The Body Shop have launched ‘Fijian Water Lotus’, the latest fragrance in their bestselling Voyage Fragrance Collection. Inspired by a tropical paradise, the perfume is described as being “a fresh, vibrant fragrance”, Fijian Water Lotus is made with natural extract of hand-picked Fijian Water Lotus and 100% Fair Trade alcohol from Ecuador, and is created to be a “signature scent for summer.” They’ve certainly picked the right weather for such a sunny launch!
“Sun, sea, sand, palm trees… Sounds idyllic, right?Well, now you can escape to your own tropical paradise with the lush, exotic scent of the NEW Fijian Water Lotus range from The Body Shop. […] Revitalising, refreshing and calming – this is bliss in a bottle.”
Way back in July of 2011 I made the decision to create an outlet for my fragrant musings. I picked a ridiculous name, asked my friend, Liam Moore (of ODOU fame) to apply some wonderful candy striping to a webpage and put fingers to keyboard for my very first, feature length review. This first post was a review of Guerlain’s Shalimar Parfum Initial, a perfume that had just been recently launched and had surprised me and many a perfume lover. How we’ve all come a long way since then!
Now it’s 2014, a mere three years later and what started out as a hobby has quickly become a huge part of my life. A lot has happened since that first post; I’ve got married, held two perfume talks for Perfume Lovers London, become the Fragrance Expert for popular perfume e-tailer, Escentual, posted 478 times and won a coveted Jasmine Award. Not to mention the fact that the blog has even been visited over a million times! Of course, this is all so much more than I ever could have expected and I am so thankful to everyone who has supported me in this endeavour – from my husband to my beloved readers. You all know who you are!
To celebrate this milestone, I have teamed up with my friends at Escentual to offer a very special giveaway. The prize is one of my all-time favourite perfumes – a fragrance that I have continuously banged on about on this blog on way too many occasions. In fact, it’s a perfume that I adore so much, I may, or may not own an entire litre of the stuff. Have you which olfactory diva I’m referring to yet?
Beware of Angels – The New Print Campaign for Thierry Mugler’s Angel Starring Georgia May Jagger
“My mother was a muse of Mugler and appeared regularly in his Paris runway shows. I have such wonderful memories of the fragrance and my mother’s involvement with the Mugler brand, It’s very special to me to be following in my mother’s footsteps.”
– Georgia May Jagger
So I may be the very last person to share this news, but as a die-hard Mugler fan I couldn’t ignore the extra-terrestrial fragrance house’s brand spanking new ad campaign for their flagship fragrance, Angel, starring none other than model, Georgia May Jagger. Now the astute among you will note that there is a strong family link between Miss Jagger and Angel, and that is the fact that her Glamazon mother, Jerry Hall starred as the face of Mugler’s flagship perfume in the early ’90s.
For 2014’s campaign, Mugler are moving away from the seductive and sultry image of Eva Mendes to a more rebellious and rocky aesthetic with Georgia May. They have seen fit to resurrect the old (and fabulous) tagline “beware of angels” (another nod to Jerry Hall) almost as a warning for unsuspecting consumers – this is a serious perfume that will knock one’s socks off, after all. I think it’s all rather fabulous.
Below the jump you can find a behind the scenes video of the new campaign as well as Jerry Hall’s original advert from 1993.
Gigi Hadid for Tom Ford Velvet Orchid [Photographed by Mario Sorrenti]Tom Ford’s Signature Collection houses a vast array of bold, wearable fragrances that are of exceptional high quality, but are also entirely more accessible than those within his Private Blend collection. They are statement pieces, right from the oriental opulence of Sahara Noir to the casual elegance of Violet Blonde, and as with all things ‘Tom Ford’ they exude a richness that is very much in keeping with the brand’s luxurious and contemporary-classic aesthetic.
