Yes, this is a review, but — first — who’s going to Sniffa? Believe it or not, it looks like I’m going at the quasi-last-minute (Sniffa is Oct 17-18). Yay! My friend Sarah is going, and she wants some company. Are you going? I have some goals this time. Goal one is not to die of exhaustion at 8 pm. Goal two is not to strain my vocal chords and lose my voice for almost two weeks afterward. I know, I talk too much and too loud. This shocks you, yes?
Second — thanks everyone for all your fabulous comments last Wednesday on my Taking My Sweet Time post. I read them all, and responded to a bunch of them. They were so much fun to read! Now, on to my review:
I divide the Giorgio Armani fragrance line into three parts. There’s the Armani Prives, some of which I like more than others, but all of which I think are at least adequate. They smell like good taste and new money to me, and I want to line all those lovely stone-topped bottles up on my dresser in my (nonexistent) child-free, urban-hip, Zen-streamlined, fashion-forward Pacific-coastal house before getting back to perusing the latest images on The Sartorialist.
Next group has those Onde things, which I liked well enough but can’t remember any of the names of (great bottles, though) which – okay, I’ll take a set of those too, because they looked so good together, although I think I only craved one of them. I could keep those in the guest bedroom of my fantasy home.
The last group is All That Other Armani Stuff; here, let’s play a game … how many Armani fragrances can I name off the top of my head? I find them really unmemorable. Here we go: Code, Sensei, She/He, White… ? White Diamonds. Wait, or is that Elizabeth Taylor? City something. Okay, that’s it. I’m tapped out. They have several on the shelves of Sephora, and I don’t think I could pick them out of a lineup in terms of their smell. They’re all fine, as far as I can recall.
Comes along the new Armani Idole d’Armani, with notes of clementine, pear, ginger, davana, saffron, Egyptian jasmine, loukoum rose, patchouli, vetiver. I remember Angela doing a review recently at Now Smell This in which she was not thrilled (the pear was bothering her), but I often like pear notes, and I thought her description of the base as an “intriguing mix of snuffed-out beeswax taper with saffron, the barest breath of patchouli, and the hot smell of burnt wick” sounded pretty awesome.
And I am doing this review today because I found Idole awful, but interestingly awful. The kind of bad I don’t run across too often. Lola? Just another slutty mall frag. Michael Kors Hollywood? Eh. Another too-sweet hot mess of a gourmand, notable mainly for its ubiquity. But this. Giorgio, amico mio. I don’t know how much you paid those folks at IFF to come up with this, but I can honestly say: you definitely don’t smell something like this every day.
I put on a single squirt of Idole d’Armani in Ulta after taking the kids to a movie (and thank God it was on the way home, not beforehand.) In the best scrubber tradition, its sillage is astonishing. Both girls begged and screamed until I hung my hand out the window on the way home. No, really. And it’s not like they’re unfamiliar with being trapped in a car with me wearing something vicious, like freshly applied Poison. Or Bal a Versailles. I am not sure what’s in that innocuous looking bottle, but you better fall to your knees and pray right now that this thing doesn’t catch on big as an office scent. Just sayin.’ I just reread Angela’s review preparing this one, and I ran across the line, “I´ve been wearing Idole off and on for two weeks now…” GIRL. STOP THE MADNESS. THAT STUFF WILL KILL YOU. GO PUT ON A NICE ALDEHYDE AND PURGE YOUR SOUL OF EVIL.
Ah — dove e il Signore Yuck? It’s hard to find the right words to describe Idole d’Armani, but I’m going to try. It is very, very sweet, but big. Molto something. So, think structure. Like an enormous bouffant. Or scaffolding. Maybe with a noose dangling from the top of it. Go ahead, hang yourself. You know you want to. There is pear, but not just pear. There’s also the Clementine and a whiff of something so wildly rank that at first I thought it was the fact that we were walking past the dumpsters. Kind of a combo of indole and rotting garbage, in the underground garage — you know that smell. Again, interesting, but hence the hanging of the hand out the window.
