Theo Fennell Scent

It is decidedly autumn. Meaning: it’s raining here. And I have a leak next to my back door. Get to call company that installed door tomorrow…

Oh, in between the trees are gorgeous and the fields at the farm shop offer a wonderful bounty (I think these are cabbages).

But as I write it’s raining, and given the sun rises after 7 AM and sets before 7 PM (and the dark will continue to close in until the Winter Solstice, when the sun arrives towards 9 AM and departs at 4 PM) it’s not my fave time of year.

Autumn sends me looking through drawers to divest clothing that no longer work, into my box of scarves to remind myself of what I actually have, and into the perfume box at the bottom of the closet for those things that only come out in cooler/cold weather.

Of course, each year, it’s the long discontinued, only fragrance ever released by celebrity jeweller Theo Fennell Scent. What a lame name for something that is truly gorgeous.

I’m surprised I haven’t written about this. I guess because I only visit with it this time of year and it’s hard to find (ebay, on discounters), so I don’t want to use up my bottle. I remain flummoxed as to why I didn’t buy more when it was released.

Launched in 2006 (a lifetime ago), Fragrantica calls this a chypre floral. I guess. It’s just heavy duty gorgeousness on me. Yes, floral, but some spice, something lush and delicious without being foody. Notes include rose, saffron, lily, cardamon, orchid, caraway, cinnamon, jasmine, orange blossom, labdanum, benzoin, patchouli, sandalwood and tonka.

Turin and Sanchez gave it 5 stars in the original The Guide and Turin called it a saffron musk (don’t see any musk notes, but I certainly ‘get’ that label). Per Turin, “A modern masterpiece moving from a radiant creamy musk opening to Guerlain style woody powdery mode and then back again to the opening. A perfectly unisex fragrance – original, memorable and technically brilliant”. Nose was Christophe Laudamiel.

I can’t recall when I bought my bottle, but I do know I got it at Selfridges and I had to wait for the exactly right SA to show up from his break because no one else knew where the boxes of this were. Just blank stares. As one would hope from a jewellery designer, the bottle is nice, tactile. Fits the hand well, good weight, manageable top.

Oh, my, this is gorgeous (I’m totally with Turin on this). In the back of my mind, I know it is, but each autumn when it comes out I’m reminded of Just.How.Gorgeous. On me, it starts saffron (I assume it’s saffron doing this) rose – ie, deep, full, slightly weird sour but in the best possible way. It’s got the raspiness of lily and the rose must have been one really happy flower.

This is very old school – ie, it’s more a soup than a salad in that the individual notes support one another rather than really standing out separately. I get the idea of caraway. As it develops on my skin, I get a worn silk lingerie thing – something tangled up on a well used bed. I guess that’s the jasmine and orange blossom’s contribution. I know I used lush above – also, rich, sumptuous, voluptuous, decadent.

The drydown is … well, everything you want a drydown to be? Which is to say, at least for me, resinous, with a smooth, full, buttery woodiness and just a whisper (really only a whisper) of spicy sweet.

Each year when I bring this out I’m bowled over all over again.

I guess I can understand why this was discontinued. It’s certainly not mainstream and it’s also not easy (a friend said it went sour on her). And for whatever reason it wasn’t that easy to find at the time. But it’s one of those frustrating things: why did you launch this if you didn’t plan to continue to offer it??? I would have happily continued to buy it.

Do you remember this? Is it in your collection?

An fyi for next week: my post will go up early on Monday rather than on Sunday to coincide with Halloween, one of my favourite holidays.