Hi there Perfume Posse! Last week here in Sydney we had a major new release launch for the Grandiflora range: Grandiflora Boronia. The owner of Grandiflora Saskia Havekes was on site to give us a background of the business and her personal journey from flowers to fragrance.

Boronia by Bertrand Duchaufour for Grandiflora 2017

Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Resins, Cognac, Black tea, Tobacco, Suede, Caramel, Dry woods, Blackcurrant, Freesia, Hemlock, Immortelle absolute, Hay

Boozy caramel, tea leaves and sharp blackcurrant open Boronia. It is remarkably Aussie and does smell like the Boronia if you pluck a little stem and rollout between your fingers. Not a soft, easy or perfumey scent but interesting, challenging and mildly abrasive. As the fragrance progresses it glows with that unmistakable immortelle (everlasting daisy) sweetness. That combined with the blackcurrant has a slightly pissy, ultra sweet animalic-ness that could also be honey.

Further in the resins appear and smooth over the more challenging accords, bringing the whole fragrance together beautifully. They smell like myrrh, elemi and labdanum to me. Suddenly this maverick becomes fine fragrance with a jaunty Aussie wink.

By the 30 minute mark Boronia’s initial fireworks calm considerably and we are left with a linear dry down that is comfortably sweet and tobacco rich with an amorphous wood/leather. The dry down is quietly alluring and thumps out for nearly a whole day, soft yet insistent.

The bottles have changed from the gorgeously elegant 100ml glass domes to a much more prosaic 50ml black cylinder. It doesn’t look nearly so luxurious but I’m a total fan of the smaller size. I can imagine this being a solo bottle on a bureau or dressing table. It looks very minimalist and cool.

LuckyScent has $145/50ml
Surrender To Chance has samples from $5.69/ml

Grandiflora Boronia LAUNCH PARTY

The front of Grandiflora shop is almost exactly as the storefront has been for decades.

Ainslie walker, perfumer and fragrance writer on left, Saskia on right.

Place names hand drawn by Saskia. so cool I kept mine.

Ainslie too this shot of me contemplating Boronia. I like it.

Saskia on left, Michael from Libertine Parfumerie was on hand to help with notes and story.

I’ve spoken about Grandiflora Michel before here on Perfume Posse.

Have you tried any of the Grandiflora range?
Portia xx