And no, I don’t mean this as some heinous, witchy rag. I actually want you to smell this, preferably on your own skin, and let me know whether this takes you to a new, strange, disturbing place you’re not sure you want to go, like that feeling I get sometimes watching a creepier part of a Fellini movie, maybe a scene with clowns and midgets and insane laughter. I am having trouble thinking what person might find this attractive. I didn’t scrub it because I was curious whether it would evolve into anything less offputting. Even the drydown six hours later, with a base that (yes) is pretty and reminds me a little of CdG 88 8, has that sugary-sweet overlay of goo still clinging to it like Swamp Thing.
Go on. I dare you. Anyone else tried this yet?
Wow, how shocking. I loved the way idole darmani smelled, then I again I only smelled it on paper. I really wanted to buy it,but now I’m truly frightened,lol. It is so true how a perfume can smellone way on paper and totally different on the skin. Maybe I’ll just grab a sample and try it for a day. Wish me luck!
I did try this one as on a card I was given by the sales lady, it smelled rather lovely. Floral and sweet. Light enough to be worn at the office and substantial enough to be worn in winter.
So I went back and sprayed on my skin and … nothing. Not a whiff wafted up to my nose, only when I had my nose pressed to my wrist and took a huge breath did I catch a whisper of the lovely sweet floral I had smelled on the card.
Then 2 or 3 hours later – boom! It hit me in the face and it was NOT nice. Sickly sweet and cloying. I don’t know what patchouli smells like on its own but I’m thinking that it had arrived and wanted to make its presence known. Yuck and not for me.
That is so funny. Opinions are all over the place on this one. You couldn’t smell it?!? My goodness!!! 😮
I am amazed, btw, at how different a fragrance can register on the skin as opposed to paper.
I’m usually not a perfume person, i’m a lotion person…but my daughter had me smell this the other day and I was not only amazed at how light and easy the fragrance was, but also at how it makes a point to stand out. I love the warm smell and how it lingers but not in a sickening way. I was sticking to scented lotions before, but now that i’ve found this…I am going to keep wearing it. I’ve gotten countless compliments on it over the last few days.
See Erin’s comment right above yours. Clearly there are people this works great on, and I’m glad you’ve found a perfume that makes you happy, which at the end of the day is what we’re all looking for.
I’m kinda shocked at some of the bad reviews….I smelled this in a magazine the other day and went nuts for it. Then the other day my friend and I were in the mall together and she smelled a scent and went nuts over it, before even seeing it I said “oh I bet it’s that Idole D’armani stuff, I guarantee it”….and sure enough, that’s what it was. I think it’s a very well rounded smell…. all the notes mesh very well together to create a warm, sophisticated, expensive…..yet not overly serious or pungent smell. I did not think it was “citrusy” at all….infact, if it was I would of rolled my eyes, because i’m sort of sick of smelling citrusy things. It seems like every new perfume that comes out is either citrusy or has that real generic overly sweet smell. Idole D’armani to me was the complete opposite…it smelled exactly the way I would of hoped it would smell…and that’s kind of rare it seems lately. I definitely will be buying a bottle…not only because I went crazy for it, but becaues it also smells like one of those warm, lingering scents that only a dab of would drive a guy crazy. I’m wondering if maybe you all thought that because it was a bad bottle or if perhaps it needed to die down a bit before the true essence of it emerged? Some perfumes smell totally different from the time you spray them on to to time they die down and begin to mesh with your own scent. I believe those of you who didn’t like it…that you honestly didn’t like it…but for those of you who haven’t smelled it yet, take the time to smell it for yourself and see what you think. You may be pleasantly surprised like I was. Thanks for reading, and for all of you fellow perfume lovers….have a wonderful weekend!!:)
Erin, first of all, thanks for having the courage to get on here and disagree with me. Seriously. It’s not like I am the Queen… all I can think of is that (collectively) people who’ve smelled it seem to have two very different reactions. They get the kind of garbage-y note I do, or they don’t. Now, I have spent a LOT of time sniffing fragrances with a bunch of folks together, trying everything on different skin, and it is clear to all of us that different people bring out different things in a fragrance. I think people who say no such thing as skin chemistry are nuts. Anyway, maybe I’ve got the stink-making skin, and you’ve got the perfect skin for Idole. The important thing is that you’ve found something that makes you happy. :)>-
