d be leading off with this one): Discovering this scent was a watershed moment in my life. Never before did I want a scent so badly just from a written description of it. That description appeared in the February 1993 issue of Allure, and it read something like, “The vanilla L’Artisan brews is so bewitching…” I don’t recall the rest, but that was enough for me. At the time, I was unemployed and generally uninspired, but Vanilia changed all that. It was unlike anything I’d ever smelled previously, and I fell head-over-heels for it. A new chapter in my life began and with it, my love for all things vanilla. I have never found any other vanilla quite like it; Indult Tihota was a pleasant surprise, but I cannot justify spending $250 for it, and needing a membership card to do so. Vanilia is an abstract vanilla, not like the vanilla extract you use for baking, or the “candyfloss…devoid of chic…reference holiday from propriety and convention…” fragrance Luca Turin claims it to be. It does not conjure up images of bubblegum-pink lipstick, platinum blonde-bleached hair ditziness. It is just the perfect combination of cozy warmth with just the merest hint of sweetness and spice. It is, in my opinion, the ultimate vanilla; and it’s never given me a cavity in 15 years.

People of the Labyrinths A.MAZE: When you think about the great rock ‘n roll bands of the 1970s, and some of their iconic, blockbuster albums, the following analogy is perfect when it comes to this scent: Luctor et Emergo is so beloved by the cultish, niche perfume community that the follow-up scent couldn’t possibly live up to their expectations; just like how the band, Boston, couldn’t top their debut album, or how Meatloaf was never able to surpass the brilliance of “Bat out of Hell”. I’ve read some of the reviews and, most if not all, describe A.MAZE as nice, but a major letdown when compared to Luctor et Emergo. The comparisons to other rose scents were inevitable: You don’t need this one if you have (fill in the blank). Having never been a really big fan of rose or heavy floral scents, I have found a few I like and wear with some regularity. A.MAZE is one of them. Rose combined with spices and woods can be intriguing if done right, and this one, for me, hits the mark. I also think Elton John’s “Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy” is his best album by far. It was the follow-up to “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road”.

Philosophy Amazing Grace: Honestly, I am amazed that I decided to include this on my Underappreciated list. But, after giving it some thought, I decided to because it is probably the easiest fragrance to wear, when you need or want to wear something easy. By that I mean something relatively inoffensive and not likely to cause someone to recoil from you if you happen to find yourself on a sold-out transcontinental flight or a crowded subway train. In addition, if you are one of those individuals who enjoy layering your fragrance, there are countless ancillary products that accompany this scent. You can shampoo your hair with Amazing Grace, scrub, soap and lotion yourself until the cows come home. Even though the Philosophy brand is flogged no end on QVC, and spotlighted in just about every Sephora I’ve been in, it still has not attained the ubiquity of Angel and No. 5.

Fresh Sugar: The Fresh brand was another one of my late 90s obsessions. I fell in love with just about everything they sold, especially this scent. How could I not? It is the most impeccable vanilla based-citrus scent I have ever smelled. When I first smelled it, the first thing I thought of was Duncan Hines Lemon cake mix. And, there is not a flower to be found in the original incarnation of this scent, even though heliotrope and white lily are listed as middle notes. Unfortunately they’ve tinkered with it, creating the requisite stable of flankers: Sugar Blossom, Sugar Lychee and Sugar Lemon. Not even Sugar Lemon comes close to smelling as good as the original. There’s just something so perfect about the balance of tart citrus with the creamy comfort of vanilla and caramel that makes me reach for this over, and over, and over again. I used to be a huge fan of Annick Goutal’s Eau d’Hadrien, but my Sugar addiction has obliterated every trace of Hadrien from my scented memory bank. Sugar is flat out genius.

First, winners of the Serge Noire samples are: Pantera Lilly and momlady. Congrats!! Just click on the contact us on the left and let me know your address to get your sample.

Two new scents out this month, as we start to go full-tilt into the fall release season, are Van Cleef & Arpels Feerie and David Yurman.

Feerie has a bottle just TDF. I mean… look at that. My little sample bottle doesn’t have the cute little fairy on it, darn it, so I’m going to have to get this one. do I care one whit what this smells like before I buy it? No, I do not because I will have that bottle. Notes of violet, red berries, mandarin, rose, jasmine, iris and vetiver. It opens with a candied violet smell, fairly sweet, I suspect amped up by the red berries and mandarin notes. A little too sweet on the open, and I was very much worried that we had another fruity candied violet on our noses. I mean. that bottle!!! I know I don’t care, but I don’t want to buy a dog just for the bottle deep down. After about 15 minutes, the sweet aspect diminished, and the iris and vetiver asserted themselves enough to talk Feerie off the sugar ledge it was on. The rich jasmine meandered through, but it stays very much a violet/iris scent, but a rich, sumptuous one. It’s not powdery on the iris or earthy. Those of you that don’t like your violet or iris sweet at all probably won’t be wearers or buyers of this scent. Since I’m buying it regardless for that darling bottle, it’s good that it fits the kind of violet/iris I do like, because it’s a pretty great violet/iris. Nothing groundbreaking, just a scent that’s easy to wear.

The famous jeweler to the up and coming rich, David Yurman makes his entry into the perfume market with a concotion of mandarin, fresh green petals, cassis, peony, water lily, natural rose otto, patchouli, exotic woods and soft musk. This one couldn’t go on any different from the Feerie. Just the opposite. It’s a big-shoulder-pad floral that shoves its way into the room with sillage floofing about like dust-devils on the Kansas plains in summer. That’s not a bad thing, though, because one thing it is not — shy. It knows what it is- it is a rich, luxury perfume made for those who want to make the statement: I.have.money….lots.and.lots. As Robin notes, it does change remarkably about 30-60 minutes into it, morphing into a still rich, but much more woody, musky perfume, but it keeps a metallic tang on me - the water lily? Chandler Burr is right, they will make a fortune on it. This is what I hoped Donna Karan Gold would be. As long as you let that open settle down before you head to the office and you do a teensy spritz, you can wear this for day and not be banned from the office.

Up next week: My Wii, which should come to live with me hopefully yet this week.

Friends, I’m a little overdue for reminding everyone of this, but don’t forget — there’s still time to register for the Chicocoa Scentsation! Join us in Chicago on Saturday, September 13 for an incredible, decadent day of fragrance and the Universe’s favorite food: chocolate!

Patty and I will be there sucking down the Caron urns and the bon bons - come play! There will be samples, raffles, treats and a casual cocktail party, featuring two niche perfume lines: Liz Zorn Perfumes and Neil Morris Fragrances.

Liz Zorn will join us at the party for a special presentation, sniffage and raffle. This is a great opportunity to meet Liz and learn more about her incredible lines of fragrances, including some from her new Studio Collection. Neil Morris will be in Paris, attending a show with his NEW EUROPEAN DISTRIBUTOR <applause!!!!> but he is graciously sending along testers of his new Vault Fragrances along with the best-sellers of his regular lines. We’ll also have samples and a raffle gift!And don’t forget the Blind Bottle Swap and the (optional) Sample Swap — a chance to unload your slightly used, mildly unloved bottles for something you might like better! I know who’s donating the Aromatics Elixir, but I ain’t tellin!

