Sacre Bleu by Aftelier Perfumes NEW! NEW! NEW!

Hi there Posse Perfumistas. Mandy Aftel’s latest package arrived and the feeling is always joyful. Mandy has single handedly inspired a generation of perfumers. Almost all the modern natural perfume houses pay at least some tribute to Mandy’s help and guidance. Her books are bestsellers and every new tome is given the same kind of feverish excitement as a blockbuster film. Upon opening I discover that her new fragrance is called Sacré Bleu. Such a cool name. Sacred Blue.
From Aftelier site: “The inspiration for my Sacré Bleu perfume is the marriage of sacred blue lotus absolute with divine hundred-year-old Mysore sandalwood oil. One of our most precious offerings, Sacré Bleu is luminous, honeyed, transcendent, and mesmerizing.”

Sacré Bleu by Aftelier Perfumes 2024

Sacré Bleu by Atelier Perfumes

Atelier gives these featured accords:
Antique Sandalwood, Blue Lotus, Ambergris, Boronia, Black Tea, Mimosa, Beta Ionone, Methyl Anthranilate

Mandy brings together sacred, healing ingredients used for millennia around the world to create a perfume so intensely, viscerally profound that I found myself smiling with joy. HA! I know how that reads. Like such stupid, overblown, ridiculous hyperbole. It’s also true. Sacré Bleu is entrancing and I was a little overcome on my first wear. Definitely not what I was expecting.

This is the most natural smelling of Mandy’s recent releases. It starts out sweet, like raspberry cordial and honeyed roses growing near a healthy compost heap that’s just been turned. Hot grasses, domesticated farm animals and bosky, earthy goodness. My nose also senses an incredibly soapy jasmine. I’m completely unaware how blue Lotus should smell so cannot comment on it. As that opening burns off I have a very Australian bushwalk smell. Brushing past fragrant native plants, kicking up the leaves and breaking twigs as we pass. Dappled shade and that sharp eucalypt smell at the first drops of rain.

The heart warms through with a golden, treacle like, resinous sandalwood. It’s been overshadowed by the major opening players till now and it comes in like sunrise. While the two are miles apart, at this point I’m reminded tangentially of my oldest bottle of Guerlain Samsara extrait. The same rush of caramelized creamy sandalwood that is almost bubblegum white floral. Sacré Bleu is so beautiful, rich and at the heart feels like communion with a higher plane.

Let’s quickly look at some ingredients:

Blue Lotus was the symbol for Ra and Osiris, sun and underworld.Sandalwood has been used in cremation and burial ritual since the ancient Egyptians.
Ambergris was burned as incencense
Boronia used by Australian Aborigines as a fragrant medicine for aged and very young
Tea has a nearly 5000 year history dating back to Emperor Shen Nung
Mimosa has been part of an hallucinogenic Brazilian sect only documented since the Portuguese arrival
Beta Ionone multifaceted fragrant inclusion smelling of raspberry, iris, woods and violet leaf
Methyl Anthranilate grape smell found in many white flowers (that is a bird repellant)

Mandy has sent me a sample of the perfume. It’s close wearing and remarkably long lived for a natural. While not a bombastic scent it does leave an admirable scent trail. I’d really like to get my hands on both a bottle of the EdP and the extrait to wear together.

Do you ever smell a new perfume and wonder what it would be like to wear a signature scent? Eschewing all others. These crazy thoughts have been banging around my head as I’ve worn Sacré Bleu over the last two days.

This is a perfume I urge you to try.
Does it read like it might float your boat?
Portia xx

  • Tom says:

    Late to the party but this reads so wonderful!

  • Kathleen says:

    Your review of Sacre Bleu is beautiful and definitely encourages me to want to sniff. I have enjoyed all of the perfumes that I have sampled created by Mandy Aftel. I have longed to be a signature scent person; however, there are too many perfume loves and scent memories to choose just one. xoxo

    • Portia says:

      Heya Kathleen,
      Yeah signature scent has been this weird thing that my mind does, forgetting that I could NEVER do it. Like a completely unrelated to me pipe dream.
      Portia xx

  • Musette says:

    I don’t have much experience with Mandy’s perfumes – but I do have a deep and abiding love for her original natural peach isolate which is….. omg! It gives such incredible peach taste without even a hint of synthetic. Peaches can be irascible little terrors and look amazing yet give almost zero flavor (sometimes even the ones from my trees! ::stupid peaches::) – her essence just… gives those little freaks a big flavor boost!

  • March says:

    I remember how blown away I was by the first ones I tried, how interesting they were … I think in NYC? Bendel, maybe? I haven’t quite fallen in love with one yet, but the line is such a great addition to the perfume world. This one sounds very interesting. Also I love the idea of the bushwalk smell; interesting how much a fragrance can stir our scent-memories.

    • Portia says:

      March, scent memory is part of what makes this hobby so amazing and singular. Every sniff is full of 10,000 other sniffs. How lucky we are to be a part of it.
      Portia xx

  • aftelier says:

    What you wrote Portia is so vivid and personal and beautiful! I love that you entered my work with so much feeling and curiosity. This perfume, in particular, has a real mystery to it and you lit that up.
    Thank you so much!!!
    ?? Mandy

    • Portia says:

      MANDY! You are a freaking superstar. It’s so lovely to have you come comment. One day I’m coming to your museum and we can spend a happy moment just being in each others sphere.
      HUG HUG HUG
      Portia xx

  • alityke says:

    As with DSH the postal cost & customs mean I have not been able to discover Mandy’s work

  • MMKinPA says:

    Sounds gorgeous. Maybe I’ll order a sample (the bottle price is way beyond my perfume budget, sadly). I have never really been a signature scent person. Some of my favorites are way too much for certain seasons, and I have too many beloved ones to ever commit.

  • cinnamon says:

    I still yearn for a signature scent. Until around 20 years ago that’s what I had: serial signature scents. This sounds really intriguing. Love all the ancient associations.

    • Portia says:

      Really Cinnamon? I think about it but could never commit, unless I had to.
      What do you think a signature would be? Why would it be better?
      Portia xx

      • cinnamon says:

        I wore the same jewellery every day (except earrings changed) plus the same fragrance for years (the perfume would shift every once in a while, but I would wear the same thing for years). It felt like ‘me’. Then, something happened and I couldn’t find ‘the one’ — so I wore different things. And still do. But, I’m getting back into wearing the same jewellery each day bar earrings … and that feels good.

        • Portia says:

          OK, this I understand.
          Every day I wear one half of the set of diamond earrings that Jin proposed with, he wears the other. Mine have never left my ear since we married.
          So what is your everyday jewellery Cinnamon? Do you take it off to bathe or sleep?

  • Dina C. says:

    Sounds like an uplifting experience Portia. I’d be up for it!