Hey March, I completely agree about skin chemistry. I’ve smelled perfumes that I thought smelled great on other people but didn’t like them on me, and the other way around. I even knew one co worker who would wear a certain pefume that would make me nauscious and I always thought I didn’t like the perfume….then one of my friends started wearing it and I even had to ask her what it was because it smelled so good. It’s probably exactly what you said regarding Idole…just different skin chemistries. I also think that some of us might have the ability to detect a note in a perfume that someone else might not pick up on. So your nose may be smelling something I’m not able to detect. On sidenote, I’m glad to have found this site, i’ll check back off and on for perfume reviews, you guys talk my kinda talk! I thought I was alone in being so into perfumes and analyzing them….now I know there are others like me! 🙂
Yes, I’ve tried it. No clowns; no midgets; and the laughter (maybe not insane, though that’s more for you to say) comes because – are you ready for this? – I smell NOTHING. Well, OK, not quite nothing, but almost. I put on several hefty squirts bcs the card smelled quite nice (yeah, I know you’re shaking your head already and calling the guys in white coats). To begin with, it smelled quite nice on my skin, too – the usual Armani-mainstream sort of vibe such as I get in Sensi + Sensi White Notes (both of which I love, btw); then – nothing. Nothingnothingnothing. I asked the SA to smell my arm – it’s amazing how many looked shocked if you do this, as if you’d suggested their sticking their nose into your pits instead of on a bit of perfectly decent limb far from your torso – and she said, “Huh. I can’t smell anything. Are you sure it’s the right arm?” So I gave her the other, and – nothing. OK, I have fume eating skin, but this is ridiculous.
FWIW, I only quite liked a couple of the Privés but, since I keep bottles hidden – and although I love your imagined living quarters – it just wouldn’t be worth it for me. The Ondes – meh. I really quite dislike Code + its iterations, along with Mania old + new; and I don’t much like the original She – BUT White Red (daft name, I know) is really lovely on me, though I do say so myself. Have you read V’s review? Here:
http://boisdejasmin.typepad.com/_/2006/06/emporio_armani_.html
I managed to snag myself a bottle last year in TJM, and another, larger one in Ross a few weeks ago, for $7 – no box, a bit bashed up. Yay me! But now I’ve discovered Eau de Lalique, which is very similar on me – and I got a beeg bottle of that at an outlet mall 3 days ago.
:0D
Btw, I mis-read one of your sentences: I thought you said “scaffolding with a nose dangling from the top of it”. Well, it IS a perfume review, so “nose” wouldn’t be too out of place – right? OK, I see the white coats approaching…
OK, I am not even going to try Idole, and I can’t be at Sniffa. What is most amazing to me is that I took just two seconds away from writing the book proposal to peek at March’s review and spent a LOT of time reading every damn word of every damn comment and laughed till tears ran down my face. You are all wonderful, loyal, delightful souls, and March, if you don’t write a book, I will leave spritzes of Idole in the trunk of your car to haunt you.
Patty,
I smelled it and just about threw up too!! It does smell like rotting garbage. I can’t stand it. Almost as bad as Cher’s perfume . Both are absolutely revolting!! Disgusting. They should fire the people who made this and they should never ever work in the perfume industry again.
So you got garbage too! Any number of people did… wonder what that is.
I am so glad I was a day brightener, and thanks for coming by to read my nonsense. 🙂
Terribly late in this but just about died of laughing!!! LOL 😀
Poor kids. The things they put up with.
It did look like it was going to be something unremarkable or miasmatic even, from the original press release, to the quotes of Signore Yuck (ROTF) on WWD, right to the beige monochromes of the model chosen who is so perfectly pretty one could cut cookies with her bone structure! There’s a reason I blog on visuals on things I know I will be bound to hate. 🙂
I’m glad I gave you a giggle. I do find it curious that the responses were clearly divided in terms of people getting a generic fruitchouli nothing and people who got what I got — a weird garbage note.