A special HUGE THANKS for Musette and Shelley, who have put a ridiculous amount of effort into organizing this puppy.

Questions/registration: chicocoascentsation (at) gmail (dot) com or click on the link in the left-hand column.

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Okay, I’ll ‘fess up — I’ve spent a delightful week mostly at the pool with my kids — DC is so dead this time of year that driving through our leafy ‘burb on the way to the pool, it’s like a scene from one of those movies where they’ve dropped the bomb that eliminates all the people. I like it that way. The soundtrack: cicadas in the background, which (along with crickets at night) is the sound of summer. The scents in heavy rotation on my skin this week: sunscreen, bug spray, and tomato leaves as I battle the dang squirrels for the rights to some of my fancy tomatoes. Anyhoo, at the pool yesterday I was catching up with a friend and ended up telling her about ABE books (abebooks.com) — the ginormous used book website. It’s a consortium of sellers ranging from Joe’s Used Books to (more and more often) the Friends of a particular library system, or a fundraising arm of a school system. I started off on ABE buying hard-to-find books for my dad, who has esoteric tastes and a yen for something he read 25 or 50 years ago. He thinks I am the greatest daughter ever when I hand him some cheap, musty sci-fi paperback from the 50s he wanted to re-read that I paid $5 for on ABE. But it’s not just “old” books — you can get almost any book on there, including bestseller “new” books a couple of months after they’re released. I do most of my book-buying on there at this point - there is almost nothing I search for that doesn’t turn up on the site, and I’ve never been burned. I didn’t know there was anybody left who didn’t know about ABE, but that’s just because I’m so used to using it, I guess. There I was telling my friend, a big reader, about this wonderful resource that she’d never heard of.

So, today, I invite you to list in the comments any website, musician, movie, gadget, or anything else that, if you were king (queen? quing?) you would make sure everybody knew about, just because you think it’s so great. I’ve learned a lot from you all on here (etsy! who knew?! and Anthelios sunscreen! Makeup For Ever face and body liquid makeup, greatest.thing.ever!) All from you commenters. So, share away.

Hey, I FORGOT TO ASK — any of you have any experience with zipping your pillows/mattress into something hypoallergenic? Can you only do that when the mattress/pillow is brand new, to keep the dust/mites OUT, or does it help to do it later, I guess theoretically sealing them in?

Hey, It’s almost August, so that means it’s time for two Serge releases.

First up, Serge Noire, which joins the export line, available in Europe now and in the U.S. in late August to September’ish.  Notes listed for it are patchouli, cinnamon, amber and black woods.   The marketing hype goes on and on about the phoenix, grey something, swirling night.  The scent says: “Hey, I’m cinnamon, nice to meet you!”  Well, that’s what it says to you as it slams on the brakes of its black, dusty Porsche right in front of your house.  Because you are then in a swirl of dusty incense and cinnamon is as close as I can get to it in the early stages.  There is a healthy amount of incense that develops early after a pretty slight start and that camphorish smell that’s in Tubereuse Criminelle and Sarrasins that kind of tickles the nose and you can’t decide if you like or no.

Those of you that aren’t fans of the cinnamon aspects in Rousse will likely be a little skeptical in the first 15 minutes of so of this scent, but the cinnamon recedes on me, and has more of the cinnamon bark snap to it than red hots.  This is a hot, dusty, earthy scent.  I’m not sure how else to describe it, but it keeps me sniffing because it just has a lot of facets that go in and out - dust, warmth, cool incense, woods.   I swear, somewhere deep in there is a hint of Borneo… must be the patch.  It’s a beautiful, interesting creation from Lutens and one of the best things he’s done in a good while.

It’s hot red dust swirling through the evening breeze. I don’t know about a Phoenix, but this is a scent I’m happily wearing.  Hey, and you can be too. It’s a new release, it’s Serge, let’s give away a couple of samples. Just put a note in comments if you want in the drawing, and I’ll announce the winners on Thursday!

Until last week I’d probably spent less time and attention on Acqua di Parma’s Blu Mediterraneo line than on picking the chipped polish off my nails. I tried Fico di Amalfi on my fig jag and found it nice enough, but anything that sounds like “fecal” when you say it isn’t on the top of my list, no matter how dumb my thinking is. Yet there I was recently in our newly opened, kinda mediocre Bluemercury (seriously, do the mediocrity fairies live here in the area? Are they employed by the CIA in Langley? What.is.the.problem.with.our.retail?) because I wanted to re-smell L’Artisan Vanilia based on its review in The Guide. And I am sure that, reading those words, there are a number of you who wish you had a tiny button you could push that would give me a short, sharp electrical shock through my computer keyboard so I’d shut up about The Guide and never mention it again, but honestly I feel like I need to give credit for an inspiration where it’s due.

Anyway, shutting down my usual sidewinding mental amble through the weedy hills of my mind and getting to the point, next to their pitiful L’Artisan collection was the Blu Mediterraneo, which I know some of you think is kind of heinous-looking but to me appears intended to be a spa-brand product extension of the AdP line – clean and calm and simply packaged. Actually, I think the bright colors and blue bottles are cheery. In the teeth of the heat that day (high 90s, matching humidity, air quality index = unhealthy), I couldn’t face the L’Artisan, so I gave this line a go instead.

Fico di Amalfi - bergamot, grapefruit, lemon, orange, tangerine, cedar leaves, jasmine, Rose/pink pepper, fig nectar, cedarwood, fig wood, guaiac wood. A dry, herbal/woody fig, more about the wind through the grove than the fruit, and totally absent that sweet coconut smell you sometimes get with fig sometimes. Although I don’t like it as much as, say, Philosykos, my appreciation for its subtleties has grown the longer I sniff its figgy kin. The woodiness is smokier and more nuanced than I’d given it credit for.

Arancia Di Capri – probably the least interesting to me, although it’s fine. A pleasant citrus (orange, mandarin, lemon, grapefruit) with a hint of petitgrain and a little musk. Worth trying if you like orange blossom-type fragrances.

Mirto Di Panarea - myrtle, bergamot, Calabrian lemon, sweet orange, basil, jasmine, rose, green lilac, sea accord, blackcurrant, lentisc, juniper, cedarwood, amber. The sleeper of the bunch — a lilting, dry cocktail of a summer scent, woody and faintly sweet, like the breeze coming off the sea and across the small sunny Mediterranean garden to reach you. Unisex, tilting interestingly (interesting to me, anyway) in reverse order from the slightly more masculine woodiness of the opening to the softer citrus and florals, still with plenty of woody herbs to ground it. Don’t let that “sea accord” scare you, I don’t get anything that isn’t delightful. It made me smile. I want some more.

