Sea Cruise: Patou Voyageur

Well, the heat is back. At least for the next few days. Not as bad as it could be and not as bad as it is in the desert, but enough to make the walk to the grocery store kind of schvitzy. (I know,, the problems I face. There should be a telethon)

Coincidentally, I won an eBay auction for a tester for the titular fragrance that Portia had originally inspired me to buy a teensy manufacturers sample of: Patou’s 1995 Voyageur. As I wrote in my earlier take, I really don’t remember this one when it came out and I should have: at the time I worked right in the heart of Beverly Hills on Rodeo Drive and popped in and out of Barney’s, Neiman’s and Saks constantly, if only sometimes to walk through the air conditioning on my way back from my meager lunch rather than braving the heat of the street (my employers required jacket and tie.) That, and my desire to be on the crest of the wave for the newest and best that the department stores had to offer (ScentBar was yet to open) you would think I would have noticed. Which leads me to think that perhaps this was past the point that Patou was a presence in those stores, or perhaps just not a large enough one and without the marketing dollars to make a big push in them. I mean, if they didn’t have giant factices of the boat and bottle combos they used for the little samples they were fools and I would have to have been in a coma not to have noticed them.

It’s always interesting the difference in the method of application has in how a scent plays out. I suppose that spraying aerates things enough that they seem stronger, more immediate, certainly I assume more in the way it was intended to be experienced. It certainly made Voyageur bloom: that fruity, sagey opening that’s rather meek dabbed when sprayed has the streamers, waving crowds, and horns of an Atlantic crossing on the Normandie. All it needs is Cary Grant and Irene Dunne quaffing champagne while her pet money slips the sacred emerald of banjaboo the little imp stole from baddie Ivor Novello into her evening bag. Or at least it would have seemed that way compared to the wan eau-de-eau’s of the time or the overly powerhouse leftovers from the earlier part of the decade. It is bright and fesh and bracing, with a lovely yin and yang of salty, almost minty freshmess and warm, woody herbaceousness. It’s a shame it didn’t get a wider audience- I suppose to take the ship metaphor further it was more an Andrea Doria than a Normandie: lovely, pared down, sleek, and gone too soon.

Like all Patou fragrances this is only available in memory and on online discounters/auctions. Which is very, very sad. Surrender to Chance has samples of Joy and 1000 available and if you haven’t, you really should. My bottle was purchased by me.

Images: my iPhone, Pexels, Wikimedia Commons