Perfume Pic of the Week: The Meditative Rose by Salvador Dalí
In a weird case of serendipity I have been in the mood to do things on a regular basis over the last week; wear rose perfumes and stare at Salvador Dalí’s 1958 work ‘The Meditative Rose. The painting captures the ethereal beauty of the rose, floating high in the sky, casting a tranquil scene that aptly sums up how I feel about rosy fragrances within my collection.
I’ve always seen roses as having a soft and calming presence and much like the two small figures in Dalí’s painting I find myself feeling quite contemplative when wearing any perfume with roses. Over the last week I’ve been relying heavily on Montale’s Black Aoud, a perfume that pairs the sharpness of leather and oud with the most powdery of roses. It’s exotic but comforting and allows one to shroud oneself in a red blanket, which is especially handy in this weather.
Gentleman, spritz your perfumes and may the best woman, smell…
I’m back, finally! After a month of painful wrestling with my dissertation and other nasty bits of uni work I can finally turn my attention back to my first love – perfume. The last month has been both stressful and refreshing – stressful for obvious reasons and refreshing because it felt like a good time to take a blogging break so that now, when all the work has been handed in, I can come back with a fresh mind and renewed enthusiasm.
Despite the absence of blogging during my uni-fest I have managed to stay (relatively) sane. This can be attributed to three things; the constant support of Nigel (my partner), a metric ton of Maltesers and a constant supply of episodes of my new all-time favourite TV programme – RuPaul’s Drag Race. That’s right squirrel friends, all one needs to get oneself through a tough time is a parade of drag queens…
If you haven’t had the pleasure of watching RuPaul’s Drag Race then; a) watch it now (go on) and; b) simply picture the model-filled runway of America’s Next Top Model crossed with the home-made fashions of Project Runway with a generous dollop of drag queen fabulous-ness on top. Now can you see why it is perhaps the absolute greatest thing on earth?
I love RuPaul’s Drag Race so much that I thought I would pay my own scented tribute to the queens that make it so darn sickening (that’s sickening in the good sense of the word FYI) to watch. So without further ado I present to you the latest instalment in the Scent a Celebrity Series, an episode containing perfumes and queens who display the ultimate levels of Charisma, Uniqueness, Nerve and Talent – gentleman, start your engines, and may the best woman, smell!
Celebrity fragrances, or ‘celebuscents’ as they are so often called, are the scorn of many a perfumista. The majority are cheap, thoughtless compositions with the sole intent of making a quick buck for a celebrity desperate to cash in on the latest trend. As you can imagine, most of the time the celebrity has very little input in the development of their fragrance, preferring simply to be ‘the face’ rather than ‘the brains’.
There are of course exceptions, and some celebrities do insist on being more involved by playing the role of creative director. Celebrities such as Sarah Jessica Parker and J Lo are widely reported to have been directly involved with the creation of their early fragrances and this involvement shows in the final product. But these celebrities are few and far between.
One brand in particular has taken the idea of the celebuscent to a new level by choosing to partner with unusual celebrities who take on the role of muse and work with the perfumer to create their fragrance. This brand is Etat Libre d’Orange, those funny French olfactory freedom fighters whose compositions feel like a breath of fresh air within the industry.
For their celebuscents Etat Libre d’Orange chose two unexpected, subversive celebrities; Oscar Winning British Actress & Androgynous Style Icon Tilda Swinton and Pedro Almodóvar’s Picasso-esque Muse Rossy de Palma. Two strong, unique women for a strong and unique brand.