Wow! What a review! I sampled this a few times using some reluctant female guinea pigs (mother-in-law and a co-worker) and we all agreed it was too sweet, a bit linear and overall cheap smelling (smelled like something Paris Hilton would release) but strangely enough no garbage or Mr. Poo Poo was detected by us or five or six others who smelt this. In fact while reading your review I felt like I was reading about a completely different fragrance to what I had sampled. Curious to know whether it’s possible that some batches are faulty/badly blended/have higher concentrations of certain ingredients that would explain this.
Also the sillage on the idole we sampled was nowhere near as strong or intrusive as what you experienced. We actually had to put our noses directly on the skin to get an idea of the smell. Very weird.
I do find the varied responses interesting. Some people got what you got, and some people got what I got. Not sure why!
Well, I was accosted in Lord & Taylor by an SA and hadn’t yet heard of the Idole. I asked him to spray the back of my hand, but he managed to—with a grand, flourishy arm sweep—very lightly dust half my arm. It was so dispersed, perhaps, that I got the fruitchouli effect. It didn’t seem much worse than many other department store scents, but I enjoyed your take anyway!
I will be at Sniffa on Saturday: my first. I am preparing myself to be overwhelmed. Y’all will have to tell me how fabulous the breakfast was, as I didn’t get in.
Eh, I won’t be at the breakfast either. 😉
oh I’m so excited i actually have a sample of this from my last trip to Macy’s. I usually don’t have have whatever new perfume you are reviewing, so I can’t actually smell it and compare. But, I ‘m going to bed in less than one hour, and I don’t dare put it on my skin, because I won’t be able to sleep if my nose is in sensory overload. do I dare wear a small amount of it to work tomorrow?
Well…. gah, don’t ask me that!! Because of course I’ll say SURE WEAR IT TO WORK, but only because I don’t work in your office… 🙂
I wish I was going to the sniffa, but sadly not..
I’d be double mad if you were going & I was gonna miss meeting you. So er, sorry you’re bummed but glad to hear it. Sorta.
Yes, come back east one of these times!
no, but i will. sounds very much like what chloe narcisse did to me years back! rotting vegetation and fruits on skin.
and, talking about scents you hope don’t catch on at the office: el sensuous. gaggariffick.
Really? EL? That’s so funny, I can barely smell it.
Sensuous, on me, smells exactly like wood varnish with some vanilla in it, and sawdust. It’s horrific. And I spritzed enthusiastically, because I was expecting it to be great, and then I had to walk out of Nordstrom with my left arm held away from me, so I wouldn’t have to smell it more than I had to.
I showered. It still lingered. Oh, it was a nightmare.
a nightmare. yes, that is sensuous! i have a coworker who wears far too much, and i choke and have to move away any time she comes near.
Laughing myself silly over the review–dangit. The bottle is attractive, and I kind of liked the idea of it…saffron and pear and all.
Well, I’ll give it a whiff when I get to Nordstrom next.
I thought the notes sounded great. I mean, they DO sound great. Just not the result. Please try it though.
Hmmm, I got a sample from Sephora and while I didn’t much like it, I didn’t think it was horrifying. The pear is very synthetic and the overall composition is too sweet for my tastes, like pear bubble gum with a vanilla-patchouli base, but I didn’t get any poop or dumpster from it!
Just another fruitchouli… I think, alas, it will probably do well… unless everyone gets the same impression as March!
The comments above from folks who’ve tried it seem pretty evenly split between fruitchouli and the folks who got the same rank smell I did. I still can’t sort out what that smell was … and I LIKE indolic jasmine, it wasn’t quite that.
Wear your good jewelry, ‘kay? 🙂
Whoops, that was meant for Musette, sitting majestically atop the hopper…
I was kinda enjoying figuring out which comment that went with.
Interesting. I only tried a dab from a vial and it did not impress me much in either direction. Sounds like I need to give it a good spray or 2.
