I was a massive, MASSIVE fan of Narciso Rodriguez’s NARCISO, which launched way back in 2014. NARCISO was an expansive and abstract gardenia carried on a hurricane of musk, and it was beautiful, speaking in flesh tones of white, pink and grey. For 2016, NARCISO has been reimagined with a very on-trend injection of powder, mixing things up completely to create NARCISO Eau de Parfum Poudrée. What do I think of this new powdery wonder? Well, click here to head on over to Escentual to find out!
Every time I look at one of those masculine Carven bottles I smile. They really are the most handsome flacons housing mainstream masculine fragrances on the market today and the scents themselves, Carven Pour Homme and Vétiver, are a delight to sniff. Carven’s fragrances don’t follow trends, they do their own thing, whether that be the revival of a classic or an entirely new take on a well-versed ingredient. They may not be cutting edge, but they are not sheep either.
This year, Carven added a brand new masculine fragrance to their line up: ‘L’Eau Intense’, this time in a white bottle evocative of a masculine fashion staple. The scent was composed by Francis Kurkdjian (he who needs no introduction nowadays) and Jérôme Di Marino. It’s described as an “oxymoron” because it is “as refreshing as mint leaf-infused water, yet brimming with intensely spicy and woody notes”. So how does this olfactory oxymoron stand up to the sniff test? Let’s see…
As I sit and write this review I am sipping on a hot cup of Earl Grey. Why? Well, for a start I am British so it comes with the territory and secondly, I also like a brew when writing to help get those creative juices flowing, but the main reason is because we are hear to talk about tea, tea and more tea! So in keeping with our subject matter I am drinking my favourite beverage. It’s a hard life, isn’t it?
Jo Malone London also seems to be inspired by the world of tea because they’ve recently launched the ‘Rare Teas Collection’ – a series of fragrances that infuse “straight from the leaf into refined fragrances” teas that are “too precious to drink”. This is a different collection for Jo Malone London because, for the first time, it sees the fragrances packaged in an entirely new bottle, specifically a whopping 175ml column topped by a sumptuous round pebble. The teas this collection celebrates are “revered” and “refined”, and their presentation is most certainly in keeping with these themes.
Oolong Tea, the fragrance I was sent to review, focuses on a fermented version of the tea called ‘Fu Lian Oolong’ sourced just outside of Shanghai, China. Created by perfumer Serge Majoullier (the nose responsible for the entire collection), Oolong Tea is described as a “woody interpretation of tea, with a smoky inflection”, positioning the fragrances as something warmer, richer and a little bit darker than the usually ethereal and green takes on the note one is so used to seeing in modern perfumer. Colour me intrigued as I take another sip of Earl Grey.
As you may know, Nick Gilbert, my scented partner in crime and I run a perfumed Twitter project called ‘@Fragrantreviews’, in which we review fragrances in 140 characters or less. After a short hiatus, Fragrantreviews is back and in the first of a monthly round-up of posts, I bring you all of our reviews posted in April 2016! They range from the sublime to the disappointing, and all that’s in between!
To follow us on Twitter just click here.
Super Scent is back, again! As you may or may not know, the idea of this series is for Basenotes, Persolaise and I to pick a perfume house and list our top five (or a few more if the house has an extensive catalogue). We are not allowed to discuss or show each other our lists before we publish and we must pick fragrances currently available and in their most recent formulations. We encourage you to share your top fives too and it’s always fascinating to see both the similarities and differences in our lists. So please do join in!
So far we’ve looked at Lauder, debated about Dior and edited the catalogue of Etat Libre d’Orange to pick our favourites, which takes us up to today and our latest subject: Chanel. Chanel is the house responsible for popularising the link between fragrance and fashion, cementing themselves as not only one of the world’s greatest couturiers, but also placing themselves at the forefront of fragrance. They are an illustrious brand with a fascinating eye for detail and a never-ending thirst for quality. Let’s take a look at my top five!
I am honoured to have taken part in an interview with British fragrance retailer, The Perfume Shop, to see what’s on my perfume shelfie. As you can imagine, there are quite a few scents on my shelf, so we talked about six that are in regular rotation at the moment, including a couple of my all-time favourites. We also covered some of my favourite ingredients, and non-perfume smells, as well as what perfume I’d like to make for myself. Click here to head on over to The Perfume Shop’s blog to read the interview.