Mandorlo Di Sicilia – bergamot, star anise, jasmine, white peach, green almond, coffee, cedarwood, white musk, vanilla. The gourmand of the bunch, obviously, although lighter than you’d think reading that list. This strikes me as a love-it-or-hate-it, depending on your tolerance for its sweetness. It’s supposed to be almond-scented, but instead was weirdly reminiscent of either sassafras or birch beer. It’s fun to try, but I can’t say I’d want to wear it more than once. It dries down into a pretty musky/gourmand floral that my girls quite liked.

Cipresso Di Toscana – grapefruit, petitgrain, clary sage, basil, rosemary, ferns, lily of the valley, jasmine, coriander, cardamom, woods, pine needles, cypress, oakmoss. My other strong favorite of the bunch. A delicious, straightforward masculine herbal/woody scent that manages to avoid cliche and that I’d borrow in a heartbeat. You know what I love about this? It’s the perfect non-romantic gift scent for some nice man in my life (nephew, brother, friend, dad) – something I’d smell very happily that isn’t laden with a weird ad agenda (I’m rich!! sexxxy!), it looks nice but not too nice (no guy-perfume vibe), not too pedestrian either, yet would be fairly easy to replace if he wanted some more. That’s a harder combination than you’d think.

Trying these all together, I found myself charmed — and reminded that when exploring fragrances, sometimes a lot can be learned from sniffing one line together and nothing else. No, none of them is going to win the Comme des Garcons award for perfume innovation (on second thought: that Mandorlo is pretty strange), at worst they’re merely pleasant, and I’d cheerfully wear the fig, myrtle and cypress scents. Their lasting power isn’t anything to write home about, but somehow that seems right. I think each also comes in a body cream and shower gel, with a couple other ancillary products for particular scents, and now I’m thinking a gel would be pretty fabulous. If you’ve fallen into a summer rut and are looking for something to wear in brutal heat that ends up feeling refreshing, but isn’t a straight-up cologne, these are definitely worth a try. Maybe it’s living in such a status-conscious area, but I am appreciative of a line of fragrance that doesn’t immediately conjure any particular marketing message, highbrow, trendy or otherwise (Chanel! David Yurman! Gwen Stefani!) These say: hey — smell nice,simple, relax, enjoy, and they do so beautifully. At $65 for 2 ozs. of sunshine, I can think of worse ways to spend my money.

Hey, fragrant friends — here’s a link to an interesting review by Chandler Burr of Hermes Un Jardin Apres La Mousson and thanks Musette for emailing it to me.  I am assuming that this will also appear in print in the NYT magazine supplement tomorrow, if I recall correctly how this all flows together, but maybe I don’t.

I am not always in agreement with Burr, but I thought he hit the nail on the head with this one and provided information that I (a rank if enthusiastic amateur) don’t have access to. I would describe the fragrance differently than Burr does; it’s clear I find it much more horrifying than he does — he’s merely baffled — I think I’m getting a lot more melon. Anyway, enjoy. The review, that is. My advice is to stay away from the fragrance itself. He gives it one star for “inoffensive” but yikes!

While I’m doing this post, here is what I think is a working link to the whole set of Scent Notes fragrance reviews, which (if you have ever gone looking as I have for one of these on their search engine) can be hard to find.

 My taste in perfumes is definitely linked to cravings. I’ve already admitted to being serially seasonal when it comes to choosing scents, but I also get a tad preferential when it comes to what form my scents take. I will spritz happily for months on end, and then I will suddenly crave perfume oils. There is no rhyme or reason to this; although I think a lot of it has to do with how hot the weather gets. Ironically, many perfume oils tend to be heady, heavy scents, but there are some that I find work best in the hot weather. There will be days when I find the temperature so suffocating that no scent is best, and on others, something reminiscent of a frozen daiquiri or piña colada is all I want to smell of. Or, I might feel like conjuring up memories of frying my pasty self on Neponsit Beach in Far Rockaway New York with my olive-skinned next-door neighbors. It was all about bikinis and baby oil in those days. Needless to say, I never could achieve that St. Tropez tan; the upside is that I have no residual sun damage from all those searing sunburns. Now, I wouldn’t be caught dead without my sunblock.

Perfume oils occupy a special place in my scent collection. My first experience with them goes back to the patchouli oil that I bought at the head shop in the back of a housewares and kitchen gadget store in the local shopping mall. That was in the late 70s and those scents were holdovers from the 60s hippie oils I used to smell on the girls my brother dated, and the scents my sun worshipping neighbors wore. Oils were not, and still  are not, completely in the mainstream. Over the years they’ve become less clandestine and more out in the open. Alyssa Ashley Musk and Bonne Bell Skin Musk oils were favorites of mine in middle school, and when I discovered Dewberry perfume oil from The Body Shop, I was content to smell exclusively of overripe, almost rotting fruit. It was glorious.

As I aged, my tastes became more sophisticated. Out of my love for vanilla grew the tireless search for the perfect vanilla perfume oil. I still haven’t found it, but I remain a fan of Kiehls Vanilla, especially when layered with their Cucumber or Grapefruit oils. I once spent an entire summer marinating myself in those scents, and then progressed to their classic Musk oil. All are still staples in my collection, as is Skin Musk, even though it is no longer made by Bonne Bell. Contrary to the many reformulations out there, this one still smells exactly as it did the first time I sniffed it in my neighborhood drug store.

I have tried a few mainstream perfume oils, often finding them to be disappointing. The most disappointing is Narcisco Rodriguez’s Musc For Her. I must be severely anosmic when it comes to Egyptian musk oils; there are quite a number of them my nose can’t smell. I can smell them in the bottle and they are usually quite lovely, but on my skin, they instantly disappear. I have noticed that there are few oils out there in the department stores – everyone goes gaga for a perfume concentration of a scent, but oils are mostly non-existent. I’ve always wondered if the fragrance industry is anti-oil due to some negative connotations, such as the one I used earlier: “hippie oil”. Is it a bad thing to be perceived as an oil-wearing “hippie” in the 21st century, but a good thing to eat organic food and buy organic, insanely expensive “Rich Hippie” perfumes? Someone please attempt to answer that for me…

After years of sampling and sniffing, I have determined that the best perfume oils can be found in the vast universe that is cyberspace. There are a few in brick and mortar stores, but I am amazed by the talent that is out there just waiting to be discovered. My personal favorites include Serena Ava Franco of AvaLuxe.com, Dawn Spencer Hurwitz of DSH/Essence Oils, Vinci & Rakos and Sonoma Scent Studio. The women behind the scents they sell are singular talents, and I own many of their exquisite creations. If you happen to live near a Barneys, be sure to check out oils by perfumer Yosh Han. Not only is she one of the nicest people I’ve ever met, she is passionate about fragrance and it is evident in the scents she creates. If you can get to Fred Segal in Los Angeles or Henri Bendel in New York, I highly recommend the Memoire Liquide line. I could literally spend an entire day sniffing every single scent they offer. If something true to the roots of “hippie oils” tickles your fancy, there are none better than those in the small Northern California chain of Body Time locations. Their China Rain scent is spectacular, and I remain convinced that Jennifer Lopez blatantly ripped it off for her JLo Glow fragrance.