Robin, I think it will take four or five sprays to reeeally assess it. 😉
I was rooked into trying Idole d’Armani (only on a strip of paper, mind you) because it has the same name as the other Idole. After my initial nose crinkle, here’s the only thought I was able to form before pitching the strip: Wait, this is by Armani? Since when do they contract out to Etat Libre d’Orange?
I would love to go to Sniffa, but my October is consistently booked solid. Will have to try some other event that’s not taking place during the busiest time of the year.
So interesting. Several people got the stinky bits… it didn’t strike me precisely as jasmine, I wonder what else it could have been? Some nose-combination trick?
Maybe there was some skunky vetiver that imparted the sweaty ‘jus au dumpster’ accord? I also didn’t think it was the jasmine, but I did not ponder it long enough to give an eddycated opinion.
Interesting. I love the smell of stables and barns (and love Bal A Versailles). Hate to hear that the smell of honest manure has been ruined!
I have tried this – and hated it, vehemently. A kind assistant gave me a sample and I excitedly doused myself with it and then had to wash it off (not very successfully). I threw it away, which is unusual ‘cos I normally give unwanted phials to my husband to wear (he has gone to work wearing various female fragrances such as Ormonde Jayne). But I could not bear to have this in the house, let alone let my husband near me if he were to wear it! I think I have now wiped the memory of its notes from my brain, and was so chuffed and amused to read your review.
Mm. Overall, reading these comments, I would say it is NOT just me. And I hear you on the samples – I could count on one hand the number of things I have thrown away, I usually file the ones I hate too.
Thanks for the great kick-start to my day! Love the vision of your Idole-wafting hand hanging outside the window. I’m afraid my own experience with Idole at my local Shoppers Drug Mart was comparatively unremarkable. Like carmencanada — hello! — I got some mainstream fruitchouli and that’s about it — a spritz-and-forget kind of a thing.
Vancouver’s a lonnnnnnnng way from Sniffa, but I’ll be there in spirit.
I too am going to Sniffa. This is my first time and I can’t wait! I signed up for Saturday and now I am thinking I should just do both (I have to convince my husband that two full days with the kids is FUN!!). Saturday looks both amazing and exhausting!! I can’t wait for the BG breakfast or being able to meet Josie Natori!! WOW.
As for the review…thanks March it made my morning which began with my car not starting…which is a real drag when you are trying to get kids to school and catch a commuter train to work!!! UGH!!! At least I have the Sniffa to look forward to. I am not looking forward to the mechanic’s bill though.
I know, I know!! Unfortunately I’m probably only doing Saturday, I too have a short leash 🙂 but I know people have a great time on Sunday. Can’t wait to see you.
I am up to my ears in a rush project (involving a 30′ container loader), El O’s car battery died in the middle of a cornfield @ 6am, ourrefrigerator just took a poop (and no, not a citrusy poop, alas)….and I thought it was going to be just a hellish day.
And then I read this hysterical review -and the equally funny comments…
…and all is right with the world (and my refrigerator guy is here – Small Town Livin’ at its finest)
xoxo >-)
oh my goodness is today the day you move the hopper? Eeeeek!
I guess that today would not be the day to ask her to post a picture of her fridge on Facebook.
No, it’s tomorrow. Today is jammed with all the stuff that doesn’t look like much – making the stairs, etc – but it all takes time. This will be a looooooonnnnng day. And I suspect the guys are flat-out sick of pizza. I know I am.
Sometime tomorrow I’m going to lash together 50 buff, oiled strongmen and have them pull this 3000-lb hopper/cart across the road to the plant, while I sit atop like Cleopatra (with a whip) and El O does that rowers’ drum thing…what a FAB entrance, hey?!
xoxoxo your delusional >-)
Now that would be worth shooting on film. 😉 🙂
YOU GO, GIRL. WEAR MITSY.
Heading for La Guardia now…
Wow. Just wow. No, I don’t need to try this on my own skin, not after that sort of sacrifice. You smelled dreadful, btw. Did it come off?
Well, that was funny. You know how I hold onto scents forever. So it lasted the rest of the evening, but was totally gone the next morning. I did have to wash the sweater I was wearing, though.
