Confessions of a perfume nerd

Out of order...

2011-05-22T03:15:00.001-07:00

I´m sorry about the lack of posting lately, but I´m not feeling well. Have been feeling strange since beginning of april and have had no idea why.

Sleeping issues, poor apetite and felt generally uninspired, tired and off. Not even new fragarnces has manage to caprute my interest, rather the other way around, new scents have felt "to much" and I´ve prefered the well known and familiar comfort scents during this period.

Anyway, now I think I´ve got a clue about what I suffer from, it can be a thyroid inflammation a condition I have had before even though it´s many years ago. Should have recognise the symptoms, but they´re rather diffuse and vague in the beginning and since I´ve been really healthy the last ten years or so I feel very un-used to being sick... I leave to the doctors to figure out if it´s really another thyroid inflammation and hope I can see one as soon as possible, even though the nurse I talked to didn´t had any time to give me the coming week. :(

I really hope for a speedy recovery. Until then I hope it´ll be a guest post about male fragrances from a well known brand by Habit Man and also I have some new fragrances to present that I hope to get around to in not to long time...

Blood concept A AB B O

2011-04-30T02:55:00.000-07:00

Do you know what blood type you have? Mine is O+, and I know that since they blood typing pregnant women and also beacuse I once tried to become a blood donator. Unfortunatly my blood vessels are very thin/narrow, so it took like forever to draw blood from me, so I decided to end my short career as a blood donator after the first and only attempt.

Some Italian guys have created a new perfume line, Blood Concept, and they presented it at the perfume exhibit in Milan about a month ago. Every blood typa has it´s own fragrance, A AB B and O. You can chose the one you like the most or go with the one for your blood type. I´ve got a kit with cardboards of the "scratch and sniff-type". It´s nicely presented even though I don´t belive they smell as they would do on skin.

To be honest I´m a little relieved, I´m not much of a blood romantic. Yes, Gary Oldman did look nice in Dracula, but I´ve never been that interested in the pop cultural Dracula nor his cousins the vampires. Yes, I read "Confessions of a vampire" back then, but non of the followers...

Youngest and oldest daughters have a weakspot for vampires though, and I had a very awkward movie experience when I saw one of the Twilight-moives with youngest daughter some time ago.

To make things even worse, the smell of blood is one of the most offensive I know. Maybe, because I´ve raised five wild childs that have occationally manage to get head injures and belive me, the way to the emergency room with a heavily bleeding kid in mine lap isn´t exactly my idea of fun. No worries though, most head injuries (at least on my kids) looks much worse then they really are, a lot of bleeding from a relativly small skalp wound.

However, Blood Concept´s fragrances don´t smell that strange (at least not on paper).
O which is my blood type, actually smelling really nice, the metallic (or bloody note) note isn´t that obvious, it´s more of a warm, sweet, berry fragrances with a leathery base. This I would´nt doubt to try directly at my skin.

AB with notes of aldehydes, aluminium, pebbles, cedar and metal is interesting. It´s very unique and the metal smells sharp, clean and modern rather then rusty or bloody. This one I would prefer to test on my husband first. ;)

The same goes for B, which is the most powerful of the four (on paper), bold notes of patchouli, artemesia, vanilla is mixed with fruity, tart notes and of course the metallic one´s. this metal is more on the rusty side, but it´s like the other notes hides it a little.

A on the other hand I wish no one close to me ever try on skin, it has a green, aromatic scent with tomato leaf and basil, that really underscores and lift up the smell of "blood". On paper and a fast sniff, I can control it, but I don´t feel like I ever would need to sniff it again.

Despite my aversion towards A, and hesitation about AB and B, I find Blood Concept to be interesting. The test kit is also cool and if you can find one I do suggest you to try them. The fragrances are really, really different and have some resemblance with Etat Libre d'Orange and Nasomatto, so if you´re into that kinds of fragrances, you really should check Blood Concept.

You can find more information about the brand here: http://www.bloodconcept.com/EN/index.php

Pic: Gary Oldman and Winona Ryder, Dracula

J. Eisenberg - Le Péché

2011-04-25T01:40:00.001-07:00

I´ve wrote about some of Jose Eisenberg´s fragrances earlier:

http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2009/05/jose-eisenberg-rouge-noir.html

http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2009/05/jose-eisenberg-rouge-noir.html

After two years I have to admit that Rouge & Noir is my favorite of them, it´s moodlifting, cozy and unique. While J'Ose is a must try for everyone looking for a dark, smoky and slightly masculin fragrance.

Even though Eisenberg have had several well made and interesting fragrances it seem like brand perfumistas often miss. Now Eisenberg has released a bunch of new fragrances and I hope they´ll get some attention.

I have tried three of their new scents, Tentation, Love affair and Le Péché and among them, Le Péché was the one capturing my attention the most.

Most of all it´s the note of hibiscus that attract me, while wearing Le Péché I wonder why hibiscus isn´t more common in perfume. I know that hibiscus is used in Costume Nationals fragrances, Scent, Scent Intense, Sheer and Gloss and among them I really like Scent Intense.

It´s something voluptus, arousing, radiant and on the border to vulgare with hibiscus. The colors are strong, the shape is bodacious and the cocky stamen speaks for itself. In Le Péché, the hibiscus is accompanied by osmanthus and orange flower, that creates a lush, heavy, tropical, sweet, velvety ground of flowers, thnaks to the osmanthus the fragarnces don´t become too heavy. The opneing on Le Péché is summery, pretty, blushing and make me want to dress in chock pink with frills and colorful accesoars.

Le Péché could be a fragarnce both for showgirls in Las Vegas or at Moulin Rouge, Paris as well as a scent for fragile temple dancers at Bali or even, a much to maked up transvestite in Barcelona. There is something filled with joy in Le Péche, but the fragrance also have a darker and more mysterious core.

The heart is filled with amber, jasmine and vanilla which lessen the magnetism of the open, but also make Le Péché softer, warmer and a little powdery. Under the feminine notes you can also sense a darker, even masculine strike in Le Péché, a thrilling counterpoint to the vibrant opening and the soft, feminine heart. Eisenberg´s fragrances often hides an androgyn twist, a flirt with both sexes that is discrete, yet prominent when noticed. The base is filled with vetiver, musk, sandalwood and patchouli.

Le Péché is different, yet without being hard to wear. Also it´s a fragarnces that is young at heart, still most likely to attract women with their prime youth beind them. This is also typical for Eisenberg, and something I really like. Eisenberg´s fragrances is perhaps high end rather then niche, but they have found their own little place and make it theirs in an obvious and personal way.

Another good news is that the fragarnces now is offered in 30, 50 and 100 ml bottles.
look for your self: http://www.eisenberg.com/

Le Péché has good lasting power and good sillage, and I think it´s amust try for anyone looking for fragrances with notes of hibiscus, also Le Péché is a perfect scent for hot summer evnings and nights.

Do you have any good suggestions on other fragrances with note of hibiscus?

Parfumerie Generale - Tonkamande

2011-04-22T01:13:00.001-07:00

Now and then I can buy a Yankee Candle in the scent Clean Cotton and put it in my combined bathroom/laundry room, I think it smells fresh and cozy, but usually (very unusual I would say) that not the kind of scent I like to wear as a perfume. Until now, that is.

Parfumerie Generale has recently launched two new limited editions, Praline de Santal and Tonkamande. Praline de Santal smells odd to say the least, but it´s not for me, it gets almost weird, like a very chunky/chewy müslibar dripped in sticky dark syrup. Yet, branflake or strong rye note isn´t THAT commonly used in fragrances, so if this sounds interesting you should at least try it.

Tonkamande on the other hand, oh lala, so beautiful, so clean, crisp and yet warm, sweet and powdery gourmand also.

Partly it smells like old scool bed linen, when people (women mostly I belive) really made an art out of washing their bed linen.Like it smelled in the washhouse when my mother mangled her sheets in the huge stone mangle, when I was about seven years old. People younger then me maybe not even remeber those? Well, Tonkamande also smells like crisp, white bed linen at a really luxurious hotel. Sparkling, clean, white and fresh.

Also Tonkamande brings a feeling of walking up a sand dune during a perfect summer day, reaching the top and look out over the never ending blue sea and the perfectly golden beach below and realise that you (and your best company of choise) will have the perfect beach totally for yourself all day, even though it´s the best summerday.

This kind of fragrances has been made before, but I haven´t got so many referenses to "clean scents", for instant I´ve hardly try any of the popular Clean-fragrances. Even though i think Pierre Guillaume manage to create a perfect clean fragrance, there is more to it, then that.

Beneath the surface of clean whiteness and a perfect beach, there is also a delicate element of the most delish, melting and powdery littel almond cookie you can imagine. sweet, mellow and so good, but Tonkamande is far from being to sweet or too gourmand. It has a rather dry almond note (very likeable). OOOOOOOh this is so good. I can hardly stay away from my small sample and I sure wish I could afford buying a big bottle of it and drench myself in it (or at least with it) during the rest of spring and all summer.

I think it´s kind of funny how my preferences is chagning over time, today i bleive it´s possible to find at least one perfect fragrances even in the most obscure and far from myself fragrance cathegories. tonkamande happend to be the perfect scent for me within the clean type of scents. I can´t reallu understand why I love it so much (after all it is a very clean frag), but sometimes you just let loose and go with the flow...

Good sillage (even from my dab on sample)this is not a shy skinscent, lasting power is good (about 8 hours on me). I do recommend it to everyone liking clean scents, but also if you don´t, give it a try, maybe a surprise waiting for you. Also the combination between clean and gourmand is quite different. Tonkamande is rather feminine, but don´t let that stop you, if you´re a guy. Maybe not the perfect scent to the leather outfit though, or perhaps just the right!?

Fow now I don´t have any money, but you bet I want a FB of this or at least half a bottle if I find someone that would like to split.

As you can udnerstand it was a total surprise to me to become so impressed, do you have aperfume love that is far from your usual preferences?

Brecourt - Contre Pouvoir

2011-04-20T00:41:00.001-07:00

We´re having easter break now and finally the weather is a little better. Spring cleaning in the garden and the cowslips has buds, the early tulips is almost over blossomed and under our garden table (behind some pots) we manage to wake up a sleapy little hedgehog.

Lately I´ve tried the scents from Brecourt, and the two I come to like the most is both intended for men, even though i found them both to be perfect unisex scents. My favorites among the women fragrances, Haram and Ambre Noir has also obvious unisex qualities.

Contre Pouvoir that I´m about to review today is true piece of comfort. The opening is very powerful and strong with hints of lavender (not listed, but I still smlle it, even though only for a short while, strong cigarlike tobacco, spices, sweetness, warmth and a dash of darkness. In the opening, Contre Pouvoir, reminds a little of A*Men.

The oomf in the opning is soon mellowing to a softer mix of cardamom, wood and some tea with grapefruit underscoring it. The grapefruit note isn´t that noisy, just a litte freshness added to the wood and spices.

The wood smells sunwarmth, smoth, soft and like it has been impregnated with cardamom. This is an extremly pleasant and cozy combo. Within the woody spicy heart of the perfume you can sense freshness from grapefruit and nice aromatic tea. During this phase, Contre Pouvoir is a mostly blonde woody scent with soft spicy and gourmand features. Just like Mauvais Garcon, Contre Pouvoir is a fragrances that will be perfect to wrap around myself when autumn comes (even though I prefer not to think about autumn right now!).

Durin drydown Contre Pouvoir becomes much darker, blacker and more interesting. This is probably thnaks to licorice wood (!?) and vetiver. The base is more masculine then the opening and heart, yet not enough from stop me to wear it. The cardamom still hangs in there and also becomes darker eventually.

Contre Pouvoir is a must try for everyone liking cardamom in perfumes and also if you fancy A'Men and it´s flankers, Contre Pouvoir is a good and economic alternative.

The sillage is good and longevity is about medium (4-5 hours on me).

Among the other offerings from Brecorut I like as i said, Haram and Ambra Noir the best and they´re slightly similar to Mauvais Garcon and Contre Pouvoir in style, warm, spicy and oriental kind of fragrances. The rest of the line up is a little more un-even, but I belive Eau Blanche and Eau Trouble (with note of carrot) could be really pretty and interesting on the right person.

Coming up, something new from Parfumerie Generale and also presenting some news from José Eisenberg.

Pic: Beach wood, flickr.com

To open or not to open, that´s the question.

2011-04-15T00:29:00.000-07:00

I´m sorry for the lack of posting lately, but sometimes things just get to much and this week has been that way. I´ll write something more about Brecourt also, but not today.

Instead of that I´ve got a question of delicate matter I would like to share with you.

Not long ago I won three little bottles of "perfume" on Swedish Ebay, they weren´t that good described and the pics was´nt that good either. But from what I could see there was mini bottles of Cassandra by Weil, Chinchilla by Weil (that wasn´t in fact a Chinchilla, but the much more common Antilope) and also a mini of Flair by Yardley. The Cassandra bottle looked untouched. Well, I´ve got the bunch for about 18 € and I belive it was quite a good deal.

The problem os the bottle of Cassandra. And the that the cellophane is still intact (but very fragile though), the box is in perfect condition and the juice itself is pure extrait! Of course I´m more then curious to find out how it smells and I allready love Zibleine from Weil. And I know that the feeling of carefully open the brittle cellophane, the box and slowly bring out the bottle would be... very, very cool.

But, what if I could sell it to a vintage collector instead? I wonder how much i could get for this rarity? It´s a bottle of exrait in priestine shape and with a perfect box that looks MUCH older then my old bottle of Zibeline. I can´t find any information about this version of Cassandra, so I guess it´s pretty darn hard to find.

As you all know I´ll destroy a big part of the value if I open the box and even more if I dare to open the bottle (which is also probably fragile at least the screwer). If I love it, I wouldn´t care that much, but if I don´t? Also I´ve heard that pure perfume or extrait gets easier spoiled then eau de parfum and eau de toilette, so there is also a danger that it has turned bad and can´t be used as a perfume any more. For a collector it´s more the piece itself then the juice that matters.

The only information about notes I havefound at The Perfumed Court, and they are: anise, styrax, fruits and some floral, doesn´t sound 100% me, but not really the opposite either.

That´s why, dear readersm i´ll leave the desicion to you. Should I open it or should I try to sell it? Another option is of course if any of you feel a crazy urge to buy it from me for about 1200€, I think we can meet an agreement if that´s the case. ;)

So leave your vote in the poll, and I would also love to hear why you think as you do, so leave a comment also. :)

Pic by me

Brecourt - Mauvais Garcon

2011-04-09T04:37:00.001-07:00

Brecourt is a new french perfume house, but Emilie Bouge is anything but a beginner in perfumes. Emilie has a history as a perfumer for other companies before Brecourt and also, her family has a past in the perfume industry.

Emilies grand parents runned a perfume buisness in the heart of Frances perfume producing, Grasse. Unfortunatly the company slipped out of the family, but with Brecourt Emilie writes a new chapter in her familys perfume story. Brecourt combines the knowledge of frecnh perfume tradition with modern spirit.

I´ve been lucky to receive a very nicely presented press kit of all the Brecourt fragrances, which are 11, and I think you could find something for all tastes here.

On me, especially the warm, spicy and woody scents becomes really nice. And Mauvais Garcon is one of my favorites among them.

Mauvais Garcon is one of the fragrances that is supposed for men, but in my opinion it works at least as good at women. Mauvais Garcon has notes of cedar- and sandalwood, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla and tonkabean. As a scent, Mauvais Garcons becomes a soft, caressing and skinclose gourmand. Both cedar and sandal are of the soft, velvety kind in Mauvais Garcon. The spices are light and the vanilla is of the cockie kind, without being at all too sweet. The woody elements in Mauvais Garcons really deserves to be called blond wood.

Mauvais Garcons smells similar to a common cookie in Sweden known as vanilla dreams. Even though similar to vanilla dreams, this is a soft and innocent kind of gourmand, the sweetness is just perfectly blended. The cinnamon and nutmeg is used with caution, in way that deepens the vanilla withoput over running it. The fragrance is rather linear, even though the basenote is mostly like an extremly soft woodyness.

Nothing with Mauvais Garcons is complicated or edgy, this is pure and simple comfort and so cozy.

On me Mauvais Garcons last about 3-4 hours and the sillage is discrete. Intended for men, still very suitable for women too. As a gourmand it has such an delicate approach I would like to call it a gourmand for people not usually that found of gourmand fragrances. And of course for those of us that love gourmands as well.

You can find Brecourt also at Indie Scents: http://www.indiescents.com/brands/Brecourt.html

On the company home page you can order full bottles as well as samples:
http://www.brecourt.fr/index.php

Pic: vaniljdrömmar

Slumberhouse - Vikt and Ore

2011-04-06T04:47:00.000-07:00

Another post-apocalyptic figure that have been roaming around in Australia is Tank Girl. As the name suggest, the main character drives a huge tank which also serves as her home. Even if the world in Tank Girl is rather devastated, the mood in the comic is anything but gloomy, rather the other way around. Tank Girl is a mishmash of anarchasex, refreshingly ironic and overall morbid, satiric and pleasantly dysfunctional.

Of course, also in the Tank Girl future, whit lack of water, perfumes probably wouldn´t be the first thing that come in mind. Still, Slumberhouse manage to create fragrances whit such an edgy (post-)modern twist that make me think of these kind of lovely, disturbed characters. They matches since they both are made with a sparkle in the eye, great personality and innovative ideas.

At first I was a little bit afraid of Vikt, since metallic note can become horrid on me. But, the metal in Vikt isn´t of the rusty, iron (smells almost like blood to me) kind, but rather like steal in motion. Like metal that slowly warms up an old mechanic engine dripping of thick, slippery motor oil. And that smells good that is!

With elements of oudh, resins and ravensara the metallic motor scents mixes and becomes softer, warmer and even a little sweet. I also feels something floral in vikt, even though I can´t find anything floral listed (maybe ravensara have floral aspects?). Oudh contributes with a soft and mellow smokiness. Vikt is a quite complex fragrances, and the different notes swirls around in a interesting way, even though the scent itself is quite linear. Vikt has medium staying power and also medium sillage. A must try for anyone looking for different and thrilling fragrances.

Ore is more soft, organic and smooth. But, also very, very screwy and odd. It´s partly inspired by Carmes lip balm (which I haven´t tried), but it´s so much more than a lip balm scent. There is a soft scent reminding of some kind of lip balm (to me it reminds of a certain Swedish lipbalm, maybe it´s similar to Carmex?). Jummy. It´s creamy, sticky and a dash of milkyness. Add black pepper, cocoa and gaiacwood! Shortly speaking, a very personal and different take on gourmand. And also, my personal favorite from Slumberhouse. Ore isn´t like anything I ever encountered in perfume. I´ll need more of this! :)

The cocoa in Ore smells dark, aromatic and slightly bitter, just like whole crushed cocoabeans rather than some soft chocolate. Ore is both mood lifting, comfy and also a little sexy in a strange way (just like Tank Girl).

Longevity and sillage as the others from Slumberhouse. Ore is the most feminine of them, without being that feminine. Ore would work on people in all ages looking for a different, personal and cool gourmand. Ore is among the most different I´ve tried, and without loosing in wearability. I really hope to wear Ore a lot during autumn and winter.

I´m sure Tank Girl would love both Vikt and Ore. And I´m sure you´ll regret if you don´t get some samples of Slumberhouse scents!

Which Tank Girl do you prefer, the comic or the movie? Imagine having a mutant kangaroo boyfriend!?

Pic: Tank Girl, Jamie Hewlett

Slumberhouse - Jeke

2011-04-06T01:19:00.000-07:00

Mel Gibson is one of those middle aged, well known actors that manage to make a fool of them self lately. Mel, is maybe not in the dignity of Charlie Sheen in doing so, but not far from it. But if we try to forget about nowadays Mel Gibson and instead goes back in time, all the way back to 1979. There we can find a young Mel Gibson, starring in the Australian movie Mad Max.

In case some of you haven´t seen it, Mad Max is taking place in a dystopic future, mostly on Australian highways and in the desert. Law and order is a joke, and people are fighting about the rare sources of gasolin. Mel Gibson plays a young, disillusioned cop.