As many successful online perfumers as there are, it would be impossible to list them all, or sample all their wares. The beauty of the internet is that it allows us to discover new information all the time. My collection of perfume oils has grown from a small gathering in a makeup bag to a serious collection, just like my bottles of fragrance. Each one is a singularly beautiful scent that I enjoy wearing, when the time is right.

Have I mentioned lately how much I hate airports and the whole security process. We were running behind today just a little getting to the airport, and they don’t have a dedicated place to check your bag when you are already checked in, except the kiosk out front where they charge you $3 to check a bag. I was being a tightwad and didn’t way to pay the $3, so we stood in line…. forever. When we finally got to the little thingie, up pops the message… IT’S TOO LATE TO CHECK ANY BAGGage, YOU MORON… YOU SHOULD HAVE CHECKED IT AT THE CURB AND PAID THE $3. 

Well, it didn’t exactly say that, but it might as well have.  So then I have to transfer from my suitcase all the things that they will confiscate if I take my bag through security, send Harry back to the truck with several expensive creams and the perfumes that I had planned to talk about, but… well, not gonna happen, as you probably guessed by now.

So I’ve rummaged around in my purse and only come up with some sample vials of things I’ve already talked about. I did get to sniff briefly the new TDC, Sublime Balkiss, right before I left, and there’s a little lingering on my arm, but not to any degree that I can say anything intelligent about it except, “it smells really nice after 8 hours on my arm,” which actually might say a lot that a TDC from Celine Ellena lasts that long.  It’s her usual understated style, and it certainly has been nice to wear all day, but honestly?  I was paying more attention to the whole flying/driving thing than the perfume.  So… nothing remotely intelligent.

But we did rent a car that I’ve been wanting to test drive for a long time, a Cadillac STS.  Suh-weeet!  Man, you just hit the footfeed and you are jacked up.  For my mid-life crisis car, I was leaning more towards a sports model, but that Caddy is pretty nice.  Any other suggestions for a sporty model of car that I need to check out?  I used to have a Datsun 280Z before I had kids, and now that I don’t need a car to haul them around anymore, I want something sporty again. 

Robin at Now Smell This asked me after my first Santa Fe post whether I had managed to “go home again” with any degree of success, having been away for so long and given my high hopes for my revisit. I’ve given that question some thought, and this is my answer.

On Sunday in Santa Fe, deep into a conversation with an old friend as I parked my cheesy rental car, I got out and locked my keys in the car while it was still running. In my defense, I’ve been driving for 30 years, and this is the first time I ever locked my keys in the car. So I called AAA, and hung out to wait for their arrival (hot tip: telling them your car is still running gets you expedited service). As I sat there, various strangers came by, laughed with me about my predicament, and tried to figure out how to break into the car. A nice man named Larry hung around for awhile and kept checking up on me. Someone else offered to run into the store we were in front of and get me a cold drink. Because, you know, I’d been sitting awhile in the sun.

When I go to New Mexico I have to dial my friendliness way up and massively dial down my aggression. Yes, of course there are things I can complain about related to the Land of Enchantment, and if I were there for six months no doubt I would. But a visit of a week allows me to pretty much focus on all the perks and skip the downside.

Having left almost a decade ago, how was it going back? Was it like going home? Well, no. The most important difference is the lack of framework; I was just another dopey tourist on vacation, taking up a parking space and looking for the best hike on the ski basin road. I wasn’t living there. I wasn’t shaping my day around my kids’ school hours and my work hours, trying to squeeze in a run to the grocery store before picking the kids up from daycare. For the first two days, I admit: it felt very strange.

And then it all became better. Because I realized, and this is a little sad, that in many ways I was appreciating Santa Fe more as a visitor. For much of the time we lived there I had two small children, and a job with long hours. I struggled, as many people do, looking for that famous life/work balance. Most of the time I felt like I was failing as a mother. I had a great career going; it was my parenting that could have used some improvement. And I’ll be honest, that struggle seemed particularly ironic in a city where many people had gone to retreat from their fast-paced lives somewhere else. I had the scenery, but the kicked-back lifestyle often eluded me.

On this trip, I took care of some business we still have there. But the rest of it was given over to pleasure. New Mexicans/Santa Feans are sensualists, one of the great good things about that place that I miss so much. There is time for an excellent meal, for chatting over the wall, for a cerveza and listening to music. There is time for a hike on the Borrego Trail, followed by a lunch you packed yourself, taking in the satisfaction of a long hike, to be followed later on by a brutal/wonderful massage in the building that used to be the grocery store. I scheduled various activities with various friends and not once did it cross my mind to make a backup plan in case they found themselves working late or otherwise confounded by a change of plans. Nobody apologizes for making time for their own pleasure. Feeling good is supposed to be part of your day, if you’re living your life right.  People in New Mexico laugh a lot, and I laugh right along with them.

I came home (wait for it!) with a rested spirit and a renewed sense of purpose, and really – what more could you want from a vacation to anywhere? (Full disclosure: I also came home with tacky souvenirs and an entire extra suitcase of frozen Bueno green chile.) I got to be nice to people who were nice to me, and I’m going to hang on to that feeling while I clean up the joint around here and get some work done. I think I’ll burn some pinon incense and recollect that giant blue bowl of a sky. So, from me to you, with no irony and snark, for just this once – peace, and I’ll be back to sniffing soon.

Canyon Road, Santa Fe: blueberrycreek.com

Hi, everyone — my flight was delayed last night and I got home late. Check in later today for a post.

So, listen…. The Dark Knight, just go see it.  No, no, don’t argue with me, really, I won’t listen to it.  Do it not only because it has my favorite eye candy in it, but because it’s a really terrific film.  It’s not just a comic book film. It’s about honor and betrayal and friendship, and what is a hero. Heath Ledger’s portrayal of The Joker is so different and yet the same from the character Nicholson did in the first Batman. The strokes on the character are the same, but where Nicholson’s was a caricature, Ledger made The Joker human and breathtakingly scary in ways that has me humbled at how talented he was. Go see it, you’ll see what I mean.

What’s a good scent for this whole movie? Well, lucky me (thanks to March getting me signed up for Andy’s 100 sample giveaway!) got a sample of Andy Tauer’s new Vetiver Dance (not released yet, it looks like fall?), with notes of grapefruit, black pepper, clary sage, lily of the valley, cedar wood, ambergris, tonka and dark vetiver from java. It goes on green and peppery, with all the earthiness of the vetiver, tonka, ambergris and wood spiking through. I don’t get much of the lily of the valley or grapefruit, maybe just a wisp. This is a scent for flawed people - at times too real and at other times almost a shadow. I deliberately did not do a comparison to Onda or Djedi, but Vetiver Dance has that same earthy clarity of those two, and that’s as far as I’ll go from memory. It’s a great scent and one that I think The Joker and Batman would wear because it suits that darkness we all have in us, standing alongside the capacity for great good and a little crazy thrown on top like an irresistible cherry. Vetiver is always my favorite “human” note because it is never covered in artifice.  Now y’all can just pine until Andy gets this released this fall.  For you vetiver fans, even those of you who are not, it will be worth the wait.