March! I’m so glad I’m not alone. If they could have scrubbed off that awful fruity tidal wave up top, they might have had something. Yuck!
A horror, but perhaps a masterpiece in horror. Shocking really, because it’s Armani and mall and you expect to be blase-d to death (and how many times have you died this particular death?) and instead you find yourself in full panic mode, shot through with adrenaline, running (as noted above) for your life.
The drydown of this (I did keep a scent strip of it) reminded me a bit of Geoffrey Beene Red, or what I seem to recall Geoffrey Beene Red smelled like, but with candy stuck in its mossy, hairy roots.
Yet, it is important to note that the visceral experience, translated here into a coil of repulsion, is something that becomes less and less frequent the more one ventures into the outer reaches of the SniffDome. Therefore, we owe the nose a huge debt of thanks for letting us feel…something.
Suzanna – I too have been bored to death of recent (recent? who am I kidding…..we’re talking YEARS) “mall” fragrances, so your comment really rang true…….except I would hate to think that we are all so jaded that we welcome the bad just because it’s not bland. Hmmmmm…..
I guess I’m just twisted that way. I perversely enjoy things I really hate, it’s like a shock to the system. But I’m an equal opportunity hater, and I acknowledge loving some things lots of people loathe.
I’m that way with a lot of things, too, but I draw the line when it’s clinging tenaciously to my person.
Honestly, I picked the bottle up twice, not really believing I had the right scent. I felt like I’d been pranked.
–chuckle … chortle —
What’s that you say? Ha! I’ve learned. Trouble enough when you hold out your arm and say “here, smell this.” Now you say “Go forth and smell that”? What do I look like I have written on my forehead? (Don’t answer that.)
But then Sophie speaks up, and the world has its yin and its yang. I think I shall choose to be the curvy line today, and rest comfortably between your dark and her light…off to ingest, not expectorate, my tea. 😉
Hey, you all know the things I wear that do not delight throngs of people. Yin and yang indeed.
Yin and Yatagan.
Hahahahaha!
HAHAHAHA this is incredible. Best. Review. Ever.
AND I am wearing CdG 888 today so… MUST TRY. I want to try this heinous thing! 🙂
Yeah … don’t put it on before work 🙂
Too funny! Like Frenchie, I think that I’ll try it too, just to satisfy my curiousity. Or to join you in your pain. Maybe just a drop on my finger.
Something compels me to try these nuclear scrubbers every so often. After reading Octavian’s review of Daphne by Daphne Guinness, I ordered a sample. (His eventual verdict? “This is not a perfume but a repellent spray for style.”) After dabbing a teensy drop on paper, I know that I need to do a skin test an hour before taking a long, hot shower!
Wow, incredible! Did you throw it away? Can I try it next time I see you?
I think its sitting on my dresser, waiting to mug me. Yes, I’ll save it for our sniffing spree.
Oooh, report back, please as I have that on my Luckyscent wishlist to sample and I’d am looking to whittle it down because I’m up to, like, $500 worth of samps at this point and really need to cut. I hope you hate it.
*I’d am*? Great, now it’s not just the addition of an apostrophe to *its*, but the random apostrofication of the entire English language. Somehow I knew that sooner or later it would come to this…
sorry, it’s ‘orrore’. My italian is getting rusty.
Hah. It’s not like *I* speak it. I got my translation from google, it’s probably wrong.
Oh no, it sounds horrible. (Terribile! Disgustoso! Madonna mia che horrore!)
But I’ll have to try it, curiosity is killing me LOL
that was adressed to rappleyea…sorry
gives ” through the nose ” a whole new meaning…
I’ll pass on the Armani , but I will be at Sniffa and it will be fun to see you and everyone else . I will be providing samples of the Claudie Pierlot trio of ” eau’s ” at the luncheon .
See you there !
Hey, can’t wait to see you!
I realized while reading this post this morning, that I really don’t read The Posse to find out about perfume, as much as to start my day with a good laugh, and on *really* good days (like today) to spew my tea all over the place! Thanks for a great laugh. 😀
You’re welcome. Mr. Yuck has gotten a workout recently.
