Strange Invisible Perfumes Magazine Street (discontinued)

Happy June. We’ve been having lovely weather. Not to hot. Very humid and pollen-y though. Loads of things bursting into bloom (my peonies look white this year rather than pink). The new rose is working on blooming (the two older ones already have masses of flowers). The younger jasmine still doesn’t know what to do with itself. On my evening walk, I had noticed an area of around 6 feet by 12 feet where the air smells incredible. It wasn’t roses. I peaked into someone’s front garden to see if they had anything (only roses) and finally I noticed the Mock Orange hiding in the hedge row. Glorious.

I had my delayed eye exam last week. Took the train rather than driving so as not to jinx myself by missing the appointment again (and garnering the wrath of the optician). All good. I had been concerned that my eyes seemed not to be working well together. Lo and behold, the left eye had decided to rather drastically improve while the right one pretty much stayed the same.

I need new glasses. This always pleases me because I get bored with my frames relatively quickly unless I’ve done a really good job of picking. That doesn’t happen often because I have a relatively smaller head and a roundish face. I’d say 50% of the time I’ve ended up with child-marketed frames.

I only found one pair of frames I like this time. So, the woman who helps out with that took them and said she would do some searching to see if she could order in a few more things for me to try on. We’ll see in a week if she’s gotten anywhere. If not, I’ll just have her use the pair I picked out.

So, onward. Based on comments on Tom’s gardenia post last week I went hunting for the one Strange Invisible Perfume fragrance I own (ie, some commenters referenced SIP’s gardenia fragrances). Which has turned out to be perfect for our current weather.

Not gardenia. Rather, magnolia.

I had written about this in 2020 – probably fairly soon after I found it at a reasonable discount because the shop that stocked it was offloading the brand.

My post from back then isn’t worth linking here.

Anyway, in 2020 my house was being refurbed and I was living in a different village. One which had a huge, glorious magnolia grandiflora I’d visit on my daily Covid walks.

This is the type of magnolia with dinner-plate-sized flowers.

My Magazine Street juice is far better now, with almost five unbothered years in its bottle. That wasn’t on purpose. I just forgot about it.

Notes include magnolia, vanilla, patchouli, musk and maybe vetiver. This appears to be long discontinued. Which is too bad – and makes me glad for my bottle picked up in the fire sale.

On me, this starts green-sour. Green fragrances don’t generally work on me but this does.

It’s got a bit of gentle fizz going, like a very understated aldehyde. And once that top recedes I get a carnivorous floral for most of the ride. There’s something meaty in there but the body is a gingery big white flower.

I don’t mind the meaty – it’s not overwhelming and it does go a long with the huge blooms of magnolia grandiflora.

The drydown loses the meaty aspect and is soft slightly fizzy white floral with a tinge of fresh green. Maybe the vetiver now? It is really a perfect end of spring into summer fragrance.

My only grump is this isn’t that long-lasting on me (4-5 hours), but that can be remedied by respraying. It is a ‘natural’, after all.

The SIP stock seems to have fallen in price in the past few years. My bottle in 2020 cost £115 and I was ok with spending that for 50ml of juice.

I have this sense that this will improve further with time. So, I’ll store it carefully.

Is this in anyone’s collection? Other SIPs you love and recommend?

Pics: Wiki and mine