Hola, amigos — I am still in Santa Fe doing a lot of eati- shopp- hard work and I’m lacking regular computer access, so this will be a quickie.

 First off, in case the suspense was killing you, Fanta Se is still fantastic, and I harbor weird fantasies about moving back here and wearing the same three flax skirts to meditation every day… or, wait, maybe the cute peasant blouse?  With the concha belt and the boots?  Did I mention the boots?  Did I mention the fabulous consignment stores?  Als0, I am living on green chile chicken enchiladas and Rolaids.  Did I mention the margaritas?  The massage at Ten Thousand Waves?  If you visit, definitely stop by the Waves…

Okay, so, perfume.  (btw Santa Fe still smells amazing, and it’s monsoon season here so everything smells just that much better after the rain.)  To me, the default fragrance smell of Santa Fe is Cedar Mountain (hope that link works) which was the Santa Fe smell for a long time, this line being the product you were likely to get rubbed down with at the Waves and elsewhere.  You mix the oil in the bottle with water and spray … well, wherever (closet, your person, the air).  One whiff brings me right back here.  The Waves has moved on to some hinoki and yuzu products, both of which are practically the new lychee/pink pepper, but today’s find is … the Indian Champa body products from There, which if I am reading the packaging correctly is, believe it or not, the house brand of Cost Plus World Market, which they have here and I love.  Anyhoo, there are other less interesting scents — oh, wait, here’s the link – the cherry blossom, lotus etc. are just fine.  But this!  Here’s their blurbage: “inspired by the delicate Golden Champa flower, which possesses a rich, ethereal scent that is prized by the people of India…. it is often placed near temples and ashrams… ” there’s a bar soap, liquid soap, bath scrub, lotion, and shower gel listed on their website, and I got the body oil in the store.

When I have more time and a better computer I’m going to investigate the champa/champaca connection, specifically whether we’re talking about the same thing and whether they’re magnolia, plumeria or something else entirely.  In the meantime, let me say this smells a lot like Ormonde Jayne Champaca, which I love, with two main differences — 1) The World Market Champa is, unsurprisingly, less sophisticated (although lovely) and 2) it costs eight bucks or thereabouts and is available stateside, and apparently online.

I put some of the body oil on this morning after my shower and it’s still going strong late this afternoon.  The great thing about the champa smell is: it smells like an incense flower, halfway in between.  I am pretty sure they use it to make nag champa incense, but it’s not like that; there’s no smoky aspect.  I’m thrashing around here because it’s like trying to describe the smell of a gardenia.  I mean, there’s just nothing like it.   It makes me think of the flower necklaces at the shrines in Thailand.  It’s powerful and meditative and unsweet and haunting.

In sum: here are two interesting, reasonably-priced things to try while you’re saving up for Nombre Noir or one of those giant Chanel bottles.

I’ll probably be checking in here later today if I can weasel back onto a computer.   If not, take care and I will see you Weds.

photos: Ten Thousand Waves, inside and out

Summer’s got us by the bal- short hairs throat, and it’s time to weigh in with our seasonal list of scents that are proving to be summer-friendly.

March’s Top Five

1. Prada Infusion d’Iris – I don’t own this, and I don’t wear it. So why is it on my list? In our crowded, humid, sweaty city, can I tell you how insanely grateful I am that this seems to have been adopted by huge numbers of worker bees I encounter throughout the day on public transport in the wretched heat? As opposed to, oh, Angel. Or Euphoria. I don’t care if one in five women seems to be wearing it with her sensible suit, pearls and sneakers. It’s a pretty, sophisticated, ageless scent that manages the rare feat of being both subtle and pervasive. Women always seem startled I can smell it on them, but in fact it’s quite distinctive. Two lightly scented thumbs up.

2. Tea. (You knew I was going to cheat on the count, right?) Take Parfums de Nicolai Fig-Tea. Not so much figs or tea as a wonderful leafy, lightly floral summer staple. Or, there’s Bvlgari White Tea. I know I’m not inspiring you with that one. But I am trying to be honest. Every now and again I get an email that asks, so what do you really wear? White Tea is one of the very few scents I’ve had to buy a second bottle of, one of those scents I can throw on when everything else seems wrong and never regret it. Newbie lurkers: Bvlgari White Tea may not be that scent for you, but everyone needs one of those scents in his/her closet – the go-to fragrance that never turns out to be the wrong pair of shoes with the outfit. Because unlike shoes, fragrance can be harder to switch out of quickly. More tea: you can’t go wrong with L’Artisan’s The Pour Un Ete (although it lasts nine seconds), or, on the cheap side, Speziali Fiorentini’s Te Nero or Demeter’s wonderful Coriander Tea.

3. JAR Bolt of Lightning. The folks at JAR don’t discuss the notes in their fragrances, and you’d have to be a better nose detective than I am to suss them out, but I smell green leaves and forest, wet stones, distant storms, and something faintly sweet to offset the drama. A fragrance that makes me think of walking through a bamboo forest created by Louis Vuitton working with Michelangelo. Is that worth $800 a bottle or whatever this stuff costs? I don’t know, but it sure smells good. When I wear it to bed I have strange dreams. An on-the-cheap (relatively speaking) summer-greens alternative: I Am A Dandelion by CB I Hate Perfume.

4. Suntan smells – the new Estee Lauder Bronze Goddess, which is a close dupe of the old Tom Ford EL Azuree; NARS Monoi oil; the wildly overpriced but still tasty Creed Virgin Island Water; or (cheap treat!) Coty Sand & Sable from your local CVS, and one spray of that is plenty, trust me.

5. Jasmine. I love jasmine any old time, but it seems perfect in sultry summer, when it really blooms on my skin. Jo Malone White Jasmine & Mint is the civilized alternative. I also love skanky jasmines like Donna Karan’s jasmine essence, Armani Prive’s Eclat de Jasmine (which on me smells like it’s growing next to the horse stalls), and Montale’s gloriously ripe Jasmin Full. NSFW, particularly, but if you wear it to a party, men follow you around like they’re hypnotized. Not that I’m speaking from personal experience.

5. Ormonde Jayne Champaca. They put some addictive drug in this thing; I can’t stop wearing it. It’s sort of incense-y, but not really - it’s not heavy, but it lasts forever on me. And since I wore it almost the whole time I was in Thailand, it now conjures all that up for me, which makes it even more special. Notes are neroli, pink pepper, bamboo, champaca, freesia, basmati, myrrh, green tea, and musk. I don’t read many raves for the scent, I think it’s kind of under the radar? I can’t understand why. Heaven in a bottle.

Patty’s Top Ten of Summer:

1. Summer is when I love me some CBs. Dandelion, To See a Flower, Wild Hunt, Memory of Kindness, so many of them are just summer smells that have accompanied some of my happiest memories of summer. I love to wear them and wrap myself up in their comforting smells. Well, you should too!