I tried it on Saturday and my only impression of it was…..goodness it just doesn’t let go. I wasn’t particularly bothered by it…..it seems sort of nice at times….but it just did not know when to quit. The next day I couldn’t remember if I liked it or not. I just knew I didn’t want to smell like it again for a little while.
So you didn’t like it? 🙂
Now I know what to wear next time I see you…
Have Blast at Sniffa!
Muwahaha. And I hope to see you soon.
Aaagh! Apologies for typo above…..
Thsnk you for a screamingly funny piece! I am definitely frightened to sniff this horror. Whatever is going on with these new releases? Sorry, but it all just drives me back to my vintage Guerlains where I can be in a permanently happy place.
I was planning an expedition from London to the NY Sniffa but unfortunately real life intervened, in the shape of very expensive dental bills coming up. Ah well. Hope you enjoy yourself!
I hate real life intervening! And I never notice the typos. Seriously. I’m one of those people who scan-read the jumbled paragraphs and grasp it all.
Citrus poop and old nasty garage? How did that one sneak by the focus groups?? So far, the only Armani I’ve ever really liked is the Bois d’Encens, that’s just mind-expandingly good incense. Otherwise, they’ve been MEH to YEECH for me.
The BdE is one of the ones I have a bottle of; it’s actually the first one I bought, and I remember at the time cringing at the price. Those were the days, eh?
March – I tried it on the weekend and boy – sillage from here to the moon!!! I waited and waited AND WAITED for somthing good to happen, only a migraine. No wonder Luca couldn’t be bothered anymore. With frags like this – why would you bother. I kept thinking what is the point of this. Anyway, apologies to Sophia and anyone else who does like it. I guess that is the mystery of fragrance. I um. . . happen to like Angel so there you go. . . . am ducking for cover.
Well, there you go, you Angel-lover. And hey, you know I like all sorts of terrible things — I already admitted to Poison up there. 🙂
I only smelled Idole on a paper strip, thought “not nice”, and “uh-oh, here comes fruitchouli again”, and dumped the strip. That’s the extent on my experience. The other Armanis have never been on my radar for some reason, not even the aspirational ones.
And snatching Lubin’s name: booooooooo. I hope they paid Gilles Thévenin for this (Lubin’s CEO).
I was expecting fruitchouli; it sounds like a few others on here got the ginormous miasma I did. And there’s only one Idole…
I have out-of-town guests coming the weekend of Sniffa, but I’m hoping that I can perhaps pop my head into Aedes on Sunday evening just to say hi to you guys. That is if I’m not permanently crippled from climbing all the way up to the crown on the Statue of Liberty, or something equally unthinkable but probably inevitable. Why, Lord, whyyyyy? The only sightseeing situation I can picture myself in that might be worse (friends and relative are all well aware that shopping for fake bags on Canal and anything at all involving a trip to Times Square is O-U-T) would be trudging through the lady in the harbour’s bowels reeking of Idole d’Armani.
Unfortunately I’ll be on my way home Sunday evening, I’ve only been given a reprieve until then. 🙂
And I’m familiar with the tourist thing, living outside Washington. I try to send them on their own, but it’s not always practical. I was hoping to meet you!
Everyone’s afraid to be left to fend for themselves in New York, or they just take it for granted that you have nothing better to do and are dying to show them the town. I usually try to stick them on a hop-on, hop-off tour bus for a day, or a Circle Line boat, but these particular guests happen to be age 5, 7 and 11, so even though I’m tempted…
Rats! Maybe I can sneek away at some other point during the weekend so as not to miss you!
Well… will point out that BG and all other places we are going are PUBLIC PLACES. I’ll be around Sat. nite and sunday until mid afternoon.
Yes, and thanks. That helpful little detail will obviously make it so much easier to swing in the event that I am able to extricate myself from the kiddies for a spell 🙂
What a drag that we now have to bother to distinguish which Idole we are talking about: Lubin (yaaaaaay) and Armani (not yaaaaay).