Well, I kind of realise that no one would have even the remotest interest in perfumes during these circumstances (except of maybe some rare survived perfume nerd), but still the new indieperfume line, Slumberhouse has manage to create a fragrance that would have suited Mad Max Rockatansky (what a name!) as a hand fits a worned leather glove, namely Jeke.

I´m really impressed. Jeke might not be really my kind of fragrance, but there´s no doubt about this being a well made fragrance with integrity, sentiment and soul (and what a thrilling dark sould that is).It´s powerful, masculin, darker then dark, interesting and still much easier to wear and enjoy then most scent similar to it that I´ve tried.

Jeke is brimful with dark, aromatic tobacco, real deal patchouli, I can sense smoke, leather and even whittered asphalt (if only in my imagination maybe?). Jeke is raw, genuin and still I find little glimpses of sweetness in it, some soft woody notes and a hint of juniper. Maybe there is hope after all?

Still, most parts of Jeke is heavy, saturated and concrete, I can´t find any soft and light top notes. Jeke makes me want to wearf my old leather jacket and my most worned old Dr Martens. Still, Jeke is a little to heavy and domination for me to wear casually. On my dear husband it smells incredible good, sexy and dirty.

Jeke is fairly masculine, still women that like heavy, dark tobacco scents with elements of charred wood and dystopia should of course give Jeke a try. Jeke has medium longevity about 4-5 hours on me, and medium sillage. Jeke also makes me want a Mad max-marathon, besides the first movie there are two followers as well, and at least part two was also quite good. Of course wearing Jeke.

You can order Jeke and other Slumberhouse fragrances (and samples) at http://www.indiescents.com/brands/Slumberhouse.html

Also you can find out more about Slumberhouse here: http://slumberhou.se/

This kind of indie lines makes me really happy, and I sure hope Slumberhouse is here to stay.

What dystopic, post-apocalytic future vision is your favorite? Movie, litterature och comic? Do you have any fragrances you associates with that kind of fiction?

Pic: Mel Gibson in Mad Max

Hermes - Iris Ukiyoé

2011-04-04T02:18:00.001-07:00

I´ve so many interesting fragrances to write about, that I sometimes don´t know where to start. But, now it´s maybe about time to tell you a little about Iris Ukiyoé that I bought about a month ago in Stockholm.

Iris Ukiyoé is the ninth and latest addition to Hermes Hermessence line, a line of exclusive fragrances all created by master perfumer Jean-Claude Ellena. I´m not a 100% fangirl of Jean-Claude Ellena´s work, some of his scents is much to light, subtle and aquatic to suit me well. But, i also have some big favorites among his work, such as (also for Hermessence), Ambre Narguile, Bois Farine for L'Artisan and also the two kind of similar, L'Eau d'Hiver for Frederic Malle and Paul & Joe´s Blanc.

Anyway, Iris Ukiyoé was love at first sniff for me. It IS aquatic, but it´s like the water have it´s very own, dark turqoise color. And iris fragrances in water color, but watercolors that is strong, bold and colorful. the opening is very citrusy, but also accompanied by something with a slightly plastic scent, but plastic in a good way. I do occationally like some plastic notes in fragrances, probably because it reminds me of the scent of a newly opened barbie-or other plastic doll (I loved to smell them right out of the box), a scent filled with joy for most little girls and a scent that stay in our memory for a long time.

No need to get panicky though if you don´t like plastic notes, it´s only there for a very short while. in a copple of minutes it´s transforms to a soft, caressing and pleasant floral scent. A dense, but still airy floral scent, like the scent from thousands of fragile, velvety petals. People that knows the scent of real iris, says it smells like this. I have no ide, but I think it´s a very unique scent, not earthy/rooty as some irises or violet or powdery as others.

Iris Ukiyoé is very happy, spirited and moodlifting kind of iris scent, when trying it in stockholm I become happy every time I sniffed it on my hand...

A strange thing is the scent of caramel/fudge that occurs after about an hour. One of the participants of the perfume meeting said it smelled like caramel/toffee on me. But that was when I was eating a fudge brownie so we belived it was because of that.

But the strange thing is that I´ve noticed that toffee note over again. It has almost made me mad. Have I some left overs from a vanilla-or gourmand scent still lingering around on my wrist or on my top? Or, do Iris Ukiyoé really smell like caramel on me?

It IS Iris Ukiyoé! Now I have showered, and put on a clean top and even clean jeans (after all i can always spill a drop or two when I decanting) and yes, the vague fudgy note is still there. I can´t find any notes responsible to this scent, there is no vanilla, no amber with tonka beans and definitly nno cheap synthetic caramel notes in Iris Ukiyoé, still I discover a faint note of milky fudge. Maybe it´s easier to get if I tell you that I discover some closeness to Bois Farine in Iris Ukiyoé?

No wonder why i like this one so much. :) In the drydown I get (besides the fudge) a soft, delicat rosy scent. Pale and perfectly soft petals and that small hint of caramel. Just perfect! Iris Ukiyoé has good lasting power, about 6 hours on me and good sillage. A must try for everyone that´s found of Jean-Claude Ellena´s perfume making and also a must try because of it´s unique and different take on iris.

Those of you that have tried Iris Ukiyoé, is there anyone out there except of me, that get´s that weird (but good) caramel note? Apart from that, do you have any favorite among the Hermessences? Or other fragrances created by Ellena?

Pic: June Rollins

Ginestet - Botrytis

2011-04-01T00:48:00.001-07:00

Do you like honey? I´m not a honey lover, even though I use honey occationally in food and baking. Pure and natural honey have a very special taste and aroma, if you put your nose in a honeypot you´ll discover that the actual scent is really special, complex and without doubt, animalic. Yes, you can smell a faint urine like scent in there.

Maybe that´s why honey in perfumes often seem to be covered up with a lot of strong, spicy and dominating notes?

Well, anyway in Ginestet´s Botytris I can´t find any of that odour. still, Botytris is filled with warm, golden and aromatic honey. Honey so soft, light and sweet. In the opening there is nothing else then this lovely honey note.

Some where in the fragrances Botytris becomes more saturated, filled with -not so loud- spices and a delicate, subdued tobacco note. Botytris is a fragrances for us that like it sweet, but it´s not THAT sweet, only just enough (according to me). Eventually it become a little darker and I can also smell some ambra and vanilla, still honey has the main role from start to end.

During drydown, the honey in fact dries down and becomes powdery, dry and very delicate. Now, botytris smells like the most amazing honey caramels with some vanilla and mouthwatering spices also. Such a perfect and enjoyable comfort scent...

Botytris is some kind of noble rot that infest grapes and then contributes to give the wine a very special and deep sweetness. Ginestet offers besides of Botytris to toher wine inspired scents, Sauvignonne and Le Boise. Besides that, Ginestet is probably more known fore their wines then their perfumes.

Botytris is a must try if you´re looking for a softer take on honey. I do recommend it to anyone with a liking of sweet and gourmand fragrances. Will probably work well on men too. Botytris has OK longevity, about 3-4 hours on me and the sillage is medium. Botytris would be a perfect comfort scent during autumn and winter.

Pic:honeycomb, greenhealthspot

Caldey Island - Island Lavender

2011-03-31T00:12:00.000-07:00

Some time ago I was looking for perfumes at Ebay. one headline captured my attention, "Rare, niche, Caldey Island lavendel, made by monks". I read the descrition and found a lot of interesting information. Luca Turin apperantly called Caldey island lavender "The best lavender soliflor on earth". Which of course, didn´t make me less curious, even though I haven´t read The Guide.

start searching on internet and soon realised that Caldey Island perfumes wasn´t that hard to get. Caldey Island is a small island situated off Pembrookeshire, Wales coast. The first monastery on the island was founded way back in the 6th century and since then several different monastic orders have had monasterys on the island. During some periods the island have been abandoned.

The recent monks are cistercians and arrived to Caldey Island in 1929. During the 50'ies the monks started selling lavender bunches to visitors. Some time later they start making their own lavender perfume as well, made of lavender and other herbs picked on the island. The perfume become very popular with visitors.

During the 70'ies the monk decided to outsource the perfume making. Today, the belgian perfume Ivo jacobs is the nose behind the present formulation of Island lavender. The island today have no actual perfume making, but the monks fill up the bottles on the island and make the outer packaging and so on. However, the monks have start growing lavender on the island again, and sell small bunches of it to the tourists...

I really find this story to be both touching and interesting, a bunch of monks on a far away island making a living of selling perfumes and chocolate(!). From Easter time and until autumn it´s possible to visit the island. Besides the monastery, Caldey Island also have the best sandy beach in Pembrookeshire, and the whole island is as a peaceful retreat. there is also a small village at the island. I would really enjoy visiting Caldey Island some day. You can read more about Caldey Island, the monks and a little this and that here: http://www.caldey-island.co.uk/

For about 10 € I got my very own small bottle of Island lavender, and of course the monks have a webshoip where you can buy it and other things such as soaps and chocolates as well.

But what about the fragrances it self? well, I´m not a big consumer of lavender scents, but occationally I just need to have a lavender soliflor to calm down and relax. At those moments Island lavender is just right. The opening is clear, fresh and yet not cold. During development, the lavender becomes dryer and softer and I also detect other herb, even though I can´t say exactly what other herbs. it has also an airy feeling.

Caldey Island lavender is mostly a lavender soliflor and smell as one shortly spekaing. If it´s the worlds best I can´t say. It´s good for what I want it to and that´s enough for me. Longevity is short, really, but at that time I´ve allready fallen in sleep. :P

I do recommend Caldey Island Lavender to everyone. Not because it´s the most amazing fragrance ever, but because "everyone" cab afford a bottle of their own, for about 10€ (comes in different sizes, very moderate prices and low shipping rates as well). And because it feel very pleasant to support a gang of hard working monks on a small island...

Pic: Caldey island

Atelier Cologne - Vanille Insensee

2011-03-24T02:53:00.001-07:00

I hadn´t tried anything from Atelier Cologne, but I got a sample of their latest offering, Vanille Insensee in a recent swap.

Mmm, mmm and... mmm, this is really thrilling. Somewhere hiding in all the dark smokiness of Vanille Insensee there is actually some vanilla. To find it I have to be a smoke-fireman for a while...

i don´t have any good smoky fragrance in my collection. Smoky notes are a bit difficult to me. Smoky smoke, often with birch tar can easily become to sharp and even headache inducing on me. Incense smoky can turn in strange directions, like Messe de Minuit that becomes sweet coca cola on me, Comme des Garcons Insence line smells more like room fragrances then perfume to me and my latest finding, Oriental Lumpus have so much insence in it that it turns on my insence allergy leaving me with my eyes all watery and red. Serge Noir is to dusty and grey and Patchouli 24 (27) from Le Labo becomes very monotone after about 18 hours and have to be put down by a dip in the water.

Vanille Insensee might be the perfect smoky frag for me! I don´t know why it becomes SO smoky on me, the name isn´t related to insence, apperantly it means something like Vanille Insane.

Notes of lime, coriander, jasmine, vetiver, oakmoss, oakwood, vanilla. Probably it´s a mix between really smoky vetiver and a grey, duty oakmoss making the smoke soft, comapct, on the border to dusty/powdery and very comfortable. i belive jasmine and vanille contributes with a little sweet softness, but over all this is an unsweet, dark, saturated and very smoky scent.

Vanille Insensee is a cologne absolut 15%, I´m not totally sure what that is. But probably diluted to 15% fragrance essences. Yet, vanille Insensee has a really good staying power, after 12 hours I still smell some smoky vanilla. The sillage is great (I´ve only got a dab on sample). Maybe you can guess it´s a cologne thnaks to it´s airy and somewhat light character even though filled with such heavy notes. How a scent can be both heavy and airy at the same time might be a contradiction, but Vanille Insensee is that!

I´ve always thought of smoky notes to be a little thrilling, a little film noir and kind of mysterious. Vanille Insensee fullfils that with ease. Vanille Insensee is really nice on women, but I think it would be great on men as well. If you´re looking for a smoky fragrance with some sweetness, you should give this a try.

Do you have any favorite smoky fragrances?

Pic:beneaththerose.blogspot

We have a winner!

2011-03-24T00:23:00.000-07:00

List Randomizer

There were 16 items in your list. Here they are in random order:

Pärlbesatt
Ylva
Bellatrix
solocha
Maria
kjanicki
a.k.a Warum
Alice
Carina
Cymbaline
Hanna
Natalia
Ann
Nilla
Ann (E)
Catterina
Timestamp: 2011-03-24 07:19:14 UTC

Congratulations to Pärlbesatt that have won a bunch of samples to test.

To comfort the rest of you I think there will be another drawing soon and mayvbe another small surprise for faithful readers. Don´t miss that!

Untitled - No 8 (Brent Leonesio)

2011-03-23T08:07:00.000-07:00

Luckyscent have given 8 perfumers the possibility to create 8 different scents. Brent Leonesio is the nose behind Untitled No 8 and also the creator of indie brand Smell Bent. Smell Bent has a wonderful, humoristic style and offers perfume oils and also eau de toilettes to really great prices. I´ve tried and also reviewed some Smell Bent fragrance and you can find some of them here: http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2009/12/smell-bent-hungry-hungry-hippies-and.html
Since Smell Bents perfume oils was such a pleasant surprise, I was of course curious about Untitled No 8 as well.

With notes of narcissus, fur, feral musk, oud and leather you expect an animalic fragrance and that is what you get and plenty of it too. It´s like being trapped inside Noah´s Ark with all the animlas and all their poo too.

usually I´m not that sensitive to animalic notes in perfumes. Muscs Koublai Khan becomes a well behaved and easy to handle champion horse compared to untitled No 8. Untitled No 8 is foamy sweaty, pungent leather and if that isn´t enough top it of with a heft dose of shit. And not just some dry horse manor with the smell of half digested hay, this is real shit. I have spend time with my youngest grand child toay and he pooped 4 times, and that smelled very much like the dominating note in untitled No 8, but Untitled No is a little more complex and mixed with other strong, animalic notes besides the shit.

Untitled No 8 is too much feces for me to feel comfortable. In a distant it smells kind of good, but any closer sniff makes me almost nauseous.

After a while the smell of poo becomes more in the background and Unititled No 8 becomes a soft, yet erotic and still dirty animalic musk fragrance. Untitled No 8 is a perfume oil, with good lasting power but not so big sillage. Even though the base is quite pleasant, the road leading to it isn´t worth it to me.

Even though Untitled No 8 doesn´t really working on me, I still recommend it to anyone curious about animalic notes in perfumes. I´ve tested it on both husband and oldest son and the shit was quite dominant on them too. Still I belive it could smell quite nice on the right person...

Have you tried it? What do you think about it? Do you tolerate animalic/dirty/skanky/body odour notes good or bad? I´m somewhere in between, some work really magical on me, while others (like the musk note in L'Air du Rien) become so unpleasant.

Today I´ve got a parcel from a fairly new French perfume house, so I´ll try them out and then review them here. And soon I´ll be reviewing a really pleasant smoky fragrance and also so indie scents all the way from USA is coming up shortly...

Pic: Noah´s Ark, Edward Hicks.

A small draw to celebrate the spring!

2011-03-20T05:55:00.000-07:00

Finally it feels like spring it´s on it´s way. I really hope this lovely sunny weather stay with us for a while. Now it´s time for springflowers and no more snow!

Now, when winter is going towards it´s end, I also start to feel for some other kinds of fragrances. Today was the first time since last summer I longed to wear Bond No 9´s Coney Island. Do you have any spring or summer fragrances that you feel it´s finally time for?

Some of the scents I´ve been writing about from around Christmas until now I won´t use as much during spring, while others will be so nice to wear in warmer weather. I belive I´ll use Cruel Gardenia with pleasure during april as well as several of Ormonde Jayne´s fragrances. Frazer parfum have several perfumes with a kind of refreshing feel and I think they´ll be beautiful during summer. When (or if) I comes to London I´ll go to Roja Dove´s at Harrods and ask how much a bottle of Frazer Parfum is...

Puredistance I that I wrote about just days ago will be so nice during spring and summer, so will Iris Ukioje that I bought when I was in Stockholm.

Some of the fragrances I have wrote about isn´t that easy to get, so I will give away a small set of samples to one winner (here and the Swedish blog).

The winner will have: One sample (1 ml) of Femme by Rochas (vintage), one sample (1 ml) of Shalimar (vintage), one sample of Cerchi Nell'Acqua´s White Out, one sample (1 ml) of Sigilli´s Claudiae, one small sample (0,5 ml) of Guerlain´s Cruel Gardenia, one small sample (0,5 ml) of Iris Ukioje and one small sample (0,5 ml) of Puredistance I.

Leave a comment below, and I´ll draw one winner at thursday 24th of march, tell me something about spring or winter favorites.

Good Luck!

Pic: krokus i snö, J.Larsson

Puredistance - Puredistance I

2011-03-17T05:28:00.001-07:00

Puredistance is an exclusive perfumehouse situated in Vienna, Austria. Puredistance offers three different perfumes, Puredistance I, Antonia and Puredistance M. Anne Buzantian is the nose behind Puredistance I and Antonia, while Roja Dove has created Puredistance M. I have been lucky enough to evaluate Puredistance I.

Sometimes when I encounter a really beautiful perfume I can feel that I lack words to describe it true, but with Puredistance I it´s almost like the other way around. It IS beautiful, but when wearing it I get a current of impressions, associations, thoughts and feelings that is so overwhelming it´s hard to know where to start and where it will end up...

Imagine there was a way of capturing the scent of the Garden of Eden or maybe the Elysium (Elysian)Fields and then put the wonderful fragrance in some kind of big, transcluent bubble. Something like that is what I feel when putting on Puredistance I. I am in a perfect scented bubble, a bubble filled with clean, paradisic air, like the smell of that air, but even better...!

The opening of Puredistance I is airy, light, elusive, vibrant and filled with emotions. I experience the sillage as huge, but never intrusive or heavy, it´s like I wrote before, like the air in the most pleasant garden, but better. At the same time Puredistance I is like a shiled against all surrounding scents and odours, it makes me imagine that this is the way the world smells.

But, how does it smell? The opening is slightly tart with soft citrus notes and a hint of black currant, a smallest dash of greenery and then comes the rose, the most adorable rose scent you can imagine. Roses so gentle that they are sailing on thw wind like a ballon, roses so soft as the most perfect veil, roses in a rosegarden blossoming in the faint light of dusk. Weak, but ever present, soft, but so intoxicating and so incredible romantic it´s hard to imagine, this is roses beyond masterpice, this is roses on the border to miracle...

I have allready decide which perfume to wear when the first of my children gets married. And now, I also know which perfume I should wear if I ever was to be married again (of corse with the same loving man I married almost 22 years ago). As a matter of fact we have talked about renewing our vows, and with Puredistance I it feels even more likely that we´ll do that in the future. Nowadays a lot of people spend really much money on their weddings, and I suggest them to spare a part of that budget for the perfect wedding perfume, Puredistance I.

Puredistance I never gets heavy, sweet, cloying or dominating. Still it has, despite of it´s softness and airyness, an extreme hereness. It´s floats around you as the most perfect cloud, and it does it for hours and hours.

Like some others (but only a few) fragarnces I´ve tried, Puredistance I is a slow perfume. It takes time to warm up and mature on your skin, to caress and enchant. You´ll be accompanied by the sheer and airy notes for a long time, where they eventually become more saturated, slowly colored with golden hues and a serene warmth. The airy rose gets accompanied by the softest, golden and perfect powdery mimosa. Now, the sillage also closes in, become close to skin, sensual and intimate. By now, there is several hours (6-8) since I put on Puredistance I I can almost fool myself that i smell this wonderful for real. In this phase Puredistance I is both very close to skin but also send of little, pleasant whiffs of rosy mimosa, smoth amber and light vetiver.

