Hermès Terre d’Hermès, Eau d’Hermès, and “The One In the Green Bottle”

Well my inbox and facebook feed were bombarded over this past week with the notice that there was a new mens Hermès fragrance, available at Nordstrom, called H24. Despite the fact that there is a Norstrom right down the street in Century City, I failed to get over there in time to grab a whiff. Hey,the LA marathon was in town. And I had a personal “Buffy” marathon going on, The dog ate my homework. Sue me.

However by happenstance a friend dropped over and gave me a sample of Terre d’Hermès, which I had tried before but never bought. Since I do own bottles of Eau and Eau d’Orange Vert (mine so old that it’s just “The One In the Green Bottle” or OGB from here on in.)

I sort of group these three as being on one or the other side of a definite timeline: around the time perhaps the green bottle got a name Hermès started making more and more perfumes that were more and more mainstream. Not that they were bad, not at all. It’s the perfume version of Jane Birkin carrying all of her crap in the bag designed for her and Jane Doe (or more accurately “Dough”) carrying ones sized from petite to garganto in everything from leather to latex to lynx to licorice. The appearance of exclusivity without being truly exclusive.

But I digress..

Eau d’Hermès and OGB came before that time.

Eau d’Hermès came out in 1951 apparently and according to my own review on this very website was quite the funk-fest: so much so that at the Hermès boutique a less than tactful friend exclaimed in tones loud enough to be heard in France “EEEEWW!! Old Man Funk!!” Which was of course what I liked about it. It was cumin heavy leather- like a hot guy just in from a ride on a cold day. Lady Chatterly’s Lover in a bottle. I ended up years later buying a bottle (off Amazon, not at Hermès) and it was far less, shall we say pungent? than I remembered. Which was too bad. Rumors were for a while that it was discontinued, but it’s still available at Hermès online and other e-tailers.

OGB has been around forever, although online sources read that it’s a 2009 concoction. March says 1979, so we will go with that. I know it’s been one of my go-tos for a long time: in that 4711 vein, it’s very cooling on a hot day. It has the usual suspects of citrus but add is a bit of tropical fruits that, while they don’t scare the horses (or ride them into your boudoir, grrr…) do add a little bit of a tropical, big sunglasses with sarong (or Hermès scarf worn as a wrap) vibe that is very welcome on even an arid, Santa Ana- blown LA day. I do have a bottle that was purchased after it was named, but still refer to it as OGB, So there.

Terre d’ Hermès definitely comes after the time when Hermès was starting to become more Chanel-like in releasing new scents. New, more Sephora friendly ones. Not that there’s anything wrong with that: after all it’s a business in the business of selling, and while we all applaud the outré it can help the bottom line to have a hit, and Terre d’Hermès was a hit. Certainly with Patty who loved it as did others. I liked the citrus/woody/spicy thing it did and really liked the unexpectedly cool and earthy drydown with it’s almost flinty aspects, like soil not easily tilled nor easily farmed. For some reason it did not however make my credit card raise out of my pocket the way so many others have. Still doesn’t.

So have any of you sniffed H24? Is it all that or does it lack the bag of chips? Let us know in the comments and in the mean time maybe I will get my lazy a$$ over to Nordstrom and find out..

Eau d’Hermès is $150 while Orange Vert is from $97 to $179 depending upon size at Hermès boutiques. Terre d’Hermès starts at $95 or so at Nordstrom and others, and of course all are available on the interwebs for less. World’s laziest picture is from m iPhone.