I’d be curious to see what sparked such strong reactions in your children as well as il signor Yuck, but after my instant migraine experience the other day, I think I’d try a cautious spritz on paper rather than my own skin.
Oooh, now I’m really tempted to go to Sniffa….but I hate to miss October weekends in CT.
Come! Come! 🙂 And there’s only one Idole… and this isn’t it.
I think I just threw up in my mouth. I will heed your warning. All you had to say was ‘underground garage garbage smell’…
March, I am not intrepid, I can’t bravely spritz the way you do. I am too timid, to fragile a sniffer. Thank you for taking one for the team but I’m sorry, I can’t do it.
And. I’m jealous, jealous, jealous that you will be at Sniffa. So tonight I am both cowardly AND jealous. Very attractive, no? I can’t go this time, I’m booked to travel. They never release the d*mn dates in time for me to set the weekend aside. Grr. How on earth do people book airfare (which as we all know you need to do 6 wks in advance to catch the best rates)? Yes, I’m cowardly, jealous & now grumpy too that Sniffa doesn’t allow me planning time.
And with that, off to bed.
you just need to reserve the middle of October !!
Bah, I wish I could! But I never have weeks in a row when I can make the weekends all off limits until immediately prior. So I just schedule my life & hope I’ll be free. This time it didn’t work 🙁
Phooey!! I was hoping to see you again. 🙁
My Idole experience: I spritzed a ribbon, took a deep inhale, then immediately dropped it and ran from the dept store. I didn’t have the fragrance knowledge (or the bravery) to determine anything more than it smelled like very strong, citrusy poop and I was afraid of it. My immediate reaction was to run and run I did. Thank you March, for having the courage to dive deeper.
“Strong, citrusy poop”! It’s official: Speaking as a rural-living person who has to drive 20 miles to sniff even something as mainstream as Daisy, I do not need to seek this out.
especially when you could just throw some Lemon Sugar or MJ Lemon on some horse poop and probably get the same thing as this! LOL!
At least that’s how I would do it – got the horse poop, got the lemon…I’m good to go! Maybe I’ll get a samp and do a side-by-side comparison.
xo >-)
Well, I have cows instead of horses… and honestly, I’ve smelled worse things than manure from cows that eat grass and hay. It’s actually got quite a grassy note (well, duh). I was smelling Soiled Diaper + Lemon Pledge in my head at “citrus poop.”
Side note: Worst Farm Smell Ever is burnt hydraulic fluid + dead bull, as in the day we nearly burnt out a tractor motor pulling a 2-days-dead bull out of the creek. Ohhhh, there have been days… but let’s agree not to go there.
Citrusy poop. Maybe they’ll hire us to do their PR.
Well, March–it seems I’m going to have to try this. Bigger than Bal de Versailles. Bigger than Poison, etc.? Maybe I’ll try it on my ankle, just to make sure, and make certain I have thick socks that day.
I’m going! I’m going to Sniffa. (Ummm…I’m excited…) I’ll be in NYC the whole week before, so I hope I’ll get through enough sampling before the big event that I won’t die from overload. I’m most excited by the idea of presentations and the parfumeurs talking. I hope it all lives up to my imagination.
I wonder if I’ll fall passionately in love with something new.
Ah, I feel like a teenager.
Well, I own about perfumes. Daisy, Dune, Princess and now Idole. I rarely buy perfume.. Daisy and Dune were gifts. I was at Macy’s got spritzed with Michael Kors new fragrance and had to wipe it off.
I saw another lady coming towards me and ducked. I asked about USl Parisian, got a sample, too light.
Then she offered the sample of Idole. I wasn’t even needing perfume, just got Princess by Wang a couple of weeks ago.
I usually wear perfume once a week. Yes it is sweet but in an earthy languid way. I love it.
It smelled sexy and sophisticated. So yes some people actually do like it. C’est la vie.
Well, good for you for commenting, Sophia. We’re a lively bunch here and I make no pretenses at wearing only things “everyone” else loves. After all, there’s no such thing! So if you’re happy I’m happy for you.
I know, it’s going to be great!! And it’s fun feeling like a teenager, as long as I don’t have to live the life…