Puredistance I is so beautyful it deserve only to be worn at the most special occations. As a perfumista I have a big collection of different scents that I can wear depending on mood, occation or color of my clothes. Puredistance I is such a wonderful perfume it somehow deserve to be worh as a signture scent. A perfect scent, loved and totally admired by it´s owner. Puredistance I is really much to beautiful and perfect to be waisted on a volatile perfume nerd!

Puredistance I has a very good, without being disturbing, sillage. The lasting power is more then good, this is a fragrance that evolves slowly and still after more then 12 hours it smells quite strong on me. I think it can last at least for a full 24 hour!

Puredistance I is a must try if you get the chanse, and you must really try it if you´re looking for pure, romantic, beautfiul and well made perfumes. Also if you´re looking for that one perfume for a very special occation, such as wedding, you must give Puredistance I a try!

to me, Puredistance I isn´t an every day scent, but a scent to wear on rare and very special occations, such as wedding anniversery and like. Of course Puredistance I have made me curious to try Antonia and Puredistance M as well. Maybe some of my readers allready have tried any of them?

You can find more information about Puredistance and their wonderful perfumes here:
http://www.puredistance.com/

Pic: Macro flower, flickr.
bubble

Guerlain - Spiritueuse Double Vanille

2011-03-15T02:11:00.001-07:00

It´s impossible not to have expectations on a perfume that -by some- is knowned to be the worlds best vanilla fragrance. i tried it briefly during one of our perfume meetings, but all I could discover then was a pleasant vanilla. Eventually I got the chanse to test it a little more carefully.

And wow, what a total surpise it was! I´ve read about dark tobacco, even darker rhum and a smoth but unsweet vanilla, and then what I get is something totally different. Honestly, during the first half an hour-an hour of my first testing I was confused and even belived that I somehow had get the wrong fragrance...

On me, Guerlains Spiritueuse Double Vanille starts with an obvious cedar note. A very much concrete cedar note, like being very small and sit on top of a big wooden crave. The note of cedar is so genuin I can almost feel how the wood feels and hoiw it would sound if I knocked on it. Anyway, inside the wood cradle is a brimful glass of ice cold vanilla vodka. The wooden note with pencil and a thad of warmth blends with cold, pure and perfect vanilla vodka. I can even taste it in my mouth, usually I don´t drink any kind of vodka early tuesday mornings, but I´m sure feel to when I smell this fragrance...

During this phase of Spiritueuse Double Vanille, the proportions is about 90% cedar wood and 10% icy vanilla vodka. How on earth do they manage to make the vanilla so cold and refreshing??? At some point in the heart note I can smell a smoky note, or not really smoky, rather like glowing wood, the cedar wood is evolved to being inside a traditional woodfire sauna. The vanilla element is now more present, sweeter, softer and warmer.

Somehaow the glass of vodka has been transformed to a glass of smoky whisky. Some powdery notes comes alson, something reminding of powdery dark raw sugar. I can´t dicover any tobacco at all on me! The vanilla is much more full bodied now. Spiritueuse Double Vanille smells incredible good, incredible complex and constantly changing to me. It´s like heading out on adventure in a magic vanilla world without having an idea about what to come next.

Never has a vanilla scent that I tried so whole heartedly fit in to the term "a vanilla for grown ups" as much as Spiritueuse Double Vanille, it´s filled with alcohol, smoke and soft sensualism. Finally a vanilla scent I won´t pass over to my youngest daughter, at least not until she is 18 or 20 or even 35!

The powdery, smoky and extremly well made heart goes on for about 1-1½ hour, then the fragrance slowly goes to rest. But, to me it has two different bases. One of them, still very much alive, has elements of sweet raisins, dark rhum and a very soft, saturated, sweet and dark vanilla. Spiritueuse Double Vanille goies from sensual to vibrant erotic according to me. I can´t stop sniffing myself, totally enchanted by this magnificent fragrance. This hold another 3-4 hours, fading little by little.

If putting on some Spiritueuse Double Vanille before bedtime (which is actually quite stupid since I smell so good I can hardly sleep) I can still smell it softly whe I wake up. Nothing left but a subtle vanilla floral, but the fragrances lingering on my skin like a distant caress.

I have to admit that I´ve fallen hard for Spiritueuse Double Vanille, about as hard as i falled for Cuir Beluga. I´m sure my decant won´t last long and then I´ll need more of it! I "can´t live" without having a stash of Spiritueuse Double Vanille.

Sometimes I feel for a pure and simple vanilla, and then Ava Luxes Vanilla Musk is a big favorite, but when looking for a more grown up vanilla experience, Spiritueuse Double Vanille is a must try. Hefty sillage, good lasting power and I recommend it for men as well. A little warning though, I´ve read reviews and comments about it and as with other scents it´s not as good on everyone. It also seem to be very different on different person, so be sure to get a sample before buying (as usual).

For you that allready have tried it, love it or hate it?

Pic: grey goose vodka crate

Guerlain - Cruel Gardenia

2011-03-12T01:45:00.001-08:00

Some time ago I swapped a decant of my Cuir Beluga for a decant of Cruel Gardenia from the same Guerlain line of fragrances, L'Art et Materie. At the first test I just noooooo, I have swapped one of my most loved fragrances for something I can´t wear!

It smelled so odd on me, something in it reminded of pale little fungus rather then flowers. there is also an element of paper in Cruel Gardenia, that thick and high quality kind of paper, but still... fungus and paper, not exactly what I expected from Cruel Gardenia. But, at least interesting, for sure.

Some hour later my youngest got home from school and just "Oh, you smell so good" mmmmmmm, "Really? Don´t you think it smells kind of like fungus" "Maybe, but very delicate fungus". Since she´s the only one close by that at all can tell different notes apart I tend to listen to her.

As you realise, some time later I´ve been used to Cruel Gardenia. As a fragrances it doesn´t remind of anything else, which means that when I´m in the mood for Cruel gardenia, nothing else will do. While Cuir Beluga pretty much is the perfect comfort scent for me, a fragrances I use often. Cruel Gardenia is rather interesting, demanding, beautiful and with loads of personality.

Cruel Gardenia makes me think about an almost ancient Russian noble woman, living in exile at the French Riviera since almost 100 years back, she´ll be 104 next time and have lived through Russian revolution as well as world war I and II and a lot of other great events. She has been married four times and have more kids then she remember and guess if she can tell you a good story?

Cruel Gardenia opens with a prominent yet beautiful and interesting fungus note on me. Soemthing like pink or pale fungus, as beautiful as any flower, like that kind of fungus I think Cruel Gardenia smells. There´s also a soft fruity note, not sweet, just fresh and juicy. And then the papery note, not heavy leathery books, just soft, thick and perfect paper. the papery note makes a core where the other notes circulate around slowly.

Some half an hour in the fungus note softens and become more flowery and also spicy. This is an enchanting, magic, dreamy and beautiful floral note. Cruel Gardenia is loaded with nostalgia, longing, elegance and a fragile beauty. Yes, I can wear Cruel Gardenia, but actually I belive this would be a perfect fragrance for any women about to become 100 years old. Cruel Gardenia evokes the feeling of long lost times.

Cruel gardenia feels lees Guerlain like then most fragrances i´ve tried from Guerlain. A lot of Guerlain fragrances have a concrete, stable feeling with both feets standing safe in a bath of guerlinade. Cruel Gardenia has breaked free and floats away with her head in the clouds...

Further in to the fragrance Cruel gardenia becomes sweeter, spicier and really, really goos, still it´s the opening that make me wants to return to it. cruel Gardenia has medium sillage and good longvity, yet quite discrete in the end. This is a scent for thsoe of you looking for a personal, dreamy and romantic fragrance.

I´m happy to have my decant after all, but I doubt I´ll buy more of Cruel Gardenia. There are several left for me to try among L'Art et materie, among them, which is your favorite(s)?

Pic: gardenia clahadine.com
fungus flickr.com

Guerlain - Djedi (vintage)

2011-03-11T00:21:00.000-08:00

Birdwatchers can go a long way to spot a bird that haven´t been watched in our country since the beginning of the 20'ieth century. they bring extreme binocculars, cameras and a book where they can hopefully can mark that they´ve seen the rare bird.

Perfumistas on the hunt after a certain vintage fragrance aren´t far from bird watchers. Some of us (more often male perfumistas I think)just have to own a full bottle, while others thinks it´s OK just to swap for some drops of the sought after scent. I belong more to the second kind, other perfumistas can hunt for the expensive bottles at Ebay.The perfume I´ll write about today is one people really are on the hunt for, namely Guerlains Djedi...

Djedi is one of the most rare fragrances from the house of Guerlain. One single ml can cost as much as a full bottle of a less rare perfume. Originally Djedi was created in 1926 (or 1927), but Guerlain released a limited edition of it in 1996. My precious drops is from an original bottle before the re-realese.

On me Djedi starts with a cloud of smoke and it is a strange, greenish kind of smoke. The top note is so dry and jagged I feel all dry in the back of my mouth when smelling it upclose, still it smells strangely good at the same time. Dry, rough, different and really good. When the smoke has settled down a little I can feel the civet very clearly. This is a comforting civet, as soft and warm as a cats fur. I have never encountered such a perfect civet note in any other perfume.

Djedi is also grassy, aromatic and with a light and subdued tart element. I guess it´s probably the vetiver that manage to be both earthy/smoky and grassy/green at the same time. Probably diffrent kinds of vetiver have been used to get this effect. Apart from the opening I don´t really agree with Roja Dove that says that Djedi probably is the dryest fragrance of them all. My skin manage to find a soft, powdery sweetness even in Djedi, and in my opinion this is partly what makes Djedi such a great fragrance. The sweetness and powder comes from a muted rose. And the rose makes all the difference in Djedi. On me, the leather is hardly noticable.

Djedi is amazingly complex and I suspect it can smell very different on different people. My skin often brings forth sweetness in fragrances, so I manage to find sweetness even in Djedi (which, to me, is a good thing).

Djedi feels like a scent that is half a great classic a typical, rich, animalic chypre vintage from the house of Guerlain. But half of it manage to be (and this is a frag created 85 years ago!) like something created today in some edgy and beyond modern niche perfume house. One part aging, faded beauty and one part thrilling, modern and on the edge. With only one of this parts, Djedi would have been either hard to wear or slightly dated, but combined they create a timeless masterpiece.

My drops are of perfect quality, over and over again I encountere vintage fragrances which smells like the raw materials was prepered last week, not years and years ago. This is to me pure magic. For sure, sometimes the top notes can be a little off, but just wait 20 minutes and the fragarnce is all good to go.

¨The drydown of Djedi is surprisningly soft, green and powdery. It´s hard to get my nose of the little spot where I put the drop of Djedi, and while smelling it I realise it might be the last time I ever wear Djedi. Djedi is a rich, different and all together wonderful fragrance, but I wont spend that much money to get more of it...

Have you tried Djedi? What do you think about it? I know some perfume nerdas avoiding it, and other vintages just to avoid falling in love with scents that is both hard to get and often very expensive. I´m more of the bargain kind, sometimes I find vintage bottles for practically no money and if no one else find it, well of course I buy it.

Pic: surreal portrait

Marcel Rochas - Femme

2011-03-09T00:38:00.001-08:00

I was supposed to write about Chanel No 5 today, but I chickened. Why? Well, the fragrance itself is an icon and furthermore worn by the icon of icons, Marilyn Monroe. It´s hard to avoid Marilyn when thinking about Chanel No 5 and how could I write anything that isn´t allready written about any of them? Maybe I give it a new try some other day...

Instead I´ll write about a fragrance, if not as well known at least it seem to be very loved by perfume nerds like me. Femme by Rochas.

There are so many perfumes out there that would be loved if you only get around to try them. Femme was one of these until about a month ago (when I bought that mixed lot at Swedish ebay). And you can guess that I´m really happy that Femme was a part of that lot?

My bottle is marked with Marcel Rochas paris, which according to vintage connoiseurs means that it´s older then bottle with only Rochas marked on. This is on the cap, my bottle have no print on the bottle itself.

Still, I don´t exactly how old my version is, maybe from the 50'ies or 60'ies? The scent itself is in perfect condition (or in fact better, it smells divine!) the only thing not so good is that it´s an eau de colgne which on my skin has really poor staying power (only a coupple of hours and my skin usually holds scents rather good). Thanks to this I´ll need a vintage femme in a little stronger concentration, like an eau de toilette at least. And I´m sure this time I´ll not get it at bargain price!

Femme by Rochas was created by Edmond Roudnitska during world war II (1943).

Femme opens really, really strong with a kind of dark, full and heavy on oakmoss top note. Usually I don´t tend to like that kind of openings, but in Femme I find it to be wonderfully dark, mysterious and animalic with elements of some sweetness and warmth. This kind of opening usually make me want that the rest of the scent opens up quickly, but in Femme I would like the bold opening to keep on going if it wasn´t for...

If it wasn´t for that the part that comes there after are so much more comfy and great that I just want to sit with my nose attached to my skin. It´s lots of cinnamon, cinnamon that smells darker and more thrilling then common cinnamon thanks to that other spices underscores it without reveal themselfs (at least not on me). It´s juicy, sweet fruits, peach and plum so ripe that they´re mouthwatering. It´s also the wildest flowers with a scent so arousing, heavy and spicy that they are almost narcotic. Glowing, redishbrownpurple flowers with a warm inner glow. Oooh my, this smells so incredible good! Dark, heavy, magnetic and erotic, yes in this version Femme is for sure a masterpiece.

You can imagine that an eau de cologne should be a somewhat thin scent experience, but it isn´t. I´ve noticed that most vintage eau de cologne (the one´s I´ve tried, which in fact isn´t that many!) have a richness not far from nowadays eau de parfum. It´s not the strenght that is the problem, it´s the longvity.

After the wild, glowing heart note, Femme goes to rest on my skin. I can smell soft leather, oakmoss, sweet vanilla and some ambra, but this is only for a short while. Half an hour later it´s really difficult to find any leftovers from Femme. Since it smells so incredible good it´s easy to put on some more and some more and, well you get it?

Is is someone that have tried (or even own) a stronger version of vintage Femme? Or have you tried both the vintage and the modern one? Should I try the reformulated one as well? At least they can be found for really good prices...

I wish I had a Femme that last for a whole evening...

Soon I´ll write about a vintage Guerlain. And there after some luxury fragrances in the higher price range (which indeed the vintage Guerlain also is). So lock up your wallets and don´t blame me if they break free!

Pic: bloglovin

Ormonde Jayne - Osmanthus

2011-03-05T00:07:00.001-08:00

There are few fragrances that makes me miss summer as much as Ormonde Jaynes Osmanthus. Over all most of Ormonde Jaynes tropical inspired fragarnces has a very summery feeling to me.

In osmanthus you find the combination of citruses with flower, a combo I usually likea a lot. One problem with that kind of scents is that they can have very short and fleeting staying power, another is that the soft and whispery start is followed by way to heavy and dark basenotes that doesn´t seem to match the rest of the fragrance well. Osmanthus have neither of these problems and the very soul and heart of the scent remains true from start to end.

Osmanthus is much more then just a cute, citrusfloral for summery wear. Osmanthus feels both moodlifting and sensual at the same time. Osmanthus has "it". Among all Ormonde Jayne fragrances, Osmanthus feels like the most youthful, but still manage to be a fragarnces that suits women in all ages. It is partly timeless, but still with some retro vibes that makes me think about slender women in long white dresses and parasolls from the time somewhere around the early 20ieth century. Osmanthus is romantic, saturated, happy and very beautiful.

In Osmanthus you can find notes of davana, pomelos, osmanthus, jasmine, vetiver, musk, cedar and labdanum. There is a note that shows up and to me it smells like a softer version of tobacco. This makes the fragrance a little caramellised, and it´s so gorgeous. Could it be the davana? Even though it´s listed as a top note... (My skin pick up sweet notes very easy)

Towards the base, the florals become less flowering and come to rest, becomes softer and dryer, the citrus fleets away and vetiver contributes with a vauge greenish and dry feeling.

Oh, how I wish that the summer comes soon! I belive that Osmanthus, but also Champaca as well as Frangipani and Tiare comes much more to their right in warmer weather.

Osmanthus has good lasting power (6-8 hours) and good sillage (much more noticable then the shy Champaca). If you love citrus and flowers you must try Osmanthus. I belive everyone, both men and women can find at least on favorite among the wonderful perfume treasure of Ormonde Jayne´s.

Osmanthus, Champaca and all of the others are well made perfumes with high quality ingrediences and a big sense of belonging. Still, my personal favorite is Ormonde Woman, which you can read about here: http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2009/10/ormonde-jayne-ormonde-woman.html

You can find out about Ormonde Jaynes line of fragrances and gorgeuos (at least they seem gorgeous to me) body products here: http://www.ormondejayne.com/

This month Ormonde Jayne also offers a complimentary 10 ml purse spray of Osmanthus to everyone that buys a full bottle of Osmanthus parfum or eau de parfum. Here´s a link: http://www.ormondejayne.com/enews/2011/mar/030311_oj_march_promo.html?utm_campaign=March%2B-%2BPurse%2BSpray%2Bpromo%2B2011&utm_source=emailCampaign&utm_medium=email

Do you have any personal Ormonde Jayne favorite? And what about the bath oil, has anyone tried it?

Coming up: Some classic fragrances and there after some really luxurious scents.

Pic: osmanthus
Kröyer

Ormonde Jayne - Champaca

2011-03-01T05:34:00.001-08:00

To test Ormonde Jaynes fragrances is a little like having a private stay at a peaceful and unknown South Sea Island. Many of Ormonde Jaynes fragrances have got inspiration from wonderful tropical flowers like tiare, frangipani and champaca. But they are representating a tropical paradise far from bright colored cocktails, coconuts and hoards of tourists. All of Ormonde Jaynes perfumes seem to be filled with elegance, beauty and holds a longing away from gloomy European winter and also, our stressed out modern life style. In most of Ormonde Jaynes fragrances (both the more tropical, but also the "western" like Ormonde Woman) you can find a hide away, a serene retrat that caresses you in a quiet but also obvious way.

Ormonde Jaynes scents are kind of laid back, delicate and truly beautiful. Among those smoth and peaceful fragrances I think Champaca is the most comfy, soft and caressing. Champaca has a quiet charm, thats maybe in a more loud company isn´t the first one to get noticed, byt afterwards you realise, Champaca is the one you can´t forget about.

Champaca has notes of neroli, bamboo, champaca, fresia, basmati rice, myrrh, green tea and musk. It smells of a restrained, quite fleeting fruity sweetness, the floral notes are complex both arousing and some drier haylike notes. The note of basmati rice makes Champaca to an extremly comfy and cuddly scent. While wearing Champaca you feel comfortable in the same way you do when you have spend some wonderful hours on a luxury spa.

During the basenote a wionderfully creamy powderyness occurs. And this is little of a common house note in Ormonde Jaynes scents, like they all share a common ground. This creamyness becomes even more interesting -to me- since there is no vanilla present, which makes this a very special, unique and personal kind of creamy. The creamyness of Champaca is soft, caressing and sensual. And in different from a lot of other comfort scents, Champaca don´t feel like an autumn/winter scent, no in my opinion it´s perfect for summer wear.

The drydown feels like put your softest favorite sweater on at a warm summer night after a day filled with summery sunshine.

Champaca has good lasting power (about 6-7 hours on me) and medium sillage, it´s stronger early on and become more of a soft skinscent during dry down. I recommend Champaca to everyone looking for a sunny, fresh, beautiful and comfortable floral. The basmati note is a wonderful element and really nice to experience without being particulary foody.

Pic: flickr

A short report about our perfume meeting.

2011-02-28T01:24:00.000-08:00

As usual a really nice day with other perfume lovers. My youngest daughter tagged along and behaved quite well (I had to bribe her with a stop at LUSH).

This time we managed to buy a travel set of Hermessence, the other two times they haven´t had any Ambre Narguile. I got me a small bottle of Iris Ukioje, which was a surprise to me, love at first sniff! More about it later...

We visited COW where I put on some Dulcis in Fundo and realised that I need more of this! Everything was just great besides that our train home was more than an hour late!!!

It was as usual so nice to meet and we had a new participant also. I hope we´ll have another meeting in a coupple of months.