It’s spring, which means that it’s Aqua Allegoria season! I always enjoy Guerlain’s mini-line of simplistic, nature inspired fragrant ditties because they are easy breezy wears that are such fun in the summer. They showcase fruits and flowers in an intelligent and high quality manner but with a sense of style and fun. This year, the mainstream AA is Pera Granita – a sweet little daydream that feels more like a scoop of ice cold pear sorbet than it does a fragrance. Click here to head on over to Escentual to read my review in full.
The American state of North Carolina recently passed a disgusting bill that not only removes some of the legal protections provided for LGBT employees, but also stipulates that transgender people can only use the toilet facilities correspondent to the gender on their birth certificate. To most normal humans this seems utterly absurd. People are people, right? What harm can it cause if they want to live their life as the gender they feel they truly are? The answer is none, but this goes against the wider conditioning within society that states that men and women, and boys and girls, should behave, dress and love in particular ways. It’s that old trope that baby boys must wear blue and baby girls must wear pink and you know what? It’s bullshit.
But why are we so caught up on the idea of gender, and what makes the world so uncomfortable with people living outside the conventions of ‘male’ and ‘female’? Is it fear of the unknown? Fear of change? I’m not sure I can answer, but it’s certainly driven by both fear and a lack of knowledge, and understanding. In truth, we all know, deep down, that it doesn’t matter what gender a person is because there is beauty in what we perceive to be masculine and what we perceive to be feminine, so when these lines blur, we just see something equally as beautiful, different yes, but still wonderful.
I’m just going to come right and say that I am hugely impressed with the many offerings of The Perfume Society. Having read the many issues of The Scented Letter, attended two marvellous events (Tea With Turin and An Evening with Le Galion), played with their innately intelligent fragrance finder FR.ed and now, having received one of their Discovery Boxes, I feel as if they are quickly becoming one of the best fragrance resources, not only on the web, but in real life too.
So what are these Discovery Boxes I speak of? Well, I’m glad you asked. Essentially, The Perfume Society offer a monthly themed box of perfume samples, including new launches and not-so-new favourites, along with tasting notes and a generous helping of blotters to boot. The idea is to give you a themed collection of fragrances to sniff in your own home at your own leisure, providing you with the tools to really sink your teeth, or should I say nostrils, into some intriguing samples. Without spoiling too much of this review in advance (I know this is a habit of mine), I’d say that they succeed!
Sometimes I look at the present state of masculine perfumes in the mainstream and I let out a big sigh of despair. Many are reminiscent of Lynx-soaked (or Axe-soaked if you are a US reader) school changing rooms, often capturing the same fresh and sporty nature that has been done to death, and is as far from the high end as physically possible. The perfume loving men of the world, or just the perfume wearing gents of this good, green Earth deserve better than that, even if they don’t know it just yet!
Of course I am tarring everybody with the same brush here and for every two or three naff mainstream masculines there is one tremendous one, but these greats certainly aren’t in the majority. With this in mind, it’s always refreshing when a designer brand offers up a masculine fragrance that is elevated above the hoi polloi, and offers something unique, high quality and dare I say, beautiful. I mention all of this because Bottega Veneta’s latest masculine offering, Pour Homme Essence Aromatique is one such fragrance: a scent from the mainstream but leagues above it.
Created by perfumer, Amandine Marie (Mugler’s Angel Eau de Toilette), Essence Aromatique is technically a flanker to Bottega Veneta Pour Homme from 2013, joining their Essence Aromatique Pour Femme as a counterpart. It’s a strange hybrid of a fragrance, somewhere between a classic cologne and a modern fougère, playing with bracing freshness and supple softness to create something that is well, strikingly pretty for a masculine fragrance. Bottega Veneta state that Essence Aromatique PH exudes a “relaxed masculine elegance” describing it as an “unexpected take on a classic cologne”. That pretty much sums it up for me, but let’s take a closer look!
The Candy Perfume Boy 