2. I join March on the Tea bench and raise her a couple more. Osmanthe Yunnan will always hit my top summer scents list because it is always perfect.

3. Incenses rule during summer. Any of the CdGs work perfectly, as does Armani’s Bois d’Encens. The heat cools those incenses to where they just whisper across your skin and nose.

4. Hermes Orange d’Verte. Duh. It lasts like 1 hour, then you reapply. Keep going all during the day. They sell it in that mondo bottle for a reason.

5. L’Artisan Poivre Piquant. Peppers and heat, yes’m. Magic. Marina tossed me this idea when we were in NYC, and I’ve had Poivre Piquant in my truck all summer to spritz on me and the inside of the truck. It easily cools it by 10 degrees as soon as that smell hits my nose. Who knew?

Visit our other perfume blog friends who are also doing their Best of Summer:
Bois de Jasmin ::Now Smell This :: Perfume Posse :: Perfume-Smellin’ Things :: Scentzilla

First, the ten winners of the Creed Love in Black samples are:

1. CC
2. annie
3. Matts
4. Jennifer O
5. Maura
6. RHM
7. Kim
8. Janet in California
9. susi
10. Anne

Just click on the Contact Us button over there and send me your address. Congrats!

So… vanilla. yeah. Love it or hate it, there are a couple of new’ish ones out there that people seem to be loving, so let’s see why!

Montale Vanille Extasy has notes of ylang-ylang from Comoro Islands, Egyptian jasmine, apricot, sandalwood, mahogany, bensoin, vanilla. This is very much a sweet floral vanilla, like a cross between Montale’s Soleil di Capri and Indult Tihota, landing closer to Soleil, without that much of a gourmand feel to it. I think that’s what makes me a little road-weary about Montales, the new one always seems to be another variation on a prior one. As a scent, it’s nicely done, fitting in with the others in the line. I like it, but it’s not me so much, a little too sweet and not enough vanilla, which is what I expected with the name it has.

Micallef Vanille Aoud has notes of bergamot, ylang-ylang, prune, oud, caramel, musk, vanilla, benzoin.  A similar set of notes, with some variation, to the Montale Vanille Extasy. This works much better from the start, with a healthy benzoin blast in the open, some nice gourmandy notes blending well with the oud and vanilla. The oud is not too bitter, but has enough bite to keep this from a frothy sugar mess. This is a much more interesting rendition, paying a great salute to the vanilla and other gourmand notes, but holding a great tension with the oud, musk and benzoin. Micallef is one of those lines that I’m always just subtly impressed by. They do nice, incredibly wearable scents with some interesting slants.

So if you had to pick one vanilla fragrance to wear all the time, which one would it be?

I’m on my way to Santa Fe today. The Cheese and I lived there for ten years – more than half our married life – and we left for a lot of good, practical reasons, but none of them was because I didn’t like Santa Fe. I loved it from the first time I saw photos of it in some books in Washington, D.C. in the late 80s, when we were young newlyweds trying to escape the urban grind. We decided to move there sight unseen, then confirmed our gut feelings with a weekend visit. We packed our junk up and drove it across the country into a whole new life. If I had a dollar for everyone we met in Santa Fe who went there for vacation and then called home and said, send my stuff, I’m staying, I’d have enough dough to pay full retail for a bottle of Bel Respiro.

When we moved west in the summer of 1990 we left behind crime-ridden downtown DC, where we lived in a house on which every window and door was covered in burglar bars (pray for no fires!), where the night was punctuated by the alarms of cars being broken into and the occasional drunk screaming obscenities or passing out on our front walk. We moved into a house in the country 20 minutes from Santa Fe, on a washboard dirt road under a sky so blue the whole thing looked like a ridiculous, fake movie set. It was so quiet that when we sat outside one of the loudest sounds we heard was the burners on the hot air balloons as they drifted lazily past us overhead. Coyotes barked at night, and occasionally you’d see them skulking past. It had a hallucinatory quality that never went away entirely in the ten years we lived there.

You know how a place gets under your skin? You can leave it, turn your back and shake the dust off your boots and drive away back to the city, but it won’t let you go. Our older girls were born there. We drove all over that huge, dry, wonderful state and I saw so many things that amazed me – scorpions and white sand and ancient kivas and ghost towns and thunderstorms that roll across 50 empty miles of desert, straight at you. For a person addicted to smells, New Mexico is full of wonders – ozone, woodsmoke, Russian olive, green chiles roasting by the side of the road in the fall. My mouth waters just thinking about the food.

Not everyone thinks it’s great. Certainly while living there I met my share of shellshocked tourists on the Plaza, gazing around wondering how they got hornswoggled into going to a place so small, so brown, so dusty, with food so spicy. Frequently they were wearing shorts in the 18-degree winter, having I guess confused Santa Fe with Phoenix? Santa Fe is high desert, 7000 feet elevation, nestled at the base of the Sangre de Cristo mountains. There’s a ski area 20 minutes away. I met people all the time back east who flat out didn’t believe me that Santa Fe had winter, often with plenty of snow. They’d never walked Canyon Road on Christmas Eve, singing carols and eating bizcochitos and watching the farolitos burning in the snow, the smell of pinon woodsmoke all around you, along with the dark, wet smell inside the old adobe churches.

Do you ever think about going to Santa Fe? Go. The spring is the worst time – cold and dirty and windy, all the way through April (the worst month, in my opinion.) Summer, with the Spanish and Indian markets, is hugely popular. My local favorite time is the Fiestas in early September, with the Desfile de los Ninos (literally, the children’s parade, where you walk with your pet dog or rooster or hamster or whatever) and the burning of Zozobra, which residents basically use as an excuse for a three-day drunk. Fall (September, October, early November) is a gorgeous time to go, with the turning leaves and the Hot Air Balloon Festival in Albuquerque, which attracts people from all over the world. And of course winter’s gorgeous if you like to ski and don’t mind the cold. Santa Fe gets 300+ days of sunshine a year.

I haven’t been back in seven years. Life got in the way every summer – pregnancy, babies, toddlers, building a house, moving, caring for ailing parents, other trips. I’m a little nervous. I know it won’t be the same; nothing ever is. But let’s face it, the locals have been complaining that the place went to hell in (pick one: the 1950s, the 70s, the 90s). It’s all downhill, right? Me, I’m just hoping to break out the concha belt and the sunscreen and feel the love all over again. Maybe not the exact same love. But something good. Something like going home.

photos from top: red chile ristras drying against an adobe wall; farolitos (DIY brown lunch bags with sand in the bottom and a lit candle, aren’t they lovely?); hot air balloons preparing for takeoff; Zozobra, the giant moaning puppet (Old Man Gloom) they burn during Fiestas, while you drink a cerveza and yell “burn him!!” For a sense of scale: that’s a person standing in front of him.  He waves his arms too; I bet there’s some great footage on YouTube.

PS: packed in my bag in travel atomizers: Ormonde Jayne Champaca; Kenzo Amour Indian Holi; Armani Prive Bois d’Encens; Tauer Lonestar Memories.