Perfume meeting on saturday and some waiting in line.

2011-02-24T05:04:00.001-08:00

This week the kids are having winter break, unfortunatly the weather has been a little to cold, even though some days have been sunny. Anyway, I´m not much of a winter sport type, but I enjoy getting out in the forrest with husband, kids and dog.
So far we have mostly indulged in indoor activities like reading and baking.

On saturday it´s time for another perfume meeting in Stockholm. We´ll meet at NKs perfume department at 11.30 and I hope my train isn´t late. I had hope to manage to visit that shop that offers vintage perfumes, but a friend told me they´ve closed. :(

Apart from that I have a cute little line up of perfumes waiting to be evaluated and reviewed. Among them for instant the Ormonde Jayne fragrances which is so nice to learn to know better, also I have at least 3 vintage treasures that want´s my attention as well as a pile of samples from Montale and Neil Morris.

Pic: insect dolls waiting in line

Guest post, LUSH - Honey I washed the kids

2011-02-22T02:57:00.000-08:00

Hello! My name is Felicia and I´m Annelie´s daughter, I´m 13 years old, and a beauty addict, and I´m going to write about one of my favorite companies: Lush!
Some of you might already know about Lush, some of you might not, but Lush is a company that started in England and makes bath and shower products. Lush is against animal tasting, and use only eco-friendly and fresh ingredients in their products. The good thing with Lush is that they have a huge variety of diffrent products that usually is booring or in worst case, doesn´t smell so good!!!! But Lush makes it fun to take a bath or a shower. But the only bad thing about Lush is that it can be kind of pricey for a small chunk of soap or a bottle of schampoo, but it´s worth the money. The list of amazing products is long but it´s still not hard to pick my favorite: Honey I washed the kids!

Honey I washed the kids is a soap, and if a soap is a teenage girls favorite product from a brand that have, bathbomb,bubblebars,showerjellies( a kind of soap that is like jell-o), perfumes and much more it must be pretty good. It smells like honey toffee and is simply perfect! HIWTK is a best seller and I know why.

The soaps from Lush all have diffrent qualities, some have exfoiliants in them, some are specielly made for dry or oily skin. HITWK is very creamy and works best for sensitive skin, and it moisturises a bit, but not as a body lotion would, and the best thing about it is that the scent stay on your skin, but it is very subtle and it´s almost only yourself who can smell it. On the top of the soap there´s honey comb, like real honey comb, and it exfoliets your skin, the good thing with that is that you can choose if you want to only clean yourself or if you want to exfoliate as well. As soon as you buy a slice of HIWTK you just want to take a shower as soon as you possibly can, that´s how good it smells.

Pic: Honey I washed the kids, LUSH

Cerchi Nell'Acqua - White Out

2011-02-20T23:37:00.001-08:00

Even though I really like Jolie and Waves from Cerchi Nell'Acqua, White Out is probably the fragrance among them all that makes me most happy and that also feels most "me". :)

While Jolie partly is a little to discrete and Waves a little to loud, White Out is just perfect. Oh yeah, this fragrance makes me so happy! It´s at least as complex as Waves, but while Waves has obvious retro vibes, White Out feels modern and innovative. But absolutly not modern like in hard to wear or too peculiar. Only like a fragrance that feel very much in phase with the time and relevant and soooo very soft, wonderful and yet with that little special something making it special and unforgettable.

As the others from Cerchi Nell'Acqua it has a very round and soft character. In the opening White Out is very much about vanilla, a soft, smoth and creamy vanilla that soon enough gets accompanied by a cooling scent that I can´t really pinpoint. Kind of minty, but without tothpaste vibes, maybe eucalypthus or menthol, it´s not fresh or aquatic, but rather a dry and cold scent that maybe could be blended with some flower (fresia?)? This cold note don´t actually smell so much, but contributes with an over all feeling of cold and stops the vanilla from being too sweet or ordinary vanilly.

On me the vanilla holds center part for a very long time, it´s like the other notes moves around the vanilla. The cold scent/feeling seem to build a bridge between the vanilla and the toher notes and makes them all tag on to each other. If this sounds strange I´m sorry, but I can´t explain it any other way... The result is a sort of warm cold feeling that stays pretty much through the entire development. Like falling snow on a soft and warm wolf if I would be a little way-out.

Besides the vanilla, the sweet and warmness of White Out could be something very discrete and fruity hiding within the vanilla. Some half an hour in the fragarnces I also starts to feel the woody notes, one interesting aspect is that the woody note also feels very soft and smooth, like beachwood, silvery pale and softened by the ocean for years (still what the woody note intact though). The patchouli is very discrete and doesn´t really smell like patchouli, but rather contributes to the woody note, after some time I also detect something reminding of oakmoss.

Shortly speaking, White Out is an amazing, complex and also very comfy fragrance. Really good lasting power (at least 8-10 h) and noticable sillage. White Out works on both women and men. I recommend White Out to anyone looking for a personal and different take on vanilla. Actually the hole line of Cerchi Nell'Acqua is very mych worth trying, and I sure hope it reaches outside Italy soon.

Pic: Inside igloo
snowcovered wolf

Cerchi Nell'Acqua - Waves

2011-02-20T00:14:00.001-08:00

If Jolie (that I wrote about yesterday) is a soft, comfy and with gourmand elements, Waves is a totally different kind of scent.

Waves starts off like it was an "unknown" classic, Waves could have been launched by Caron for many, many years ago. I don´t think that I ever have encountered a modern fragrances that in the opening manage to smell so alike a vintage greatness. Of course this can partly depend on that this kind of fragrances isn´t asked for by young and not so perfume interested customers. On me the opening is on the border to to much, probably beacuse I didn´t expect such a magnificent and huge start. It´s like looking for a comfy sweater to put on, but by mistake happens to end up in a tight sequin dress. :)

But relax, even though Waves will keep parts of it´s grand opening, it´ll softens and mellows as time goes by. The opening is a blast of bergamott and citrys mixed with splendid florals and a dash of warm spicy cinnamon. After about 5-10 minutes, Waves warms up in the most beautiful way.

Waves is a fragrance that constantly changes, but as the name suggest the changes are soft like waves and without actual start or end. Waves as a scent spins around it´s own axle. elements of opoponax, ambra and sandalwood makes Waves to a warm, golden and glowing kind of scent. Waves is very sensual, even erotic and made for a grown up women with taste for glamour, drama and surprises.

The flowers in Waves are wonderful and warm, on my skin jasmine and orange flowers are most noitceable, but violet, iris and lavender is also present. ActuallyWaves seem to have so many different parts that I belive every single part of my skin, where I tested the fragrance, smells a little bit different. Complex, changing and in constant movement, but as with Jolie, no sharp edges. Waves has a bulit in smothness, soft, caressing and round as a perfect beach pebble.

When the citrus notes has tuned down and the florals has come to rest on my skin, there is golden, glowing, soft and slightly powdery scent of opoponax, ambra, sandalwood and spicy cinnamon left. this smells totally gorgeous, great and really addictive. Five out of five without a doubt!

Waves have good longvity and also a great sillage, even a bit demanding in the start.
Waves is an absolut must try if you´re usually into large, heady florals with some real vintage feel.

Pic: Dahlia close up, flickr
beach pebbles

Cerchi Nell'Acqua - Jolie

2011-02-19T01:03:00.000-08:00

Enrico Buccella is a very profilic and creative man, not only is he the creator of Sigilli that I just wrote about, but also he´s the genious behind Cerchi Nell'Acqua (water circles). As for now, Cerchi Nell'Acqua is only available in Italy, but I hope it´ll be available at www.humbra.it soon.

While Sigilli was inspired by the etruscans and feautured a little more rare notes and combination of notes, Cerchi Nell'Acqua´s five (Jolie, White Out, Waves, Piccolo Amor and Ambr'ero) fragrances consist of some well known ingrediences, but presented in a brand new way. What´s new and sursprising with Cerchi Nell'Acqua is that the fragarnce is built in layer on layer, in circles (therefor the name water circles).

And yes, I have to admit I´m really impressed with these fragarnces and also, very enamoured with three of them. I´ll start with Jolie which is the softest and lightest of the five. Notes of vanilla, almond, milk, fruits and musk. Jolie is so easy to like, soft as eiderdown, delicate like a porcelain ballerina, smoth as a mothers caresse and comfy as the softest blanket. Somehow Jolie smells like the equivalent to holding a really soft and rounded stone in your hand, softness without any end or sharp edges.

Since it´s not built as a usual pyramide shaped fragrance, the different notes shows up slightly different from one wear to another. I suspect that Jolie, but the others in the line as well, would be quite different on different persons. On me Jolie starts off with a smoth scent of almond and vanilla, softly followed by a very transparente note of cherry, then I can sense a note of cold milk and those notes runs in and out of each other and it feels like the fragrance is changing in phase with my heartbeat or like waves on my skin. Jolie makes me think of anything soft like little downy chickens, soft baby cheeks, the blanket my son got in Christmas present, powdery snow and powdery sugar, kittens and puppies, whipped cream and vanilla custard.

What makes Jolie stand out from other fragrances with almond and vanilla (there are quite a few actually!)is the roundness, somehow it feels like a scent without an end, like something that goes round and round, and then round and round again (like a perpetual motion machine). As a women it´s natural for me to recognise and appreciate anything cyclic, therefor Jolie, and other fragarnces in the Nell'Acqua line fits me perfectly.

Jolie is a superior comfort scent with soft gourmand character. A must try for everyone usually found of the vanilla+almond combo, but also for everyone curious about a new way of perfumery. Jolie has excellent stating power (+8 hours at least with generous application), sillage is also good and then I only have a dab on sample.

I´ll write about some of the other Cerchi Nell'Acqua fragrances as well. What do you think about the traditional pyramide shaped fragrance, does it feel dated? Today, a lot of popular mainstream scents have a fabolous opening, but after 10-20 minutes there isn´t much left at all... Perfumers have tried to create starshaped or square shaped fragarnces, but in my opinion the round shape seem very natural and not so constructed. What do you think? Of course it can be difficult to have an opinion about a scent that you never tried, but there is some other fragrances with a roundness to them also, for instant I find Guerlains Insolence (edp) to be round and built in layers...

Oh, and there is only one week left to our next perfume meeting. I´m soooo looking forward to it. :)

Pic: Eiderdown and porcelain ballerina

Sigilli - Claudiae

2011-02-15T05:05:00.001-08:00

Claudiae is probably my favorite among the Sigilli fragrances. Sigilli´s fragrances are interesting and even thrilling to test, but some of them have been a little hard to relate to for me, mostly because the unfamiliar combination of notes. This makes Sigilli fragrances unlike anything else I´ve tried, which is of course, both good and bad. I´ve also noticed I like several of them better and better when I have got a little time to adjust to them. Sigilli´s perfumes are truly niche when it´s at it´s best, ground breaking, unique, but maybe not fitting everybodys taste.

Such a fragrance is Claudiae. Claudiae is an odd, but also comfy creation. The opening is filled with green, aromatic tomato leafs that soon gets company by a nutty, grainy and very aromtic note of poppy. the opening feels like a very beneficial , but also strange kind of herbal tea or herbal remedy of some kind. I´m usually quite found of medical elements in fragrances, so to me this makes Claudiae interesting and personal.

After about half an hour, Claudiae is chagning a little, rose makes it softer and sweeter, but at the same time a note of fennel shows up, with it´s herbal anise like scents, but also something that underscores the nuttyness from the poppy. This is a really well made and creative fragrance. It feels like a clebration for an ancient fertility or harvest goddess. Despite it´s "antique" character, I´m sure Claudiae would suit perfume lovers in any age looking for something truly unique.

The base is warm, creamy and dense. And with elements of patchouli and musk it gets deeper, darker and more sensual with time. The base feels, in different from the rest of the fragrances, quite modern and very easy to like and wear. During this phase Claudiae is more of a comfort scent and I can´t stop sniffing my wrist.

longvity is good and sillage is also good, even though i only have a little dab on sample. Claudiae has so much of personality and charm that I´m sure I´ll need more of it when my small sample is finnished.

As mentioned, Sigilli has more fragrances to offer, and besides the two I have wrote about here I feel I have to mention both Asprosa and Athunis. They are pretty much each others opposite, but I like them both. Asprosa is a wonderful soft and feminine floral with notes of citrus, rose and orange blossom. If you like L'Artisan´s La Chasse Aux Papillon, you probably love this one too, it´s that kind of creamy citrus floral and with good lasting power too. Athunis on the other hand is all about warm wood and strong smoke, with notes of cedar and vetiver it is a masculin fragrances, but also suitable for women liking really smoky scents, cause it might be the smokiest vetiver I ever smelled. An aboslute MUST try for all vetiver lovers!

for now, Sigilli is available at Aus Liebe Zum Duft, but Enrico Buccella is planning for a webpage soon.

Pic: poppies

Sigilli - Ferfaen

2011-02-13T00:40:00.001-08:00

While mainstream perfume brands seem to be inspired only by youth, beauty, and nowadays fame also, some niche-and indie perfume brands seem to find inspiration in past times, with Hollywood glamour, smiling pin-up girls and the happy days of the 20'ies.

Still, it´s not that common to find fragrances inspired by an era more than 50 or even 100 years ago. But, Italian perfumer, Enrico Buccella have found inspiration from the etruscan culture. The etruscan people lived in what is known as Italy in our time, their culture and society flourished around 500 BC. A lot of information about the etruscna people has been lost, but it´s recognised that they where skilled artisans. Eventually the etruscan power diminished and they become assimilated in the Roman empire.

It´s an interesting challenge to test the different fragrances, Asprosa, Claudiae, Tyrsenoi, Ferfaen, Ea, Athunis, Pyrgos, Thu, Hesperia, Volumnia and Tuscia, but with that many new fragrances to evaluate it can be a little hard to overlock them all. They all have one thing in common, they manage to create a feeling of an long time gone culture in avery genuin and trustworthy way. i don´t like all of the fragrances in the line as much, some of them are even a little hard to pull off, but still they convince at least me, that this is how people some 3000 years ago liked to smell...

One of my favorites is Ferfaen, which means verbena in celtic, and yes, this is a scent with fresh verben in the middle, but also underscored by dark and aromatic notes of tobacco and musk. Ferfaen is complex and changes a lot on my skin, the opening is like a mix between herbal and aromatic citruses and some fresh mint. after about 20 minutes - half an hour the scent darkens, tobacco gives a deepth to Ferfaen, while verbena and mint is still noticable. Something in the meeting of verbena and tobacco gives a dry almost papery feeling, but at the same time something that also smells like rugged leather. I´ve never encountered anything like this in a fragrance.
It´s strange and different, yet Ferfaen is one of the most easier to wear among the Sigilli fragrances.

The base is warm, aromatic, sligthly sweet and with some animalic musk. It´s senual and even a little erotic, so I can see why verbena was used as an aphrodisia.

While testing Sigilli, I was reading a book about Pompeiji and the fragrances brought
another dimension to my reading experience.

Ferfaen has good lasting power (about 6 hours), and not that huge sillage, but I´ve tested it with a dab on sample though. To me, I can see Ferfaen being used by both men and women. And I do recommend you to put on any of the Sigilli scents if you´re about to watch any costume movie taking place under the Anticque era. Or of course if you read a book about that time. Sigilli will bring a little extra something to that experience...

Serge Lutens - Jeux de peau

2011-02-09T03:04:00.001-08:00

Now about something totally different then a bargain. More precise, a small sample of Serge Lutens latest offering Jeux de peau, which I bought at Ebay last week for no less then about 7 €. Oh, well and yesterday I get an offer to get a sample for free. Win some loose some...

Even though I have lately manage to extend my perfume collection quite much, I also have had time to test Jeux de peau a few times. And yes, this I do like! Comfy yet different, soft and sensual.

It opens with a very genuin note of roasted bread. Have never smelled anything like this in a fragrance actually. The roasted bread note hangs in there for a while, but become quite soft. Soon an equaly soft and pleasant note of apricot is showing, I think of it as apricots in milk or even cream. Not so sweet, but very comforting. This part of Jeux de peau smells incredible good, but I also discovers similarities with Etat Libre d'Orange´s Like This. If you like Like This, you´ll probably like Jeux de peau as well. But, I don´t think you´ll need them both. Both of them are soft, sensual and skin close scents, and about half an hour in Jeux de peau I even think I prefer it before Like This...

But, after some time the sandalwood note joins, it´s both nice and creamy, but also with a certain sharp and brisk element that some sandalwood gets on me. In this fragrance the sandalwood don´t become too brisk and sharp, but still it´s the reason that I in this phase prefer Like This over Jeux de peau. Like This continues on the soft side, but with that discrete chili note that I like so much. Jeux de peau feels like a layer of softer than soft (apricot+milk+bread) mixed over a sharp layer. I think it´s matter of taste what you prefer.

If it wasn´t for that sharpness in the base, i would say that Jeux de peau is spot on fabulous comfort scent, but in the base it become more like a sandalwood scent with some soft musk, the bread and apricot isn´t there in the end.

Until I tried Jeux de peau I was sure to buy a BB of Like This soon, but now I feel a little less sure. Maybe I like Jeux de peau a little tiny bit better? Or the other way around? I´m not sure, I guess I have to do a little more side by side testing.

Jeux de peau have good longvity and soft, skin close sillage. It´s a rather feminine scent, but I think it would be really interesting on man too... Anyway, this is a must try if you like Like This or if you´re looking ofr different and not so sweet gourmand fragrances.

Pic: flickr.com

Buy 15 and get 14 for free.

2011-02-08T23:33:00.001-08:00

Usually I don´t buy 15 bottles of perfume (or fragrances) at the same time. But some times I stumble upon offers that seem to be to good to be true. I promise I had to pinch my arm yesterday...

First of all I bought a lot of ten different fragrances at Tradera (Swedish Ebay) and since the seller lived in the same town as me, we agreed that I could get collect them at his place. What I bought was ten bottles of un-specified fragrance, but thanks to the pic I could at least identify a bottle of vintage Shalimar and a bottle of vintage Femme by Rochas, some of the other offerings wasn´t that interesting, for example several bottles of deo spray... I think it´s so thrilling to buy this kind of things, it can be a true finding, but also it can show that the precious perfume haven´t manage to well and gone stale and sour... Oh well, for about 15 € it´s a risk I´m willing to take.

When I come to collet the bottles the seller told me that he have a lot of other perfume as well, a whole box that I could check if I was interested. Oh yes! It was at least 30-40 bottles, even though a mayority was cheap Avon-Yves Rocher kind of scents I did find a bottle of vintage Chanel No 5 almost full, a bottle of vintage Miss Dior, and Dior´s Dune, and Paris by YSL and Eau Torride by Givenchy. I explain that I am most interested in perfumes from well known brands, since they´ve probably hold a better quality and will stay good for a longer time. For another 15 € I get those bottles as well.

My knees was all shaky! Wow what a finding!

The pic above show most of the bottles, but not the deo sprays etc. I have briefly tested the known fragrances and they seem to be in good shape, except of Shalimar that smells so MUCH better then my newer version. It´s much more full bodied and glowing and... wow, and yet it´s only and eau de cologne.

Some of the bottles are nothing but curiosities, like the one in the left corner, Parfum de Escapade by AB Perplex, made only for "Hemmets Journal" a swedish ladies magasine, seem to be about 50 years old and I guess it´s really, really rare, but not so much sought after though. :)

The bottle with the greenish label is from Mallorca, Aromes de la Granja, it have a flower of some kind floating in the juice.

If someone have any information about the After Dark or Great lakes bottles, please let me know.

I tend to some strange buyings from time to time. This far I have been dissapointed once, and that was when the seller (or someone else) had blended the remainings of the frags with water!

Do you prefer to play it safe when it comes to perfumes? Maybe you plan exactly what to buy? A bargain can easily end up to be a bunch of dust collecting bottles... But, in this case I know I love Shalimar, and that I probably will use Chanel No 5 from time to time, and Dune is also smelling quite good and Miss Dior, well I guess I make a nice bargain after all. :)

What is your best bargain?

A little internet hate...