Perhaps the most iconic fragrance within M. Ford’s oeuvre is the dramatic Black Orchid (released in 2006) – the brand’s first and most daring outing. With this perfume, Tom Ford sent a strong message, shouting that he wasn’t going to approach the world of fragrance in a typical or boring way, he was going to create divisive perfumes that make their presence know and celebrate all that is fashionable and glamorous. And that, my friends, is what the man has done ever since.
For 2014, Tom Ford has worked with perfumers Yann Vasnier, Antoine Maisondieu, Calice Asancheyev-Becker and Shyamala Maisondieu (a practical dream team of noses, if you ask me), to create a new riff on his incredibly successful debut perfume. Housed within a royal purple flacon and bestowed with the name ‘Velvet Orchid‘, this perfume is seen as an evolution of the legendary Black Orchid and is promoted by the brand as a new signature fragrance within Ford’s wonderful Signature Collection.
“Velvet Orchid lives in a glamorous world of mystique, evolving the carnal grandeur and seductive power of Tom Ford’s original Black Orchid into a harmonious an uber-feminine fragrance. Lavished with cool freshness, dramatic petals, honey and rum, Tom Ford Velvet Orchid is an oriental floral fragrance that teases and caresses with enveloping and brilliant warmth.”
A perfume can be many things – beautiful, thought provoking, pretty, classic, over the top and sumptuous, to name just a new. But what about those fragrances that don’t want to smell good? I am of course referring to the skanks of the perfume world, and by ‘skanks’, I mean those randy animalic scents that smell utterly beastly when compared to their prettier and more mainstream counterparts. These bad boys and bad girls like to get down and dirty and they don’t care what you think – after all, aren’t the best things in life just a tiny bit unsanitary?
For last week’s Escentual column, I proposed to take readers on a guided tour of the dark underbelly of the fragrance world. Down these smelly back streets, one will find a bevy of filthy beauties that lure one on to the side streets with the intention of ensnaring willing victims. So, if you want to revel in the filthier side of life, simply click here to head on over to Escentual to read my take on animalic perfumes. There is but one rule – leave your soap at home!
Of course, this guide serves as a look at of some of Escentual’s finest, and filthiest offerings, and is by no means a comprehensive look at skank in the fragrance industry (I’d have thrown in Maison Francis Kurkdjian’s Absolue Pour le Soir if I could have – it’s more than just a little bit frisky), so please do feel free to share you filthy faves either in the comments box below or underneath the article on the Escentual blog.
Rozy – “Like a Rose Tattoo” (Image via Vero Profumo and Freddie of Smellythoughts)
“Blue songs are like tattoos
You know I’ve been to sea before
Crown and anchor me
Or let me sail away
Hey Blue, here is a song for you
Ink on a pin
Underneath the skin
An empty space to fill in
Well there’re so many sinking now
You’ve got to keep thinking
You can make it thru these waves
Acid, booze, and ass
Needles, guns, and grass
Lots of laughs lots of laughs
Everybody’s saying that hell’s the hippest way to go
Well I don’t think so
But I’m gonna take a look around it though
Blue I love you
Blue here is a shell for you
Inside you’ll hear a sigh
A foggy lullaby
There is your song from me”
– Joni Mitchell –
Swiss perfumer, Vero Kern does not make perfumes – she crafts olfactory characters. Her extraordinary perfume line, ‘Vero Profumo’, is built on these perfumed personas and consists of; Rubj – the dramatic, yet distant actress, Onda – the stoic matriarch, Kiki – the flirtatious Parisienne, and Mito – the stone nymph that comes alive at night. But what of Rozy, the latest addition to Vero’s wardrobe of olfactory personalities? Well Rozy, is the bad girl – a tattooed biker chick with a rebellious soul.
Taking inspiration from Italian actress Anna Magnani’s performance in the Tennesse Williams-adapted film ‘The Rose Tattoo’, Rozy is the most unconventional of rose perfumes that showcases a darker, and altogether more daring side of one of perfumery’s most beloved flowers. In both its Voile d’Extrait and Eau de Parfum concentrations, this latest addition to the remarkable Vero Profumo collection is, as expected, a striking, complex and bold character.