I wasn’t a huge fan of Creed’s Love in White. The Magnolia in it is just not a note that I love, and, well, I sorta despise the scent personally. So when I heard about Love in Black being released, I wasn’t exactly hopeful that it might even be remotely something I’d like.

So let’s go to the marketing blurb, which isn’t heinous at all. Created to celebrate Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, it uses elements that were symbolic of her life. Night-blooming wildflowers from the Greek Isles; Virginia cedar from the countryside where she rode her horses; iris from Florence, a city she loved; clove and tonkin musk; blackcurrant from Bourgogne; and Bulgarian rose.

Now, I have no idea whether this would remind me of Jackie O or if she would have worn it, but it is elegant and not frilly in the least - it feels a little darkish, but more like a shadow over a bed of flowers on a summer day, not something that only comes out at night. It has a lovely iris/violet floral open, velvety soft and just glides right out of the open into the heart. Now, y’all know I am a complete iris/violet slut, and this perfume is not going to be an exception to my unabashed love of those notes. It’s beautifully rendered, with just a touch of sweetness that adds so much softness to it, but it never veers off into syrupy purple goo, just stays elegantly cool and soft. If you loved the Dior La Particuliere special edition iris one, I think it was No. 9? You will adore this. It’s got the same cool, smooth, elegant treatment that would fit any occasion, day or night. I think guys who like to wear violet/iris combos would welcome this in their wardrobe too.

I’m not going to say there’s anything groundbreaking in this scent. It’s well done and lovely and a good addition to the Creed line, which I admit I just haven’t found a lot of things in the line that I’m smitten with (Hey, BNers, don’t hurt meeeee!!! - I kid, you know I love y’all! ). This is going to be one of the few exceptions - I will wear this - and have been - a lot and very happily. The price tag is eek! territory - $230 for a 75 ml bottle and $130 for 1 ounce. The gigantor flacon is the way to go, $350 for 250 mls, splitting it with your friends. Right now available only in the Paris boutique, it is due to arrive in U.S. stores in September. My early prediction: This is going to be a bestseller for Creed. They’ve got the marketing right, the image tied to Jackie O, the black bottle, playing off the success of Love in White, and a nicely done fragrance in the bottle.

Disclaimer and happy news for y’all! I was sent this fragrance to review Creed, which never has an impact on if I like something or not, but I do like to disclose it, and I need to bundle up some of it to send to March as well, but I’m going to give away TEN 2.5 ml samples to some lucky commenters. Just leave a comment, and I’ll draw ten names out and post the winners on Thursday.

BTW, just a note about comments. I (and I know March does) love your comments, and I love the way so many of you have these great discussions amongst yourselves. Sometimes be a really daunting task to find the 2-4 hours a day necessary to respond to all comments. So, for me, I want comments to be something I keep loving, so I’m not always going to be able to respond to all. I may just respond to a couple that have questions in them or that I have something to offer back. Some days, I may respond to all of them. I just don’t want anyone to feel like I may be ignoring them if I don’t respond to all comments. And I sure don’t want less comments! That would really suck.

Continuing my exploration of samples I bought awhile ago because I’d heard/learned/read something about each, and now I have no idea what that was – I threw caution to the wind and spritzed on a heavy dose of Vivienne Westwood’s Boudoir. I have a sense of this being a fragrance people either love or hate, but other than the name suggesting something sexy (and I have a soft spot in my head for eccentric Viv), I wasn’t sure what to expect.

As I stood there, enveloped in the miasma that is Boudoir, it came to me: I must have wanted a fragrance that smelled like being in a nightclub 20+ years ago, jammed up against some tall, sweaty girl’s armpit. The club is dark; it’s hot; it’s loud; everyone’s smoking; they’re playing Madonna or Dead or Alive or Herbie Hancock or even (flashback!) One Night in Bangkok and you are singing along loudly because you have maybe had one or two controlled substances (admit it, you know all the words!). Then this tall girl is smashed up against you, possibly because you fell into her, because you … are … toasted. She’s wearing some radically in-your-face fragrance like Giorgio, and there are massive sweat stains in her underarms, one of which is inches from your nose.

I was kind of digging this, to be honest. Boudoir is not everyone’s cup of tea. This is, in fact, probably not the cup of tea for hordes (acres? furlongs? planets?) of people, among them Tania Sanchez, who in The Guide suggested it be renamed Bidet. It’s really not quite altogether pleasant. (Should I have smoked that clove cigarette? Drunk that fifth beer? Eaten that last mushroom? I feel a little queasy! Maybe I should go outside where it’s cooler, but will the bouncer let me back in?!?) There’s something mildly sick-making about Boudoir, and at the same time, it’s glorious.

Notes for Boudoir are viburnum, marigold, orange blossom, orris, rose, cinnamon, coriander, cardamom, amber, vanilla, sandalwood, patchouli. I suppose you could pretend it’s all about buxom, satiny seduction, but I’d argue this is the perfect scent to wear before a night out clubbing followed by some unspecified debauchery and the obligatory walk of shame in the full, pitiless light of morning. Boudoir doesn’t want to stay home in any boring old bedroom (no offense); it deserves a night out on the town, with some champagne and some social smoking and some mojitos and whatever else you might have trouble remembering the next day when you wake up on some stranger’s couch.

Sure, it’s freshly showered for about the first 25 seconds, but then the stank blows in and it’s breathtaking. In more than one sense. I think it must be the combination of viburnum (some kinds of which to my nose can smell, like linden, a little gamey) and the coriander.  Close behind the spicy floral aspect is the perfect idealized smell of sweat – young, fresh nightclub sweat, not flop-sweat, but still — the effect is as if you put on perfume to mask your own stink. The marigold and the cardamom and the patchouli have effectively strangled much of the femme out of this thing. I would love to smell it on a man.

An observation – once it settled a bit, from a distance, 11-year-old Enigma (twice) told me how much she liked the way this smells, and then when she sniffed my skin she recoiled in disgust. She seemed flummoxed by the fact that it is the same fragrance, and I have the same experience; the closer you get to your skin, the nastier it gets.

So go ahead. Wear it. Not to work, for Pete’s sake, or to church, or to visit a sick friend. And certainly not to your next job interview. But if reading this prompted any kind of nostalgia, real or imagined, for clove cigarettes, fingerless mesh gloves, gin & tonics and giant earrings from Fiorucci, maybe you need a little of this in a spray atomizer.

Siouxie and Dead or Alive albums; Vivienne Westwood rocks the horns (!) on newcultureform.org.uk. Man, I wish I still had those Fiorucci earrings….

Hey, all, to head off more wild rumors than are currently running around, the message board is not working for reasons that I don’t know.  I set it up through a free message board service, I’ve messaged them to see what’s up, have heard nothing back. Since it’s free, I can’t exactly stamp my feet and demand what I paid for. So it may never be back, for all I can tell, sorry!

But  that’s the only reason it’s not working.  If it comes back up or I hear from them, I’ll update y’all.