2011-02-06T00:18:00.000-08:00

When I´m on to not liking things I can as well continue with it, right?

Imagine you work at an ordinary company or health care or school or whatever. As long as your cleaner staff does their job good you might not even notice them. He/she maybe not even works the times you work. But, if you´re ordinary cleaner quits and the new one don´t clean that well, forget to fill up the toilet paper, no dusting underneath the photo copier and so on. Then you notice the cleaner, don´t you? At least you notice that it isn´t clean. That the new cleaner have two less hours than the old to make the same job, well no one remember to inform the staff about it... So everyone ends up wanting to strangle the poor cleaner.

This is kind of how I feel about our mailman now. I KNOW that the swedish post had have major cut downs lately, like there isn´t any post offices left anymore. You have to go to your local grocery store and do your postal buisness. And I hate posting letters there, since the staff don´t even know where USA or Great Britain is situated (inside or outside Europe!!!). So nowadays I buy my own stamps and weigh my own letters.

Still, I can´t deliver my own post! Even though that is a question 'bout time, probably sooner or later ordinary people have to go to the post terminal and get their own post, every day monday-friday, between 12-14, except on thursday when they have a staff meeting. Well, what is going on is that post on it´s way to me have started to dissapear. :(

Since beginning of november at least five different parcels on their way to me have not maked it. At first i blamed the post in Italy, France and Great Britain, but then I talked with out neighbor.

She told me that our post have been put in their mailbox the whole week. Of course the neighbors put it in our mailbox, but that isn´t exactly their job.

Now I´m really paranoid that all my interesting perfume samples have been delivered to someone else (not our closest neighbors, I think they´re really reliable), but people some other place that don´t know me (us) at all... Of course my bubble mailers looks a little more interesting then envelopes from some dull authority.

The thing is that I belive I have a copple of perfume friends in Sweden that also have noticed that the mail isn´t as smoth as it used to be. Small parcels that should have been delivred the next day don´t arrive until after about four or five days. And you don´t chose sign for delivery (in Sweden this is quite expensive) if the value is about 3 euro.

What is your experiences with the post companies? Have you noticed any change lately? Or do you think the post was better where you lived before? Have you waited in vain for something that never arrived? Or have something you´ve send don´t reach the right destination? Feel free to wine, it´s totally Ok to "hate" the post delivery today on my blog. And in our modern society where common people don´t send post any more, we perfumistas is an exception...

pic: fashionbysara.blogspot.com

L'Artisan Parfumeur - Traversee du Bosphore

2011-02-05T00:00:00.000-08:00

Istanbul seem to be such a thrilling and lively city. Amon cities I dream about to visit, Istanbul may not be in the absolute top, but not far from. Filled with cultural treasures, historical buildings and places, streets filled with life, shops and food. East meets west, I belive it´s about 1% of Turkeys quite large landarea that is situated in Europe, while all the rest is a part of Asia. Like a blue ribbon east and west are divided by the strait of Bosphorus...

Not to wonder about that L'Artisan and nose Bertrand Duchafor, latest offering, Traversee du Bosphore woke my curiosity. Bertrand Duchafor travels around the world to find inspiration to his fragrances from the most different places. With notes of turkish delight, appel tee and leather, it must be soo good I belived. I´ve even noticed that people that usually find fragrances inspired by turkish delight to be too sweet and cloying actually like this one. That is really good for them, but I don´t like it though.

Oh well, I kind of like it sort off, about 75-80% of it. On me there isn´t much turkisk delight at all, it´s like you take away turkisk from turkish delight and put some apple in there instead, so you got some kind of apple delight. Unfortunatly a rather sweet, cloying and sticky apple delight. Beneath this I dicover a weak, but still noticable leathery note. The lether is whiffing around, like a scaled down leather jacket leather. For some reason this combo makes my stomach ill...

Usually I don´t feel sick when I try perfumes. I usually like and even love to many perfumes for my own good, but not this one. It´s not as nauseting as when I tried Etat Libre d'Oranges Viergos et Toreros, where I had to rush to the bathroom and scrub it of really fast.

The first time I tried Traversee du Bosphore I liked it and belived that the vague nausea depended on something else. The other time I tried it I realise it was caused by the perfume. It´s not like full scaled nausea, more kind of vague discomfort.

But I realise now when I sit here with a littlest spray of Traversee du Bosphore that I become a little more uncomfortable for each time I wear it!

What in Traversee du Bosphore that makes my stomach feel so uncomfortable I don´t know. It IS sweet, but I love a lot of much sweeter perfumes without a problem. Maybe it´s thanks to that apple note which on my smells very cheap and synthetic. Honestly if someone pored this in another bottle and presented it to me as the new offering from britney Spears, I´ll probably belive them. It smells a little cheap and synthetic to me. Sorry, sorry, sorry!

You have to excuse me, now I have to go and scrub... this.... off... immediately... sorry!

Pic:Blue Mosque and the Bosphorus_ Istanbul_ Turkey

Not a post, but a link to a post...

2011-02-04T04:05:00.000-08:00

I have been a little lazy the alst week and not manage to write even a single post to the blog. Tomorrow I hope I manage to write together a little piece on L'Artisan´s new fragrances Traversee du Bosphore. Apart from that I´m in the middle of trying two really interesting Italian perfume lines AND also the new Serge Lutens Jeux de peau. More about them all soon.

Today I´ll just link to an article at Ca fleure bon, my first posting for them:

http://www.cafleurebon.com/forever-amber-fragrances-a-love-story-heart-of-gold-draw/

I feel really honored to write for them since they´ve some "worldknown" perfume writers with great passion, knowledge and ambition. Thanks to dear Michelyn that gave me this opportunity. :)

The Pink Room - Darkly Audacious

2011-01-30T01:03:00.001-08:00

Darkly Audacious is the newest offering from The Pink Room. In different from No 1 it wasn´t love at first sniff when I first tried Darkly Audacious, but pretty soon I realised it is one of those fragrances that keep growing on you. It´s not as splendid, glorious and daring as it´s older sister No 1, but on the other hand it´s much more soft, cosy and a little thrilling...

In Darkly Audacious you can find notes of bergamot, jasmine, rosewood, rose, plum, patchouli, amber and vanilla. Someone asked me what kind of plum it is in Darkly Audacious, but at that time I hadn´t really learned to know Darkly Audacious. Now I know, but on me the plum don´t really act as plum. One of the days when I was trying to figure Darkly Audacious out, I realised, it´s not plum, on me it smells like cherries. Yes, in the opening I can swear that Darkly Audacious smells like refreshing, tangy and sweet cherry coke.

Neither cherry or heliotrope is listed, but when I have recognized the smell of cherry I can´t make it to become plum again. And i really don´t mind smelling the kind of cherry I find in Darkly Audacious, in the opening it´s juicy and sweet, but soon it becomes darker and more thrilling.

Within 20 minutes Darkly Audacious becomes soft, powdery, feminine, soft floral and mysterious. A feeling of dark velvet, blackish red. Full bodied, grown up and sensual. It´s still a sweet scent, but nicely balanced. It manage to be both a snuggly comfort fragrance and really sensual at the same time. Not as moodlifting, flirty or lively as No 1. Darkly Audacious rather make me think about a beautiful, sensual but a little shy women.

Anyway, the dry down is my favorite phase of Darkly Audacious. The warm wood notes becomes more prominent, vanilla and ambery glows through and something in the base smells like smoth, roasted haselnuts on me. The nutty note is kind of discrete, but still there and very, very pleasant. I usually like nutty notes in perfume, and this is nopt an exception. Simply gorgeous.

Darkly Audacious don´t have any sharp edges, it´s smoth, pleasant and sensaul from start to end. A perfect scent for winter or at parties. A little less heavy on sillage then No 1, yet quite powerful. Longvity is also good, even slightly better then No 1 (6-8 hours on me). I recommend Darkly Audacious to anyone looking for a cozy yet sensaul winter fragrance or if you favour sweet, differemt scents with gourmand elements.

Pic: National geographic

The Pink Room - No 1

2011-01-26T00:22:00.001-08:00

To try new scents is always thrilling. Some of them have nothing to add, while others smells incredible good. Some are very interesting, different or creative, while others are plain boring. some perfumes lack both heart and soul, while other has plenty of it. A lot of fragrances has nothing to say, while a few tells me stories...

The Pink Rooms first offering, No 1, is one of those fragrances that creates a fantastic dreamy story on my skin. From The Pink Room (that until now has been a quite unfamiliar brand to me) I had expect some well made and lovely scents, but really not this...

It´s a grey, windy and gloomy day in the end of january. You´re on your way home through snow slush and ice, people you meet seem to be fully occupied with getting inside as fast as possible. But suddenly, it´s like a grasp of air among the people. You look up and notice a totally stunning beauty pacing down the street. A woman escaped from the most glamorous time of Hollywood. While she´s getting closer, you can swear that she is the young and glorious beautiful Elisabeth Taylor. A young Elisabeth Taylor dressed for an red carpet walk. Wearing an amazing dress in heavy pink velvet, impeccable hair and flawless make up. All the people on the street stops and hold their breath and savors the almost magic moment. When Elisabeth Taylor slowly passes you, you can inhale the smell of her perfect perfume...

In a blink, the scenery is changing. In some way the stunningly beauty Elisabeth Taylor transforms to the pretty, carefree, flirty and girly Katy Perry! While Elisabeth Taylor walked by, the people hold their breaths but now you can see them smile and even laugh. Katy Perry might not be magic och mystic, but her aura is so happy, quirky and filled with joy that you can´t help being smitten. The grey january evening is changed to a shiny party mood.

The Pink Room No 1, sett off my imagination, but also so much more than that. The opening is a radiant, heady, strong and brilliant floral. Full-bodied, sweet, aromatic and classic. This is a scent that would have easily made Elisabeth Taylor justice during her days of glory, or chose which ever grand Hollywood starlet you prefer. If No 1 would be a a piece of clothes, it would be a glamorous vintage creation from some of the big fashion houses, vintage, but still wearable today.

During the last days I have had cravings for No 1. I can think of any better fragrance to chase the january cold and greyness away. The notes of jasmine, lily of the valley and rose is so glowing, heady and big that they become magnificent. No 1 isn´t a perfume for the modest or shy, this is a fragrances that easily ends up wearing you, but sometimes I like that. When it comes to No 1, I love it!

But, somewhere in the middle, No 1 is drastically changing. The huge, classis floral is fading a little and a softer, still floral, but also vanilla laced scent is getting up on the stage. No 1 is now becoming girly, flirty, modern and happy without being childish. very mood lifting, energetic and fun. The jasmine, but even more, the lily of the valley is slowly dissapearing, while the violet becomes more noticable. together with the rose, they create that smell of expensive, creamy lipstick that I love in fragrances. Suddenly No 1 is as made for Kay Perry when she looks the most girly, quirky and flirty fun you can imagine.

The best thing with No 1, is that I love it from start to finnish. Maybe the transformation from classic, huge floral glamour to modern pop princess is a bit abrupt, but that is also for me a reason to like it even more. It´s full fo surprise, happyness and elegance. Both in the opening and base No 1 smells so good I´m having troubble to stop sniffing my wrist. From start to end, No 1 smells well made, luxurious and full bodied.

The sillage is, partculary from start, really big, but getting a little more gentle after a while. It has good lasting power (5-6 hours on me). In my opinion No 1 is a really feminin scent, but that wouldn´t stop perfume interested men from trying a really grand floral. It might be No 1´s hugeness that can cause troubble to some. I´ve heard people saying they have no clothes that would match such a grand perfume, others got headache from it. Thankfully, non of that goes for me. No 1 is probably among the best "larger then life" florals that I have tried. Really FB-worthy if you ask me. :)

You can read more about The Pink Room here: http://www.pinkroom.co.uk/

Pic: Elisabeth Taylor

Katy Perry

Comptoir Sud Pacific - Vanille Canelle

2011-01-24T03:24:00.001-08:00

I´ve decided to stay with the vanilla for yet another posting, but the fragrance of today has another note in the leading role, namely cinnamon.

Cinnamon isn´t as commonly used in perfumes as vanilla, still you can find cinnamon in a lot of scents. But, it´s not as common that cinnamon get´s to play the leading role, Comptoir Sud Pacific´s Vanille canelle is an exception. Comptoir Sud Pacific offers a whole line on the vanilla theme such as Vanille Apricot, Vanille Banane etc, but unfortunatly it seem like Vanille Canelle is no longer in the line up, but you can find it at Ebay though.

Vanille Canelle is really a quite simple scent, and parts of it has a slightly syntetic smell (particulary in the opening), but when it settles on my skin it starts to smell incredible jummy. It´s like the scent of warm, spicy and aromatic cinnamon with a dash of vanille in some kind of gas. Really jummy and nice, as a gourmand it never becomes to heavy or sweet, this is light, airy and very comfy.

During the firts half hour, the cinnamon is dominating the fragrance, and I really like this part. After that the cinnamon becomes softer and change places with the vanilla. The vanilla is sweet, soft and creamy and becomes a little more interesting thanks to a slightly burnt sugary note. That is pretty much how complicated Vanille Canelle is, but when I feel for a simple cinnamon without any other spices, florals or whatever, Vanille Canelle is a given choise.

As a gourmand it´s incredible light, easy to like and mouthwatering, as a comfort scent it´s extremly cozy and sensual in a cuddly way. A must try for everyone that likes cinnamon. I wouldn´t mind having it as a home scent either. The sillage is definitly noticable, but the lasting power isn´t that good. After about 3-4 hours all that remains is a weak scent of vanilla sugar. the not so good longvity is something I´ve noticed with some other Comptoir Sud Pacific scents.

Since, Vanille Canelle probably will be harder and harder to find, do anyone have some nice suggestions on other fragrances with cinnamon without so much else going on around? Preferable not so sweet or heavy.

Pic: cinnamon2

LUSH - Vanillary

2011-01-23T00:09:00.001-08:00

Can as well keep on going with vanillas, now when I´ve started. And it´s really quite suitable since I´ve had crawings for vanilla fragrances during december and january. Last year at this time I was craving large florals and honey, this year it´s vanilla and amber. What cathegory of fragrances have you had the most lust for during the last months?

Vanilla is a really popular note in fragrances, sometimes used only by very light hand to get some sweetness and softness, and sometimes the vanilla is in center of attention, like in Vanilla Musk that I wrote about yesterday and also many others. In vanillary from LUSH, the vanilla is also in center of attention, but with more company then yesterday´s vanilla.

I have an over all soft spot for LUSH and their products, unfortunatly we don´t have a LUSH store in our town, but everytime I visit our bigger neighbor town I´m for sure heading to the LUSH shop. Their bath ballistics, massage bars, facial masks and soaps are really something little extra. And for some time now, Gorilla Perfumes ( a new start for old Be Never...) had made perfumes for LUSH, so it´s even more nice to stop by...

One good thing with LUSHs perfumes is that they come in several and quite small sizes and they also offer perfume in cream (I haven´t tried it though, but looks like a nice alternative). Their purse sized sprays are so affordable and you can in fact buy both one, two or three of them without being ruined. You van find more information aboutLUSH and their products here:

http://www.lush.se/

The day before Christmas Eve I bought a small bottle of Vanillary and that is totally different vanilla then yesterday´s Vanilla Musk.

Vanillary isn´t really a gourmand vanilla that you put on when you have sweet cravings. Despite that there isn´t any doubts about Vanillary being a vanilla scent fro vanilla lovers, the vanilla is in front and very obvious, I belive the closest is to call it a vanilla for grown up vanilla lovers.

Besides the vanilla I can smell some flowers in vanillary, jasmine but also something else, probably ylang which fades away rather quickly though. Directly from start Vanillary also have a very smoky feeling. This is also a vanilla that would suit men perfect.

I find Vanillary to be strong and can be used by light hand. For me, one spray at my wrist is enough, the sillage is really large, while lasting power is about medium.

The florals from the opening fades little by little, but the smoky note stays, slowly the vanilla getting deeper, darker, but also creamier, a little powdery and sweeter. This phase of the fragrance makes me think of someone smoking vanilla cigarettes. Quite stunning actually, and this also makes Vanillary to a nice vanilla for evening wear. It´s soft and cuddly at the same time as thrilling.

Do you have any LUSH favorites? I´m really a fan of the bath ballistic, Waiving not drowning.

Pic: Marilyn Monroe

Ava Luxe - Vanilla Musk

2011-01-22T05:13:00.001-08:00

If you can see the pictures above, I´m sure you can also imagine the flavor of them? And that´s really the only thing that I have to write about Ava Luxe´s divine, yet simpleVanilla Musk. If Indult´s Tihota is my daughters favorite vanilla, Ava Luxe´s Vanilla Musk is mine.

I´ve got a small sample of it in in perfume oil when I placed my order before Christmas and I was totally blown away from the first second...

It´s sweet without being cloying. Full bodied without being heavy. There isn´t anything strange about it like a vanilla fragrance for people that really don´t like vanilla, no this is straight forward vanilla for people that love vanilla that is sweet, gourmandish, juicy, soft, creamy and totally vanilly. It has a soft musk base, that on me deepens and strengthens the vanilla without making it complicated, but it´s a clkean and simple musk that don´t mess up the vanill at all in my opinion.

On me, Vanilla Musk smells at least as good as Indult´s Tihota and therefor I saw my chanse to convince my daughter about that too, but she isn´t that easy to corrupt, she belive Vanilla Musk become a little bit sharp on her and she refuses to compare it with her beloved Tihota. Probably you can experience Vanilla Musk differently depending on skin chemistry and sense of smell and taste. Oh well, according to my senses this is as close you can get to a perfect, uncomplicated vanilla.

My next order at Ava Luxe will definitly be with at least one bottle of Vanilla Musk perfume oil. Has anyone tried it in eau de parfum?

Lasting power is good, even though not as good as some other Ava Luxe´s. Sillages is skin close. A perfect vanilla for people that loves vanilla shortly speaking. Thanks to it´s simple and linear qualities it´s also good for layering.

Time to meet again?

2011-01-19T03:33:00.000-08:00

I´ve got some qestions about another perfume meeting in Stockholm. For English speaking readers that is interested to join us, please send me a mail or state so in the comments, so I can return to you for closer information about the meeting. My suggestion is a meeting at saturday 26:th of february.

We have had really nice meetings, and new participants are of course welcome to join us.

Ava Luxe - Loukhoum

2011-01-18T00:12:00.001-08:00

I have a soft spot for fragarnces that are an interpretion of turkish delight (loukhoum). Some find that kind of scent to become to sweet, to powdery, to overwhelming, but on me, usually it becomes just delicious.

Of course I haven´t tried all different kind of loukhoum inspired fragrances that is out there, for example I haven´t yet tried Serge Lutens Rahat Loukhoum, but I´m sure I´ll love it when I do. Anyway, I have belive you don´t need several diffrent loukhoum scents, one will do just fine. And until now, Keiko Mecheri´s Loukhoum have been the loukhoum scent in my dream (even though i still don´t have even a decant of it!). Well, that was my opinion until I´ve got my Loukhoum from Ava Luxe...

As you might remember, I have a very special place in my heart for some of Ava luxes fragrances as Nude Musk, Midnight Violet, Film Noir and Kama (and even more that I still haven´t write about here), still some of them fail to impress me as Chaos and No.23. Oh, Loukhoum is so in the first cathegory, it is so beautiful and adorable.

Yes, Loukhoum is definitly a interpretion of turkish delight, the top notes pistachio is both dry/roasted and creamy nutty at the same time. Then the airy rose enters, vanilla, powdery, soft and delicate... kind of transparent and thin, like smelling a cloud of turkish delight.

That is the big difference between Ava Luxe´s Loukhoum and other loukhoum varieties I´ve tried. All of the others are sweet, heavy, on the border of to much of the goodies turkish delight. In Loukhoum Ava Luxe seem to capture it from a totally different view. this Loukhoum smells like if turkish delight wasn´t actually Turkish, but Japanese. Well, japanese delight, a most delicous miniature frolic, that is eaten by the most celbrated geishas during a directed ceremony reminding of the japanese tee ceremony.