The Jimmy Choo Man Campaign Starring Kit Harrington and Photographed by Peter Lindbergh
British actor, Kit Harrington (he of Game of Thrones fame) is to be the face of Jimmy Choo’s debut masculine fragrance, ‘Jimmy Choo Man’ launching in August of 2014. The campaign, which covers the fragrance, autumn/winter collection and Carrera sunglasses collection, is shot by veteran fashion photographer, Peter Lindbergh and captures the interplay between Harrington and his female co-star in an “intense love affair”.
A behind the scenes look at the campaign and the fragrance can be found below the jump, but before that, let’s take a quick look at what the handsome Mr Jon Snow Mr Harrington has to say about his position as the first masculine spokes-face for the Jimmy Choo brand:
“It is incredibly exciting to work with a brand that is so highly regarded in fashion so it is a real honour to be the face of their campaign. The shoot was great fun and the location was stunning with panoramic views across LA and working with Peter was an amazing experience, he is such a talented photographer and gave great direction.”
‘Rubbing Noses’ is a new series, in which I, The Candy Perfume Boy, grill the most important members of the perfume industry – the perfumers. These are the brains and noses behind the perfumes we know and love, and their unrivalled insight into one of the world’s most ancient of arts is something to be treasured, enjoyed and shared.
For my very first episode of ‘Rubbing Noses’ I am posing questions to a perfumer whose body of work includes such gems as; Etat Libre d’Orange’s Jasmin et Cigarette, Comme des Garçons’ Stephen Jones, Aqua di Parma’s Magnolia Nobile and Bottega Veneta Pour Homme. I am of course referring to Antoine Maisondieu and I think that we can all agree that his fragrant back catalogue is quite impressive, with a wide variety of perfumes that make him a perfumer that cannot be pinned down to a particular genre or style.
One of Antoine Maisondieu’s latest creations is the beautiful California Rêverie for Van Cleef & Arpels’ Collection Extraordinaire (a perfume that I’m quite smitten with of late). In our Q&A, we discuss this new fragrance, the inspiration behind it and how this talented perfumer manages to take heavy materials and make them feel as light and soft as a summer breeze. We also talk IFRA and the smell of California, so all-in-all it’s a very intriguing read with a well-respected perfumer who is undeniably interesting in a varied number of ways.
This August, multi-platinum rap starlet and pop princess, Nicki Minaj is set to release her third pillar fragrance ‘ONIKA Nicki Minaj’. Taking its moniker from Minaj’s real name (Onika Tanya Maraj), ONIKA Nicki Minaj is a fruity floral billed as the “most seductive fragrance yet to join her [Minaj’s] striking portfolio” and is described as being “sexy and fearless [and] infused with Minaj’s personal touch”. As Minaj, herself puts it:
“ONIKA is my birth name; I want to share this personal side with my fans, empowering them to wear the fragrance and flaunt their own uniqueness. Sexiness is powerful – it is all about feeling confident, knowing who you are and loving it.”
Up until very recently, Van Cleef & Arpels was not a brand whose fragrant offerings I was particularly familiar with. They are well known for the older scents, especially the Jean-Claude Ellena-penned ‘First’, which was created way back in 1976. It seems that in my ignorance, I have been missing out on some intriguing perfume blends, especially with the brand’s exclusive line – ‘Collection Extraordinaire’.
For last week’s Escentual column I have reviewed all of the fragrances within the Collection Extraordinaire, including the latest addition – ‘California Rêverie’ (a more in-depth review of which, can be found here). This is, for the most part, a thoroughly well-executed collection that covers a wide range of familiar styles and serves as a rather understated approach to ‘niche’ perfumery. To read my review, simply click here. Don’t forget to let me know which of the collection is your favourite in the comments box.
The Candy Perfume Boy 