Most of my life, I’ve been listening to all of my Canadian relatives tell me, “Everything’s better in the United States.” Well, yeah, maybe that’s the case from a purely capitalist standpoint – we Americans do love our shopping malls, department stores, et al, but from a quality of life perspective, that wouldn’t be my primary reason for picking up and moving from Canada to the United States. I’ve made the strenuous argument over the years that this is not the case (especially not at present), but my wacky but lovable family refuses to listen to me. Now, with US and Canadian currency practically at par, and a good many of the American chain stores open for business in the larger Canadian cities, there really isn’t much lacking as far as selection. But, if we’re talking drug store chains, I must defer to the Canadian chain, Shoppers Drug Mart. If you happen to be a mainstream fragrance and beauty addict, hands down, this is the place to go. Walgreens, CVS, Eckerd and the rest can’t hold a candle to the newly re-vamped Shoppers Drug Mart stores. Personally, I can disappear into one for hours and emerge significantly lighter in the wallet. It’s gotten to the point that I almost deliberately forget to bring certain toiletry items with me when I visit my Toronto relatives, just so I have an excuse to go to Shoppers. Oh; forgot my deodorant? I gotta go to Shoppers. Can’t walk around all stinky now, can I?

Years ago, Shoppers Drug Mart was just your basic run-of-the-mill drug store chain. There was absolutely nothing extraordinary about it; you went there for your prescriptions, shampoo and other toiletries and that was about it. About 4 years ago, I happened upon a newly-opened Shoppers location when I was genuinely in need of something – I can’t recall what anymore, so I wandered in and was promptly blown away by this new store. It was sectioned off into two areas: one, with high-end cosmetics and fragrances – Lancome, Dior, Chanel, Clarins and other department store-staple brands, displayed so that you can sniff, touch and test to your heart’s content. The other side had the usual array of drugstore makeup brands and fragrances, along with the coveted French skincare lines, Vichy, Avene and La Roche Posay, which used to be almost impossible to get in the US. The rest of the store wasn’t too shabby either: all the toiletry basics, a special section devoted just to vitamins and supplements, pharmacy, greeting cards, housewares, groceries, photo processing, post office…this place seemed to have it all. I must have had that deer-in-the-headlights look when I was approached by a sales associate in the high-end cosmetics section, because the first thing she asked me was if I was OK. I said I was fine, and asked, where did all this come from? She told me that this was one of their new concept stores, and at that time, was one of only two in the Toronto area. They were testing the layout and the merchandise to see whether or not Shoppers could be one of those “destination” type stores, where you could pick up everything from a container of milk to a bottle of Chanel No. 5. I guess their formula was successful since more of these stores have opened in the Greater Toronto Area, as well as existing locations undergoing renovations to update them.

Now, virtually every Shoppers location has morphed into one of these destination stores you can play in for hours if you so choose. Their list of brands has expanded to include BeneFit, Smashbox, L’Occitane, Boots No. 7 and other new lines that seem to pop up every time I go in there. Speaking of Boots, I can see where the inspiration for this type of store came from since I think Shoppers borrowed a lot of their layout from the Boots chain in the UK. I did happen to get lost in some of those stores when I visited London a few years ago.

What I can’t seem to figure out at this point is why this type of drugstore/beauty emporium/lifestyle store hasn’t migrated southward, tickling the fancy of any of the major drug store chains here in the US. Granted, we have become oversaturated with Sephoras in recent years, but Shoppers has a completely different vibe to it. I really enjoy the fact that I can shop for both high-end items and drugstore items in the same location, whereas Sephora stocks only high-end lines. Plus, the convenience of being able to buy laundry detergent, Tylenol and other such items completes the shopping experience in such a marvellous way. Where I live, Walgreens seems intent on taking over the world, and the CVS, Rite Aid and Eckerd stores are so dingy and neglected looking that I rarely patronize them. A few CVS locations have added a couple of the French skincare lines I mentioned earlier, but they’re displayed in the same nondescript manner they stock everything else. The new Shoppers stores are clean, well-lit and organized to a fault. There’s some marketing genius at work here; not that I really care about that sort of stuff, but whoever is responsible for implementing these changes gets high marks from me for vision. When I’m at home in New York, traversing the suburban retail landscape and all the American drugstore chains, I think – boy, I would really love to have a Shoppers here.

I would love for any Canadian readers to weigh in on their feelings about Shoppers. Here in Toronto, they’re pretty much the only game in town. I know of a few Rexall/PharmaPlus locations, but not many. My family thinks I’m a bit off my rocker for waxing rhapsodic about a drug store, so I’m in need of some validation!

Neil Morris would like to offer a special 15% off discount on their fragrances for Posse readers. Just use the code POSSE from now to August 15 on any full bottle purchases for your 15% off. Thanks, Neil and David!

So what to review today? The summer slump over fragrance continues. Not a lot of new releases, and I comb through my drawers to see what I want to talk about until White Patchouli and Love in Black and the two new Serges come bounding through my door.

*drumming fingers on tabletop while looking through samples*

Comme des Garcons Zagorsk - one of my favorite incenses, period, and particularly great in the summer. Notes are white incense, pimento berries, pine, cedar, violet, iris, hinoki wood, birch wood. There is a piney woodiness to this incense that takes it out of the “really churchy” into the outdoorsy reverent. The floral notes and pimento berries give it a softness and a spicy quality that enriches it. It’s not a warm incense, but I don’t find it as cold as Bois d’Encens from Armani. It’s a dispassionate incense that is comforting in the way your best friend is. For me, it’s really perfect in the summertime, cooling and refreshing. Right up there with L’Artisan’s Passage d’Enfer and Bois d’Encens, both of which are summertime staples.

Aroma M’s Geisha Blanche now comes in an edp and has notes of lychee, jasmine, hyacinth, ylang ylang. Okay, I’m kinda digging this even though those notes aren’t usually my thing. It does have that “fresh” thing going for it, is that the lychee? It’s not overly sweet or overly floral, and the fresh isn’t as “Tampaxy” as a lot of these are, it’s just kind of brisk, slightly sweet and refreshing. If you don’t like fresh things, this likely won’t change your mind, but you’ll probably hate it less than other fresh-smelling perfumes that have come down the block. I think the hyacinth lends it a less sweet and more interesting feel than other fragrances in this genre.

Of the two? I’m going with Zagorsk, but I’d spritz the Geisha Blanche on some days, and I think a young woman would find it really lovely to wear and enjoy it a lot.

Is it fall yet? I’ve got more construction projects going on at my house than you can shake a stick at, and it feels like everything is either torn up or breaking, with no end in sight, all delays, and I just want to leave the country again until it’s over. What is making me happy this summer is my new wine habit. Um…. should someone with a perfume addiction take on a wine addiction? My budget is saying no… my nose, which totally gets how much wine and perfume lovers have in common, says hells yes! Though I read in a wine magazine how one person stopped wearing perfume after they started into their wine education. Um…. why? The mind boggles at why that would happen. Anyone have a guess? I’m clueless.