When other loukhoum scents tend to be to sweet, Ava Luxe´s Loukhoum become interesting, instead of an obvious, thick kind of scent, this is eteral and subtle. The smell of rose is so delcate, so thin, so crisp that I imagine rose petals so light pink that they are almost not there. The scent of vanilla powder is gorgeous. Shortly speaking, I love everything about it.

The sillage is good, and lasting power is really good (8 hours or so). I´m happy that you can buy Ava Luxe´s eau de parfum in 15t ml bottles, that way I cabn afford more of them, but on the other hand 15 ml is way to little of Loukhoum, I´ve had my bottle in about a month and it has been of much use. I love it, middle daughter love it and youngest daughter too!

I recommend Ava Luxe´s Loukhoum to everyone that usually likes this kind of scents, but also if you find ordinary loukhoum fragrances to sweet, to powdery, to gourmand, this one could very well suit you. Try it!

If you want to indulge in Ava Luxe´s wonderful perfumes here is the link to follow:

http://www.ava-luxe.com/

Pic: flickr.com

Yves Rocher - Nature Millenaire

2011-01-14T00:01:00.000-08:00

How doesn´t remember the millenium shift? Personally I celbebrate the ending of the 20:ieth century in Boden with my family and relatives. Not a very special New Year party, but still we had a nice time. Even in little Boden, that years fireworks was something really special!

A little over ten years have passed since then. In some ways it feels like it was not at all long time ago, but in some ways it feels like it really was. One interesting thing with being middle aged, is that you can look back on different phases in life and see them begin and end. During that period I was really a mother with capital M. My youngest was 2½ years old and the others was still kids, or not the oldest one, she was just about grown up. Style wise I was a little influented by Africa, i had a lot of long skrits and dresses, even tie-dyed! I have to admit I don´t have any of those clothes still in my wardrobe.

the perfume I used most back then, and the one I think suited my sooo well, was Yves Rocher´s Nature Millenaire. A flanker to Nature that was sold only about the year around the millenium shift. With that name it was kind of dated in a coupple of months really. Unfortunatly! According to me, this was a great fragrance. When they was about to not sell it any more, I bought two bottle for the price of one, so when we moved here in 2004 I still hade some tiny amounts left. however I runned out of Nature Millenaire at least five years ago.

apparently I wasn´t the only one liking this, becasue now and then a bottle shows up on Tradera and usually goes for quite much money, at least to be an Yves Rocher fragrance. Anyway, a while ago I manage to catch a mini bottle of it. Would I still like it? Time has changes and I wasn´t a perfume nerd back then, so my taste in perfume has also changed pretty much.

But yes, I still likes it. Not as much as back then, but I think it´s a good and different fragrance that would have deserved a longer life and a better name. In my imagination i think it would have been Nature Afrique instead. Back then, when I used it much, I got associations to Africa, heat, sweetness, proud and beautiful women, dark woods, mystic incense and dusty African soil.

This is how I still feels about it, I really think it has something African in it´s apperance. It is warm, sweet, dark, strange, sensual, laid back and cozy. It´s quite linear and I find it to be a little to monotone now, and a little synthetic as well, still without feeling cheap though.

There are two head features in Nature Millenaire, one is the almost narcotic scent of iris mixed with sweet vanilla, the other is the dark wood, dusty almost earthy spices and smoky incense. together they create a very powerful, strong and warm scent. If Yves Rocher decided to make it again, i would totally buy a bottle and use it from time to time. It has something evry special that is totally charming I think.

Great lasting power, huge sillage and porbably would work on men that likes sweet fragarnces as well. Unfortunatly not see easy to come by any more, but if you get a chanse to try it, don´t miss it.

Pic: Paulette 56

Lorenzo Villoresi - Iperborea

2011-01-12T01:30:00.001-08:00

What is your favorite kind of snow? Mine is no snow at all. :) But if I have to chose I´ll take that kind of dry, powdery snow that tends to fall in colder weather. As a kid I should have chosen the wet kind of snow that you can use for building stuff with (sorry but I couldn´t find the english word for it, I don´t think it´s hugsnow???) as snowmans or snow fortresses. I never was much interested in throwing snowballs though. A rumer at our school said that a somewhat older boy was hit in his eye with a snowball and become blind. But when it was snowball fight I helped out by making snow balls for our team at least.

As I´m born and raised just a about 100 km south of north polarcircle you can trust me when I say I have some certain sense of snow. Different types of snow smells in different way. Snow mixed with rain has a slightly mineral/matellic scent. Wet snow on the other hand smells a little more wooly, like wet sheeps in distance. Fine, powdery snow has a scent that reminds a little of fabric, some close woven cotton or linen. lorenzo Villoresi´s new fragrance Iperborea manage to capture that scent remarkable well.

To be honest, I´m not sure if Iperborea really smells like powdery snow, or if it´s just manage to capture that feeling. As I can recall, powdery snow don´t really smells of citrusfruits, delicate flowers or vanilla, while Iperborea does.

I´ve tried all the fragrances from lorenzo Villoresi, and Iperborea manage without a problem to become one of my favorites from the line. In different from many other offerings from Villoresi, Iperborea is a subtle, soft and discrete kind of scent. It seem like Villoresi has a soft spot for snow and Nordic inspiration in his perffume making as his Teint de Neige means the color of snow, while Hyperborea (Iperborea) according to greek mythology is a land north of the Nordic wind that was said to have a most enjoyable climate despite it´s placement. For me that comes from almost north of the nordic wind Iperborea feels like a more trustworthy interpretion of snow then teint de Neige which mostly smells like huge amounts of old fashioned cosmetic powder (still, I like it and when I feel for a really powdery scent, that´s a favorite).

Iperborea is cristal clear, cold but with surprisingly warm elements, citrus soft and a weav of delicate flowers so seamlessly blended that it´s hard to tell any single flowers apart. The opening is pure and refreshingly fruity, not only citrus as I detect a really nice pear note also.

But it´s in the heart of the fragrance Iperborea remind most about powdery snow, actually as much as I feel like going out and make snow angels, but the snow right now isn´t at all snowangel snow. Iperborea is absolute worth testing, it´s really great if you think you would like a fragrance reminding of priestine powdery snow and the most delicate flowers. Very pure, very different and very beautiful. Not so hefty sillage, but goos lasting power. One of the most genuin fragrances in the "flowers in snow" genre.

Pic: reser.se

Perfume and children.

2011-01-09T00:03:00.000-08:00

According to me there isn´t anything that smells as good as babies. A copple of days ago we where babysitting our youngest grandson. Just to sit with him in my lap and smell on his little baby hair is pure bliss. Usually I try to avoid stronger fragrances when I´m around babies, something my husband don´t seem to worry about. So when it was time to feed the little one after he had sit with his grand pa for a while I noticed he smelled of Black Aoud! And belive me, he smells much better without. Black Aoud is heavenly on my husband, but not on babies.

One of my readers asked for my opinions about children and perfume. And that is something worth thinking about. in some countries is totally OK and even quite common to perfume one´s babies. I don´t really understand why, because I´m almsot certain that even Italian, French or Latin mothers also think their babies smells best in the whole world. Usually the fragarnces used for infants are alcoholfree and with really soft notes like camomille, talc and vanilla, but still. I wouldn´t have dreamed about to perfume my kids when they where babies. What do you think? Readers that have kids, have you ever put on your infant (younger then 1 year) perfume or perfume body products to make your baby smell more? If you come from a culture where it´s more common and even expected to perfume babies, what do you think about that tradition?

I´m aware that Sweden don´t have much of a perfume culture at all. In a country where most of the grown up populkation don´t want to smell anything but clean it´s out of the question to start perfuming infants. But, why it is considered worse then to put a bow in a small baby girls tiny curls? Or a bowtie under the many cheeks of a little baby boy?

When is it OK to put perfume on kids? Small children from the age around 3 is usually very curious about anything adults do, and they copy adult behaviour into their play. Dressing up in daddys och grandpas shoes is so fun or to borrow grandmas purse and pretend to be a lady or mummys lipstick. Why should it be wrong to spray on just a little perfume in such a play? maybe, you should wait until the kid asks for it, but as long as it is a part of having fun, why´s that wrong?

A kid from a home with perfume interested parents would of course become more curious then a kid from a home with vefry sparse use of perfume. If you´re afraid of your childrens delicate skin to get hurt, you can spray on the sweater.

Older kids understands the connection between perfume and smelling good. And make up and looking better. Pre-teens like to own a bottle of -celeb- scent, to seem more adult. during this phase, perfumes can be used to tell whom hot and not. "All" the girls should have their own purse filled with make up and a bottle of perfume. Those who don´t are considered immature or geeky.

My 13 year old is quite indoctrinated when it comes to perfume. She is quite self acting when it comes to perfumes now and have some favorites. Vanilla seem to be popular and she loves anything from Jessica Simpson´s Fancy to Indult´s Tihota. I let her try most of my scents, but try to keep her away from the most animalic, erotic one´s. Maybe a girl in her age should just be contempt with having a bottle of Fancy and not drewling over Tihota? Anyway, I´m looking forward to follow her perfume development. But maybe she´ll revolt at 15 and start to refuse wearing any perfume at all?

When, if at all is it OK to let your kid use perfume? And which fragrances are OK to use? Is it cool to let my 13 year old borrow my Lolita Lempicka but not Frederic Malle or serge Lutens? When did you start use perfume regularly? I strarted to have "Date" cologne spray during pree-teens, most of the girl in my class prefered the blue version, while I loved the red one with a Russian name like Nadia.

Pic: Gustav Klimt

Frazer Parfum - Chapter 5, swiss stone

2011-01-07T23:50:00.000-08:00

Stones are in different from animals and some plants (especially trees) hard to get any contact with. Even with a small hamster people experience it´s possible to have some contact, I even experienced I had some contact with my fishes. And with some trees and my most loved plants and don´t get me started with "Burre" my firtree...

And those of us that have had (or have) a dearly beloved pet, who among us haven´t at least once though "Oh, if only you could talk". And tests have shown that plants like it better if they´re living in a home where someone talk to them. But stones, so hard to make any sort of contact with! If they where human they would be autistic all of them, and I mean really, really severe autistic!

And yet, imagine if stones could talk. What haven´t the smallest pebble been trough during it´s million and millions years of existance? And that smooth, beautiful stone you bring home after your vacation to the Mediterrean? And the old stone walls running across the landscape (at least here in Sweden), the result of many long hours hard work. And boulder ridges and glacial erratics and the lake stones of Loch Ness!? Oh well, I know I began to sound quite dopey now, but still, if stones could talk I´m sure they have a lot more interesting things to tell you then your average hamster....

Frazer Parfum chapter 5 swiss stone is a fragrance about stone. Among the nine scents this is the coldest and maybe also -at least to me- the most austere. If corsica everlasting is adventures close to a sunwarmth Mediterrean, swiss stone is adventures in much colder surroundings. Yeah, like in Switzerland obviously. But I don´t have to go all the way to Switzerland (even though it´s nice there and I would love to go there again) to recognise this scent. To me it smells like the nature just outside my house.

swiss stone is the scent of an autumn walk through the forrest in moist, but not yet rainy weather. And it´s also a walk through late autumn, most leaves have fell off the trees. Swiss stone starts of with a sharp almost piercing note, but just for a few seconds there after comes aromatic, haylike and wet notes. There is also something cooling, like mint. And then, there it is, the smell of stones, mineral, some iron, a dense, cold and strangely singing note. This is like the scent of the old stone wall close to Eriksbergs cottage. A stone wall covered by moss, with big old trees around and yellow grass and open soil.

Swiss stone feels lika a withdrawn, slightly melancolic scent. Bittersweet, emotional and as made to wear while you´re writing some beautiful poetry. Swiss stone also evoke almost meditative feelings, it´s a scent for peace and quiet and inner travels. Melancolic, yes, but stikll in perfect harmony and balance.

Swiss stone can be worn by both women and men and have good lasting power and good sillage. Just like corsica everlasting, swiss stone can be a bit challenging, a fragarnce that want´s to be noticed while you wear it. And of course, you wouldn´t forget about since it has a strong precense and take it´s place more then well.

Swiss stone is a fragarnce that would be very suitable for someone mysterious, a little withdrawn but very interesting. This is a scent for someone that prefers to be uniqe not to blend in with the crowd.

pic: geograph.org.uk

Frazer Parfum - Chapter 4, corsica everlasting

2011-01-04T02:39:00.000-08:00

Among the nine fragrances from Fraer Parfum, corsica everlasting is perhaps the wildest, the most genuine and the most adventurous. I write perhaps, since there is -at least- one other that also would fit that description really good. Anyway, corsica everlasting is a really unique, wild and genuine scent.

All the scents from Frazer parfum shows a surprising complexity and of course corsica everlasting also does. In the opening I can sense both late summer dry medditerrean fields as well as some juicy alsmot berrylike notes, honeyed sweetness and an aromatic tobacco like note, I can also smell the vague currylike note from immortelle (everlasting flower), but it´s very soft and never becomes foody or to spicy. It´s rather make a balsamic backdrop for the other notes to rest upon.

Corsica everlasting is a fragrance of sunburned mountains but still with some salty seabreaze in the air, it´s a scent of adventures, of wilderness and maybe, meybe all the way in the remote heart of the scent you can belive to meet some freedom fighters around a camp fire... i get a most genuin feeling from corsica everlasting which makes it comparable to Hindu Kush, Nasomatto´s Black Afgano and DS & Durga´s Beartrapper. Corsica everlasting takes me on an olfactory trip to places I have never visit and probably never will visit.

This of course make corsica everlasting a little more demanding to wear then the earlier three I wrote about, this is a fragarance that want´s some engagement from it´s wearer. During base note, corsica everalsting, gets smother and softer though, the wild notes are getting tamed and become soft and serene, like if the sun slowly set upon the heath of the day. In the drydown I can smell some leathery elements as well as the honey note which contributes with a soft sweetness. There is aromatic but also powdery elements during this phase. The powdery note feels more like sandy then common powdery.

Corsica everlasting is suitable on both men and women. It has good lasting power and medium sillage. A fragrance for adventures, within or for real.

Pic: everlasting flowers, flickr

Frazer Parfum - Chapter 3, coffee & orange blossom

2011-01-04T00:13:00.000-08:00

Usually people don´t care so much about the small white coffe flowers, since it´s the coffee beans that matters on the coffee bush. When I wear a drop or two of frazer parfum Chapter 3, coffe & orange blossom I belive this is how the small coffe blossoms should smell, but for real I have no idea how they smell or even IF they smell at all...

Coffe & orange blossom is possibly the one among the nine scents from Frazer Parfum that smells the absolute goodest. Oh, it´s so soft and caressing, yet aromatic, airy, creamy and complex. In the opening I think lavender is domnating, but it´s a warm, soft and gorgeous kind of lavender. Soon thereafter the coffee shows up, soft, with some sweet elements and roasted goodness, slowly mixing up with some juicy orange and eventually some creamy orange blossom.

Coffee note can behave a bit boring on me, some times it tend to dominate the scent totally and other times it get totally soaked up by my skin within a few minutes and dissapears. In coffe & orange blossom non of it happens. The coffe note is soft and creamy, but also still there, mingling with the orange blossom creating a scent that -in my imagination- is like a genuin scent of coffee blossom.

Also the scent of orange blossom can be quite volatile, and I like to think about orange blossom as a scent of summer. Coffe & orange blossom isn´t an exception, it captures a small piece of a perfect summer day, but a perfect summer day in much warmer climate then Sweden or even south of Europe.

Coffe & orange blossom isn´t as exciting or challenging as the toher two from Frazer parfum that I´ve wrote about, but it is one of the most comfortable scents I´ve tried. Totally comfy that´s coffe & orange blossom. It´s so soft, so smoth, so caressing and adorable I even forget about the fact that it´s ice cold january outside my door. At the same time it smells so good, so cherful and happy that it never gets boring.

There is however one let down with coffe & orange blossom. It hasn´t got as good lasting power as the other from Frazer Parfum. Maybe, this is because it´s also starts off much more softer and skin close. Since it smells so amazingly good I gets kind of desperate every time I notice it´s about to dissapear, I don´t want to be without it at all...

Yet, it has that in common with other scents that captures the smell of a perfect summerday, wonderful is truly short.

Pic: coffee flower, chiangmai.com

Frazer Parfum - Chapter 2, narcisse & ylang

2011-01-03T03:17:00.000-08:00

To write about and evaluate Frazer Parfums nine different scents is a little like being mother to a big bunch of kids. All the children are different from each other, but at the same time they share a family resemblance. No mother to more then one child could say that she likes one of the children more then the others. Most mothers (and fathers too of course) like all their kids as much, but in a little different ways.

I don´t like Chapter 2, narcisse & ylang, any more or less then nutmeg & jasmine or any of the other fragrances. If I some time in the future would have the -economic- possibilty to buy one fragrances from Frazer Parfum, I would have really big problems deciding which of them to chose...

Chapter 2, narcisse & ylang is as beautiful, well made and lovely as nutmeg & jasmine, but narcisse & ylang is happier, more vivid and more colorful. This is a scent for someone enjoying to dress in bright and clear colors. Narcisse & ylang make me think about beautiful dark women with colorful and exotic clothes like saris, sarongs and festive head pieces in all different kinds of colors, but most of all shades of yellow, orange and goldy.

Narcisse & ylang opens with a burst of warm, but also complex notes. I can detect notes of something buttery, something fruity (very soft like pears, peach and citrus), swirling garlands of golden flowers, smoth spicyness and a little animalic dash.

Just like jasmine, daffodil (narcisse) can have slightly indolic, dirty notes. In this fragrances those notes are accompanied by sweet juicyness from ylang. Narcisse & ylang is a more active fragarnce then jasmine & nutmeg, this is a moodlifting and sherfull energy boost. But as with nutmeg & jasmine, I can´t get enough of it...

While the scents develops it strikes me that it have such a nice, comfy and warm glowing effect. Narcisse & ylang becomes more complex and deeper during basenote. A papery spicyness occurs, a soft woody base brings smoth softness. Also the base is erotic, magnetic and intense, but still manage to be so comfortable. I belive narcisse & ylang is not for the shyest among us.

Narcisse & ylang lasts for about 6 hours and a little goes a long way, this is a potent blend. To waer any of Tammy Frazer´s fragrances makes me feel luxurious, relaxed and very content. Narcisse & ylang is a sparkling, lively and golden little masterpiece.

pic: Daffodil detail, flickr

Frazer Parfum - Chapter 1, nutmeg & jasmine

2011-01-02T23:51:00.001-08:00

Here I am with my nose almsot constantly attached to my wrist, which makes it a little hard to write. The start of the new year has been really good, especially when it comes to perfumes. During hte days between Chrsitmas and New Year I´ve got my wonderful samples all the way from South Africa. Samples of Frazer Parfums entire line.

The creator behind Fraer Parfum, Tammy Frazer, is only working with 100% natural and organic raw materials, and guess if she´s good at it? It´s along time since I´ve got so impressed by all the fragrances in a line (Iand with nine different fragrances also), they´re all good enough for a long review. It´s also quite a while ago since I become so impressed of a line of all natural scents. Tammy Frazer´s scents remind me alittle of Italian brand La Via del profumo by Dominique Dubrana/Abdes Salaam the line behind favorites of mina as Hindu Kush and Tasneem.

According to me, Tammy Frazer´s fragrances are at least as good. But if they remind me of La Via del Profumo when it comes to quality, power and beauty, they´re so totally unique in other ways like they have a certain feminine grace an inner strenght and beauty. When I heard of Fraer Parfum I didn´t know much about them, and it was first when I waited for my samples to arrive that I discovered that they are sold in a very special place, namely Roja Dove´s Haute Parfumerie at Harrods. Wow!

Anyway, with Frazer Parfum I have once again encountered perfumes to beautiful to be fully described in words. Also, non of the pics I found to illustrate these scent can make them justice. So no matter what I write about them, there is only one thing that´s for sure, you have to test Frazer Parfums yourself. To be sure you understand me I write that again, Frazer parfum fragrances are a MUST try for any perfumista. That´s just the way it is, and now when you know it I can continue writing...

Chapter 1, nutmeg & jasmine are one of the most complex jasmine fragrances I´ve ever tried. The opening burts of with a high, clear and almost varnish like scent that kinds of burns. This is only during a few seconds then nutmeg & jasmine calms down a little and become a more subdued and warm jasmine note. Or actually, several, both in the opening but also later on it´s like Tammy Frazer somehow manage to add layer on layer on layer of different kind of jasmine absolute and extracts from all sorts of different jasmines. One streak is avout the really pure, high and clear kind of jasmine, another one is more sensual, soft and powdery while yet another is of that heavy, fyll bodied, indolic and animalic kind of jasmine. These different kinds of jasmine scent makes like a bed of softest jasmine petals or a bed of fluffy clouds colored golden in the sunset. I´ll promise I have a hard time to get my nose from my wrist!

Slowly the nutmeg note appears, it brings spicyness and warmth to the fragrance and prevent the jasmine from both being to pure/cold but also from being to indolic/animalic. The nutmeg softens the indolic elements and together they make soft, delicate and very sensual scent. I doubt jasmine can be any better than this, and that´s said about a 100% natural scent with no fizzy aldehydes or other synthetic powerhouses to help it on the way. Just amazing!

In the end of the heart note, the nutmeg is melting in to my skin, while the jasmine continues to blossom and now is showing a velvety soft side strenghten by a little dash of vanilla and some really creamy, caressing and blissful sandalwood. Towards the drydon, nutmeg & jasmine is seamlessly blended making a perfect veil of jasmine, vanilla and sandalwood smelling like a sandalwood tree with jasmine flavor. During base note, nutmeg & jasmine is simple and true, not as complex and shifting as in the opening. This is a jasmine fragrance worthy of an angel.

nutmeg & jasmine has good lasting power (surprisingly good, about 6 hours!), it´s strong and with a good sillage. One single drop on my wrist is enough for several hours filed with perfumed enjoyment. Also I have no idea how much they charge for a bottle, but whatever, it might be worth it! Also they offer a solid perfume in wonderful handcarved little wooden boxes, I think they can be very much worth the price.

More information about the wonderful world of Frazer Parfum you can find here:

http://www.frazerparfum.com/

Pic: White jasmine, flickr

Huitième Art - Manguier Metisse

2010-12-31T02:04:00.000-08:00

Have had some nice and relaxing days with my family. My husband has been at home all week, but works today. Of course, why work on weekdays when you can work on New Years Eve? Yet, he´s home at 8 o´clock and we´ll have some really good food to eat.

The middle daughter returned to Markaryd on wednesday and on monday our youngest son turned 18 (18!!!!).

When it comes to perfumes December is quite a mess, it´s hard to find time to evaluate and analyse a scent for real in the middle of Christmas preparations. But during a big part of December I´ve been constantly attracted to a certain fragrance...

Pierre Guillaume (the creator of Parfumerie Generale) has recently launched a serie of 8 different fragrance that he calls Huitieme Art (the eight art). 2010 seem to be a year where perfume creation has taken a step closer to art, now different kinds of olfactory art is available, created by not only by different actors within perfume/beautyindustry, but by artist and/or perfumers in collaboration with artists. To even have to state that perfume IS art can seem to be a little needles for those of us allready in love with perfumes, but for the mayority of people perfumes are synonyme with mass market realeses and celebrity scents, and that kind od scents aren´t really art or are they?

But, if different actors within niche and indie perfumes takes there fragrances and says "This IS art" what happens? Regulations that forbids use of some key notes within perfumes as they are looked upon as commercial products would surely be treated in another way if they where art? I find it very interesting to think about art and perfumes even though I´m not fully have the right tools to make a "real" analysis.

Huitieme Art offers eight different fragrances; Ciel D'Airain, Ambre Ceruleen, Fareb, Aube Pashmina, Naiviris, Sucre D'Ebene, Vohina and the one I´m going to write about today, Manguier Metisse.

Usually I´m not a big fan of tropical fragrances, tropical fruits and sweet flowers can easily become too sweet and big on my skin. Because of that it´s always extra fun when I find a tropical scent that I like and Manguier Metisse is definitly one of those. If I had tried a month earlier it has probably become one of the 2010 top scents.

Manguier Metisse opens with the most juciy, fresh, natural sweet mango you can imagine. I have never before encountered such a genuin mango note in perfume. The scent is orange golden, bursting with fruit juice, that soft but still aromatic and spicy smell that ripe mango got and also the smallest elements of tartness and freshness. The mango note is very dominant at first, but after a few minutes I discover a soft, but still obvious floral note. Mango and flower is voven together, mixes, takes one´s turn, one part of golden ripe mango and one part fully flowering tropical flower. It´s like a really beautiful lei. Like sitting on the beach at the most beautiful tropcícal island with a ring of flowers around your neck and eating mango so good that it has to be grown in paradise.

Manguier Metisse smells like if I suddenly become a model in a Gaugain painting. This is the Tropics, golden skin, sunwarm sand, a jungle so lush it almost become a caricature, flowers so beautiful, so big and over the top that they´re almost surreal.

December has been a extremly cold and snowy month here in Nyköping, can you imagine any better scent tgo wrap yourself up with then Manguier Metisse? No, me neither.

After a while (30 min+) Manguier Metisse becomes a little less lush, rich and juicy. The mango dries in, leaving a scent like mango powder, even though it could be a bit hard to iamgine, it smells so gorgeous. The flowers become alittle papery, but at the same time also a little more mysterious, wild and intoxicating, I can almost smell something reminding of menthol or eucalyptus. This is softer, but also kind of sexy.

I can´t think of any big tropical scent that I like as much as Manguier Metisse. It´s a bliss to wear in cold winter, but still not so big it couldn´t be really good during summer as well. Longlasting and with nice, but not huge, sillage, Manguier Metisse is a must try for everyone caring for big florals, tropical scents, grown up fruity scents, but also if you still haven´t got any tropical fave, this might be it!

There isn´t anything wrong with the other seven scents in the line, even though I haven´t fallen for any of them as bad as for Manguier Metisse. Fareb could be the most interesting, but also the most demanding among them (at least to me). Aube Pashima is a must try for every lover of green scents (Pierre Guillaume is really gifted when it comes to green scents, he manage to make them sexy). Sucre D'Ebene is something to try for gourmand lovers. Yet, Ambra Ceruleen didn´t impressed me that mush, it become very buttery on me, too buttery if to be honest. Anyway, I´m sure everyone can find at least one favorite among the 8 fragrances. You can read more about Huitieme Art and also order a nice sample set here:

http://www.huitiemeartparfums.com/

Pic: bestindoortropicals

2010 Toplist

2010-12-28T02:24:00.000-08:00

I´ve had an incredible nice and cozy Christmas holiday and I sure hope you had that too. It isn´t that original to write a toplist today (all the perfume blogs seem to have it today!), but great minds think alike or something like that.

I also realised that my last post was a bit wrong, of coure it was a wishlist for 2011 and nothing else. I´m always a bit confused when the new year is coming and write the old year for a month at least. But this toplist is of course for perfume that I´ve tested during 2010.

I´ve tried a lot of fragarnces, but probably not really as many as during 2009. It seem my perfume interest has entered a new phase. I still gets a lot of samples, but I´ve been moving on to decants, split bottles and full bottles even more. I´ve also noticed that the more I´ve tried the more it takes to impresse me.

Fragrances that I´ve tried during 2010 and that really manage to capture my interest and that I want more of (or allready have more of):

January 2010: Histoires de Parfums - Tubereuse Animale. Wonderful, warm, full bodied, animalic, leathery, spicy with some tuberose elements. A demanding scent, but also so unique that it doesn´t remind of anything else. This I have a decant of, but wouldn´t mind more.

February: Parfums D'Orsay - Tilleul. I fell in love with this green, soft, sweet, complex linden blossom fragarnces and could hardly think about anything else for a month. To me this is a spot on late winter/early spring kind of scent so I didn´t wanted it as bad later during the year, but I suspect I´ll have cravings for it soon.

Agonist - The Infidels. Warm complex, animalic, strong, retro and all together wonderful fragrance from the Swedish brand Agonist that co-operate with glass artist Åsa Jungnelius frpm Costa Boda. Amazing multi dimensional scent that is hard to forget about, hopefully I´ll have more of it soon. :)))

March: Farmacia Annunziata - Ambra Nera. The most wonderful amber scent I´ve ever tried. I would easily go for a full bottle of this if I didn´t happened to stumble upon those Egyptian perfume oils. A MUST TRY for amber lovers.

April: Simone Cosac - Trama. Could be the best rose scent ever. The opening of this svent is among the best openings ever (also!!!) and it´s gorgeous. 100% realistic scent of how it´s smell when you unwrap a rose bouquet. I liked Perle di Biance, but Trama is even better on my skin. I´ve got some remainings in a tiny sample, but probably will need more of it. Also a absolute must try for anyone that wopuld like to be impressed by a rose scent.

Hors La Monde - Shiloh. Tart citrus, creamy flowers and oakmoss. Wonderful, and classic, strong, longlasting and modd lifting. This years birthday fragrance. This I recommend to everyone looking for modern scents with classical elements.

May: Was dominated by the super exclusive Xerjoff line. And even though I melted as snow in sunshine for several of the scents, I seem to be not really as impressed any longer. Partly thanks to the price tag as I realise I´ll probably never could afford a bottle of any of them. Despite that, I do think every perfume lover should give at least some of the scents a try. They are really worth trying.

July: La Collina Toscana - Girasole del Poggio. Sunshine in bottle, full bodied, nutty, creamy and very different flowery scent. Still got my sample, but when that is gone I´ll probably get more of it since it don´t remind of anything else. Very quirky.

September: Andrea Maack - Craft and Sharp. Interesting, personal, cold and Nordic scents fromicelandic artist Andrea Maack. I´ve got a bottle of Craft and wouldn´t mind splitting a bottle of Sharp. Really good pricepoint also.

Serge Lutens - Bas de Soie. Aquatic, strange floral with slimy elements. I haven´t yet figured out why I like it, but I do! Have some remainings in a bottle, probably will get more. It´s like a likeable version of Secretions Magnifique.

L'Artisan Parfumeur - Nuit de Tuberesue. First I liked it, then I didn´t. Now I´m back to lking it again. I´ve used my little spray sample much more the I belived I would do. It´s a winner in the long run and I wouldn´t mind splitting a bottle of it eventually. Different and cool version of tuberose. Works well on men too.

October: Amouage - Memoir Woman. Gothic, sad and a little melancholic. My big fave from Amouage. The question is if I ever could afford it?

My bargain of Egyptian perfume oils was a big and wonderful surprise also during october. Four out of five oils smells fantastic.

And not to be forgotten about: Etat Libre d'Orange´s Like This. It was SO close to be this years Christmas perfume (present), but the I found a bottle of Cuir Beluga for a really good price. I don´t regret buying Cuir Beluga, but I do wonders a lot about how to get me a big bottle of Like This as soon as possible. This is a MUST TRY!

Also two scents that I´ve used a lot:

Guerlains Cuir Beluga. I don´t think I have use one scent as much and as often as Cuir Beluga since the time when I use to have one signature scent at the time. According to me Cuir Beluga fits on all occations. Totally fabulous.

And Costume National´s 21, discovered at NK in may and re-discovered during autumn. Such a comfy scent with great personality. Have a decant of it and will buy more when it ends.

One thing that strikes me when I´m looking on my top list scents is that they are really different from each other. From soft, aquatic florals to bold animalic leathers and sweet gourmands and spicy orientals. I have a varied taste in perfumes and during 2010 I´ve learn to like oakmoss as well and also some vintage scents.

Of course I haven´t enjoyed all that ve tried. For instant the line of Boadicea the Victorious failed to impresse me, to many and to un-interesting.

Honore des Pres made a nice thing and gave away samples of Vamp a NY and I got one of them. Unfortunatly the scent wasn´t my style at all even though a lot of people seem to like it.

I also tried all scents from Czech & Speake and only one, Dark Rose was worth mentioning. Nice, but boring.

Annick Goutal´s Ninfeo Mio with an opening so beautiful and and dry down so hideous. Big dissapointment.

What has captured your interest during 2010? Some dissapointments? Some big fave or several? Have you tried some fragarnce that you haven´t reed about here but that you suggest me to try? What are you looking forward to try in the beginning of 2011?

I´m very curious about the new Serge Lutens that is said to smell like toast. And L'Artisan´s Traversee du Bosphore which sound interesting as well. And I have just found out about a very special scent that I really must try.

Happy New Year to all my lovely readers!

Pic: tacomadowntown

2010 Wishlist

2010-12-19T06:54:00.001-08:00

Just a few days before Christmas. I think time never runs as fast as the weeks before Christmas. I have a lot to things left to do, but at least I´ve rolled the meatballs, baked the gingerbreads and boiled the Christmas candy "knäck". I´ve also manage to buy at least 2 Christmas presents if not 3...

A coupple of days ago I´ve got this years probably finest perfume, Guerlain´s gorgeus Cuir Beluga, and if not the finest at least the most expensive not only this year, but for all the perfume I´ve ever bought. Just a few days after that I´ve got a possibility to buy another fave scent and gosh, I realised I´ve really bought a lot of perfumes during 2010. Yesterday I composed a list of all the perfume bottles I´ve bought, and they´re quite many I have to admit.

But at the same time I´ve sold a lot of samples and decants, so I´m not totally broken. And the perfumes have a great varietyt in price, from about 1-2 € and up. Actually most of them closer to 2 € then to 100€. And also some of the most affordable have proven to be some of the most gorgeous one´s (like the Egyptian perfume oils).

Some toher day I´ll write more about favorites from 2010, surprises, dissapointments and which fragarnces I´ve actually used the most. But today it´s time for some wishes from my readers. A wishlist for 2010 we can call it.

Is it anything you miss here and would love to read more about? Is there any perfume house that you´re curious about, but that I haven´t wrote anything about? Do you feel you would love to contribute as a guest blogger, please let me know and we work something out. Of course I acn´t fulfill all wishes, some scents can be really hard to get samples of and other fragrances I might not be interested to write about (if you would love to read an analytic review of all Naomi Campless scents, this isn´t the right place), I also lack of knowledge in some areas as perfume chemistry and how all that is working. But if I can make someone happy in a simple way I will try my best.

Oh, buy the way, I´ve allready got questions about the next perfume meeting. That´s a thing I love to be asked about. It´s so much fun to meet my readers and spend some time with other perfume lovers. Don´t hesitate to contact me if you have any suggestions about a perfume meeting, probably in Stockholm.

I have pretty much to do the days before Christmas, but I promise there will be some fragrances all the way from Africa here shortly, and perfumes as art, a top list and something really new also.

1000 Flowers - Reglisse Noire

2010-12-15T00:06:00.001-08:00

I am both a chocolate and licorice lover. Usually I´m also a sucker for gourmand fragrances. But, it has shown to be not the easiest to find gourmand scents with notes of chocolate and/or licorice that works on my skin. Licorice usually dissapears on my skin in a few minutes and a lot of chocolate scents ends up being to sticky and kind of soapy. Despite this I still would love to find a perfume with notes of licorice and chocolate, and it looks like I might have found it now...

1000 Flowers is a new indie perfume house started by the Canadian perfumer Jessica September Buchanan. Jessica has a history in aromatherapy, but have also studied at Institute of Perfumery in Grasse, France. You can read more about her, her work and of course about Reglisse Noire here:

http://www.1000flowers.ca/

With notes of mint, white pepper, star anise, licorice, cocoa and vanilla it´s easy to belive that Reglisse Noire is an overly sweet, foody and heavy kind of gourmand, but that sin´t at all the case. From the first seconds, Reglisse Noire manage to capture my interest. It´s soft and airy like a cozy cloud of licorice. In the opening the note of licorice is dominating, still it is as light as licorice steam. I belive the notes of ozon, mint and maybe also white pepper contribute to this nice opening.

Reglisse Noire continues to be a light kind of smell, but after about 20 minutes some stronger notes occurs. The licorice is still present, but now becomes more aromatic, woody and herbal. About now I´m also starting to feel the smell of chocolate, or actually cocoa. This is not that strong, overwhelming and sticky kind of chocolate note, no this is soft, airy and with some discrete bitter elements. The vanilla adds some sweetness and body.

Shortly speaking, I become impressed by Reglisse Noire, I can´t think of any other fragarnces where so heavy notes as chocolate, licorice and vanilla has been used with such delicasy and still without being lost. And, there isn´t any flowers listed among the notes, still there is something in Reglisse Noire giving it a kind of floral base.

Reglisse Noire is a complex scent, and during the heart phase of the scent I can smell to different layers. One is soft, slightly powdery and almost floral, the other layer is deeper and develops from soft notes of cocoa and licorice to more and more woody, dark and mysterious. Now, Reglisse Noire feels like being in a dark and adventurous forrest with licorice trees with chocolate leafs and the ground filled with little white flowers. I belive Reglisse Noire could totally chram most people and at the same time it´s among the most mystic among gourmand scents that I ever tried. (I can´t honestly recall any other mystic gourmand!) It´s also so much more than a gourmand, it is both woody and oriental too.

During basenote the patchouli is quite dominant on me, even though I can sense a papery note also, which is thanks to vetiver I guess. But, also the licorice is still there hanging on from start to end. It´s actually during base this scent really fulfills it name Reglisse Noire (Black Licorice). It´s now it´s really become mystic, dark and exciting, but also warm, sweet and cozy.

Reglisse Noire can be worn by both men and women and everyone fancy a fine gouramnd should give it a try. But, also if you´re not usually in to gourmand scents this could suit you, since it has a nice woody and oriental ffel to it as well. The sillage is discrete without being a skinscent and lasting power could have been a little better in my opinion. To me this is the only letdown of Reglisse Noire, I wish it to last longer and being a little more prominent. But at the same time I think it´s thanks to the softness of those strong notes it´s also so easy to wear and like. And since it ebing an eau de toilette I suspect it´s become a little stronger if sprayed instead of dabbed on.

Do you have any favorite perfumes with notes of chocolate/cocoa or licorice?

Pic: Basset´s licorice all sorts

Korres - Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear

2010-12-12T00:21:00.001-08:00

I´ve got a slightly doubtful relation to pears. Pears can taste wonderful, but usually I encounter pears that have the same juicyness and fruity as old winter carotts, or pears so hard that they are like wood or with that strange granular texture, and with hardly no taste what so ever. Maybe you have to grow your own pears for a pleasant taste experience?

My grandparents had a little cottage outside Malmö and sometimes we visited them during early autumn when all my grand fathers fruit trees where filled with ripe apples, plums and pears. Those pears was so good, juicy, sweet and almost melting in my mouth. Once when I lived in Umeå I bought some rare kind of bright red pears. They where probably twice as expensive then the ordinary one´s, but they where soooo worth it. Until this day those where the best pears I´ve eaten.

It´s that kind of pears I find in one of Korres new scents; Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear, at least the scent of them. I wrote about another of Korres scents last year:

http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/search/label/Korres

Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit become a favorite for me and I´ve used it a lot. Even though I think Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear is a really good scent, it´s not really manage to reach the height of Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit on me. Not that Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear doesn´t smell good, it does, but Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit is a little bit more "me".

Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear is one of the best scents with note of pear that I ever encountered. And just like Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit it seem to have a built in charm, an exuberate personality that is hard to resist. This is a cherful and moodlifting fragrances with elements of euforia in it. The note of peony isn´t that strong, on me it´s more like an aromatic slightly rosy smelling backdrop, while the pear note is more forward. I haven´t tried that many scents with pear, but among the one´s I´ve tried the pear note usually are very soft and short lasting and sometimes even boring. That is not the case with Paeonia Vanilla Amber, as I said, this is equal to the best pears I´ve eaten. It´s juicy, sweet, fruity and very genuin. Do you have a weakspot for pears, this scent is a must try!

Despite notes of vanilla, amber and pear, this fragrances isn´t too sweet, it´s sweet, but more like a ripe fruity kind of sweetness then sugary, candy, cookie-like sweetness. It´s not heavy or sticky either, more like refreshing and cuddly, but a little to briks to be a spot on comfort-scent. Paeonia Vanilla Amber Pear make me feel alert, happy and filled with creativity, and that is so welcomed in dark december.

It has a medium sillage and lasting power is a little weaker then Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit. i belive this scent would be liked by those of you allready liking Jasmine Pepper Gaiacwood Passionfruit, but also among those of you looking for a little more refreshing and light scent. And I must say it again, this is a MUST try if you´re a pear lover!

If you´re curious to find out more about Korres and their products, you can find it here:

http://www.korresscandinavia.com/

Pic: o-red-pears charles nowell

Vivienne Westwood - Let it Rock

2010-12-09T00:12:00.001-08:00

I don´t write negative reviews so often. Partly because I like most fragrances that I test, not love, but most of them smells at least nice and pleasant. And that isn´t anything to write about. It´s also a matter of time, I have to keep up to manage to write about all the amazing scents out there, so where would I squeeze in the bad one´s?

Sometimes I do an exeption. Today is such a day.

Usually I like Vivienne Westwood´s fragrances, even though I have to admit that Anglomania, Boudoir and even Libertine kind of are perfumes from an earlier stage in my perfumania. Still I think they are interesting, obvious and very Brittish. Now Vivienne has launched a new scent, Naughty Alice, the bottle is almost hiddeous cute, but I don´t know about the scent, yet. Unfortunatly I do know everything about another Vivienne Westwood scent, Let it Rock...

When you don´t like a fragarnces there can be sevreal reasons. Some are headache inducing, still you can like the way they smell. Others makes you nauseaus, a little or way to much. Some don´t make your head ache or your stomach turn, but smells so disturbing, strong, cheap, screamy, synthetic or sweet that you can´t stand it. Let it Rock gives me headache and make my stomach turn and smells cheap, synthetic, sweet, vulgar and strong. It´s like a scent created by Jordan (above) rather then by Vivienne Westwood.

Actually Let it Rock is among the worst scents I´ve tried! Without suspecting anything I put on a few drops of Let it Rock from a sample. The very first minutes it was kind of OK and I almost belived that I would eventually like it. But then it starts to get stronger and stronger and stronger... It smells like if both patchouli and freesia was made of some strange plastic materials. Just plastic! Tranquilising fake flowers smushed with plastic and the worst kind patchouli that screams to you and makes your eyes watery.

Yes, Let it Rock becomes terrible on me. And I´ll never try to find out how it becomes on any other family member beacuse I don´t want it in my house. I would never want to encounter this scent ever again. Of course it´s a scrubber. And washing of just a little won´t help, you´d better get yourself in the bathtub with lots of lather.

As I said, it´s extremly rare that I react this strong to a scent, I think Etat Libre d'Orange´s Viergos et Toreros is one of few others.

I don+t recommend Let it Rock to anyone, because I don´t want to smell it on anyone. Fortunatly it seem to be very, very rare in Sweden.

Have you tried Let it Rock? Some people seem to actually like it, what do you think about it?

Pic: Katie Price aka Jordan

Annick Goutal - Eau de Charlotte

2010-12-08T05:01:00.001-08:00

It has been a while since my last posting, about a week actually. I promise I´ll not go away for a while now. It was really fun to visit middle daughter and her boyfriend. I thought I was bohemian but... Well, let just say they give the word bohemian a new meaning. their apartment is filled with art but not so much furniture. It´s like stepping inside a strange art exhibit.

After coming home it feels like it´s time to start fokusing on the upcoming Christmas and all things about it. I´m not that much of a Christmas decorating type, but the more I like Christmas cooking, baking and candymaking. I think I´ll start with some Christmas baking this weekend.

What is your Christmas MUST, if any? How important are the Christmas fragrances to you? Which is your fave Christmas scent? I think mine are a cozy and homey mix between hyacinth (my fave Christmas flower), citrusfruits and cinnamon/gingerbread-spices.

One scent that´s smelling really cozy and nice, but not that Christmasy is Annick Goutal´s Eau de Charlotte. I´ve discovered that Eau de Charlotte is a chameleon like scent, that wears very different on different people.

usually it´s my middle daughter that seem to like Annick Goutal´s perfumes the best. But with Eau de Charlotte I actually think it´s smells the best on me. With notes of black currant, lily, lily-of-the-valley, mimosa, vanilla and cacao it isn´t really certain how a fragrance ends up.

On me, Eau de Charlotte, becomes soft floral with some tart berry notes (a little black currant but I also smell some more tart kind of berry like raspberry or red currant). This floral and tart scent gets accompanied by some milky vanilla and the chocolate never shows up on my skin, insetad I find something similar to tea with milk and honey. That sounds kind of good, doesn´t it? And yes it is, on me. It´s a cozy, caressing mix between floral and soft gourmand. A really comfort scent, like having breakfast at the veranda a summerday with the smell of the garden flowers surrounding you and blackberry jam, toasts and tea.

On my youngest daughter Eau de Charlotte gets a totally different character. The flowers are more noticeable on her and most of Eau de Charlotte ends up smelling like an expensive and creamy lipstick. There is a violet note coming through on my daughters skin that isn´t at all present on me. Both me and daughter also thinks that Eau de Charlotte wears much stronger on her then on me. But eventually it becomes more similar what it is on me.

On the middle daughter it explodes with notes of really tart and also sweet berries and a somewhat sharp and soapy chocolate note. I noticed that middle daughter didn´t liked this Annick Goutal as much as other scents from that brand. It´s like we´re wearing three different fragrances. I can´t think of any perfume that wear so different on the three of us. However it´s quite similar during basenote.

If you have tried Eau de Charlotte, how is it on you?

Well, after about an hour Eau de Charlotte develops to a soft, milky gourmand with some floral elements on the three of us. Lasting power is OK for a Goutal scent, about 3 hours on me. But the sillage was very different on me and the daughters, medium on me and youngest but quite strong and pushy on the middle daughter.

I think if you like Eau de Charlotte, you´ll also like Paul & Joe´s Blanc and other slightly soft and gourmand florals.

Pic: confiture and croissant 1watercolor by Carol Gillott

In my part of the pond...

2010-12-01T00:33:00.000-08:00

Perfume blogging is usually a very peaceful occupation. That Swedish teen blogger like Kissy and Sissy get headlines and also making a lot of money on their blogs is totally un-beliveable for me.

My blog posting don´t attract any headlines and I don´t make any money on the blog either (OK, OK I actually have earned about 20 € this far this year, that´s the reason I cleaned away the commercials or stuffed it way down, If they´re not generating any money they don´t deserve to be in people´s faces).

Perfume lovers -and bloggers usually also are very peaceful, friendly and helpful people. Of course a person that has as his bigest interest to sit down peacefully and smell on different fragrances must be quite serene, nice and even a little withdrawn.

Perfume blogging isn´t that big, and in Sweden there are few other perfume blogs and non as I know of that update often and regularly. From a global point of view it´s of course bigger, but still only a small part in the total of all different blogs. Surely, there are room for new perfume blogs? Apperantly not, one of the old and established perfume bloggers feels that all the new blogs drains fokus in discussions which are supposed to be on that blog!

Some of the established perfume bloggers are hanging out with people in the perfume industry, that seem not to be a good thing either. I think it must be impossible to live for instant in Paris, write about perfume for years without learning to know a lot of different people in the perfume industry and among those surely there are a coupple that you happened to like so much that you eventually become friends. This of course make way to an insider look on perfumery that perhaps isn´t always good, but also hard to get pass.

Anyway, if I felt like having lunch or go to parties with Serge Lutens, Pierre Guillaume, Olivia Giacobetti and Kilian Henessy I so live in the wrong place! But on the other hand nothing stops me from having really good connection with some perfume folks, especially within the indiebrands, but also among large and established brands I´ve encountered so much friendly and helpful people when I´ve contacted them. It´s apart of my "job" to contact perfume people and perfumers.

Of course my blog is considered new if I compare with blogs that have been going for about ten years. But at least I´ve had it for more then 2 years and even more important, it´s regularly updated at least every single week for 2 years. If counting all my postings, I´ve got quite a few by now.

The thing is that newcomers has to find their own style. Style of writing is very personal and to review the same fragarnce can be done in so many different ways.

I can´t keep up with perfume bloggers that lives in paris and other big cities when it comes to having sneak pre-views. I don´t automatically get samples from the big brands when they release something new. And with a limited income (hehe, 20€ is a very limited income, right?), i can´t manage to order samples from every new release. So keeping up with news will not be my thing, that I realised a long time ago...

My thing is to find those small unknown indiebrands or perfume houses out for their first round. Maybe my blog will be the only one ever mentioning these scents? OR, they eventually become popular and then this little blog was the first one that you read about that brand on. As I am having a little reporter personality a scoop always feels good.

I also like to hunt down those un-familiar brands, which sometimes isn´t the easiest thing. A lot of mail that I send never get any answers, for instant, the Swedish niche company Byredo NEVER had answer any of my mails, I have no idea why, but I think it´s a bit sad...

I´ve also got so many boring answers, like this: I write a very polite mail presenting myself and my blog and pointing out that I have perfume interested readers all around the world and would like to write about the brand and evaluate their fragrances. "We dont give samples to customers, but we can tell you wear you can buy or perfumes" "Thank you, but I´m sure you don´t have a retailer in Sweden, I respond" "No, we don´t, the closest to you is in Paris" "OK, thank you, then I can´t write about your brand" Oh well, it´s not my problem if they haven´t figure out that to be mentioned on a blog (even though a somewhat small blog) is usually good and -almost- free marketing!

The perfume world (at least western perfumes with some arabic and japanese influences) is a small pond. All perfumistas knows about new releases from Serge Lutens, Frederic Malle and Guerlain in no time. But also smaller actors like Ava Luxe (you know the very moment Serena decide to re-launch Midnight Violet it will be sold out), Andy Tauer and Neil Morris is out on the street in no time, and much thanks to devoted perfumista followers. And when a perfumista has decided to get a certain fragrances nothing will stop her. It could take months to get it but eventually the sought after scent is arriving and the fealing when you opens that envelope... oh yeah!

This is something some in perfume industry knows a lot about, while some don´t.

Anyway, I´ll leaving town tomorrow, so you have to manage without me for a few days, during this time I suggest you read Brians post at I Smell Therefore I Am:

http://ismellthereforeiam.blogspot.com/2010/11/are-you-perfume-blogging-snob-take-this.html

Paul & Joe - Blanc

2010-11-29T23:51:00.001-08:00

What a weather! Half a meter of snow and -15 C cold, and it´s not even december yet!

The change of seasons influences me, this time of year I´m usually a little more tired, a little more keen on candy (yes, I admit I have tried to swap for candy at Perfume Posse´s swapmania) and not as sparkling as I am in may or june. On the other hand the Christmas preparations are mood lifting and yesterday me and daughter made a gingerbread house, it was so much fun.

When autumn turning into late autumn and eventually winter my taste in perfumes also changes. The warm spicy, woody and often amber-based perfumes I love wearing during autumn slowly being replaced by scents with gourmand feautures. I was so close to make a sample order with only gourmand samples, but then an Ebay thing got in between, so I have to wait with those gourmand until after Christmas.

Paul & Joe Blanc isn´t really a gourmand scent, or it is, but it´s a different take on gourmand. I´ve been curious about it for some time without manage to get it. First I visited the only shop in Sweden that have it, but they didn´t have it right then. Then I was so close getting a used bottle of it at Ebay and when I was about to place the winning bid the seller had forgot to allow bidders from outside UK (I´ve asked for it beforehand). Now and then I manage to mess things up, even though I know it´s perfectly simple to order a sample of Blanc from The Perfumed Court. Whatever... Anyway, now I have a sample thanks to a perfume friend.

And I like! Not sure what I like, but Blanc smells a little like this: 60% common, not that bad but still, common floral. This isn´t the part of Blanc making it special it´s the other parts. Another part maybe 30% of Blanc smells similar to much more expensive L'Eau d'Hiver by Frederic Malle, soft, subtle, caressing, cold and a little milky floral. Wonderful and different. But maybe the best part -according to me- the little one remaining (about 10%) smells like my loved Bois Farine by L'Artisan. Or, add some tiny, tiny note of something skankydirty then you get it.

In fact, Bland is much more subtle, well made and complex then to expect for a scent at this price point. I could easily buy a bottle and have instead of much more pricey L'Eau d'Hiver. Floralgourmand-scents without any fruit (is nut a fruit?) and not much sweetness isn´t that common. So in my opinion Blanc manage to fill up an otherwise quite empty spot.

One problem with Blanc is that I´ve heard a lot of people that don´t get neither the nutty or the milky notes from it. This is quite subtle, and I wouldn´t at all think that Blanc was something special if I didn´t get the milky and nutty notes. If it´s because of skin chemistry or sense of smell is hard to say, maybe a combo? I suspect that Blanc smells a little different on me on different occations, but I haven´t tried it enough to be sure.

Without the more odd notes of milk and nut, Blanc is left with some soft floral notes of lily of the valley and jasmine, and some hints of lilac (I´m glad it´s only hints, usually I´m not a fan of lilac in perfume). Blanc is a soft but also somewhat cold floral, like flowers dipped in powdery snow. The nutty note is most obvious during the opening, but some traces of it lingers for a while. The milky note is more apparent in the drydown.

Unfortunatly, Blanc don´t have that great lasting power on me. After about 3 hours it becomes so subtle and close to skin that I tend to forget that I´m wearing it. However, I have just a small dab on sample, and longvity and sillage could be much better if sprayed on.

I do recommend Blanc to all of you looking for a floral scent with an odd, cold tvist. Or if you´re looking for a starnge, not so sweet gourmand or something in between. I hope to get me some small bottle of it myself or at least a larger decant.

Thursday I´ll go away agian. Heading south to my daughter in Markaryd and then to a funeral in Skåne. Back home again on saturday.

pic. flickr

Indult - Tihota

2010-11-26T00:38:00.001-08:00

I´ve been home from Gamleby for some days now. The kids have a chanse to almost try borading school life for a weak. Apart from the school subjects they have a lot of evening activities such as movie, pool, bowling, disco and other fun stuff.

It was nice surroundings but bad and boring weather, I belive every small town is easier to like in summer sun then in november rain.

That any of the kids would have notice my discrete scents wasn´t anything that I had to worry about since I was surrounded by big clouds of Pink Sugar, Midnight Fantasy, Christina Augilera and loads of cheap male deo scents. I had Keiko Mecherié Loukhoum, L'Artisan´s Bois Farine, Pure Poison, ELOs Like This, Ormonde Woman and Ange ou Demon with me. Besides that some of the kids smelling really strong they where such nice and friendly atmosphere. I´m sure it had been more chaotic to spend a coupple of days with grown ups on a company kick off-trip...

Finally time to write again, even though I have to admit that todays scent isn´t that inspire me that much. Tihota from indult is one of the most expensive vanilla scents, and I´m only liking it so and so, even though I´m usually a vanilla fan.

But, I do think that Tihota smells reallyreallyreally good. It smells like pure, genuin, warm, creamy and expensive vanilla. The only problem is that in my opinion there are several other vanilla scents smelling as good but for a fraction of that price. I can´t smell anything but vanilla in Tihota and wouldn´t spend that much on such a linear and "simple" scent. Usually vanilla takes me to exotic island with dense greenery and lush flowers, but somehow Tihota don´t manage to do that, probably because I keep on thinking that I should get more for the price then what I get.

Well, I won´t need anymore of Tihota, personally, but the taste differs. My youngest daughter looooooves it! I let her try a small spray (Tihota is potent and longlasting) and the she sat with her nose attached to her vrist for a long time screaming it was the best scent she had smelled in her entire life! And since she´s my daughter she had tried more perfumes then the average 13 years old I belive. I have tried to stir her away from Tihota by letting her smell others not as expensive vanillas, but accroding to my daughter there isn´t anything coming even close. And the fact is that Tihota smells differently on her then on me, it´s more complex and smells kind of MORE on her.

So I´ll manage without Tihota, while my daughter won´t. I have promised to try to get a decant of it for her, 5 or 10 ml, so if anyone that reads this has a little to spare, please contact me.

Tihota is a thick, full bodied, sweet (but not THAT sweet), creamy, genuin and pure vanilla scent. I feel warm, comfy and sensual when I wear it as long as I don´t think about the price (about 160 € for 50 ml I belive). But as far as I´m concerned I can buy a small bottle of Vanillary at Lush and smell almost as good.

Anyway, Tihota is longlasting and if you invest in a big bottle of it you´d have enough vanilla to last you for years and years. Tihota smells as you expect a vanilla to smell and could best in class on that. If you´re not a big vanilla lover, Tihota won´t covert you since it´s a typical vanilla, not that kind of modern vanilla trying to get away from itself....

Oh, and I indulged in Perfume Posse´s hilarious "swapmania" the other day, such a fun event and now I´m looking ofrward to Neil Morris sample, a big bottle of Lorenzo Villoresi´s Musk (if you read my Villoresi-reviews you knwo that Musk become on of my faves from that line) and apart from perfume I´ll also get me some Ameriacn candy, hope they´ll arrive before Christmas!

pic: amamdeusvanillabeans.com

A little time off...

2010-11-20T23:57:00.001-08:00

Tomorrow I´ll be leaving for Gamleby for a few days together with youngest daughter and her school. It´s going to be so much fun and really interesting to be a part of her school work during some days. But she have told me not to wear too much make-up and I have to brush my hair! She don´t seem to worry about that I´m going to say a lot of stupid things at least and it´s cool with her if I bring some perfumes.

I don´t really think that school environment are the best place to wear perfume, but since almost all of the girls in my daughters class douce them selves a lot with fragrances from Britney Spears, Paris Hilton and Christina Augilera I don´t think anyone will mind if I dab on a few drops of something subtle from Annick Goutal or L'Artisan.

If it is Ok to wear perfume when spening time with (teen)kids, which perfumes would you bring? I plan to take some subtle, soft and warm skinscents. Even if the girls stinks of perfumes I belive they still have a better sense of smell then a lot of adults, so they can easily detect "strange" scent....

My daughter usually wears Jessica Simpson´s Fancy during school time, but when she comes home she can wear anything strange from my collction.

When i get home again there is a lot of interesting things to write about. Hopefully I´ll present some really far away fragrances, even though it still could take some weeks. Also I hope it´ll be a really good offer here, don´t miss it.

Four winners!

2010-11-18T23:44:00.000-08:00

List Randomizer

There were 19 items in your list. Here they are in random order:

Hanna
clivia
Susanne B
Bellatrix
Carina
womo531
Lilla My
Lisa BTB
waftbyCarol
Julia
kastehelmi
queen-cupcake
kjanicki
Lotta
Ulrika
Therese
Matilda
Maria G
Anna

Timestamp: 2010-11-19 07:40:00 UTC

Congrats to: Hanna, clivia, Susanne B and Bellatrix. Send your address to my mail and I´ll send the samples of Shahrzad Palace Perfumes to you. It may take a while since I have a busy time before me.

I wish better luck next time for the rest of you.

Etat Libre d'Orange - Like This

2010-11-18T03:29:00.001-08:00

I´m not always that fast with perfume news here. There are a lot of new releases all the time and of course I´m not interested in all of them. And there is alot of thing that can come in between when I find something new that interests me, like some bargains at Ebay or Tradera... another "unknown" perfume brand I just have to write about or some really good samples in a swap... By the time I order the new scents, they´re not actually new to anyone... but me.

Etat libre d'Orange´s Like This is one of those scents. It was released a while ago and by now it feels like everyone have tried it. Anyway I was really curious about it, Tilda Swinton seem to be a very different kind of celbrity, both her look and what she chose to work with. And that she chosen to aks Etat libre d'Orange to make her scent is also really appropriate and cool. But this isn´t news anymore and I´ve decided to fokus on the scent itself.

Like This isn´t at all as I thought it would be. with notes of ginger, pumpkin, immortelle, vetiber and helioptrope I belived it would be really warm, sweet and autumnal and kind of strong-w

sweet. But it´s not, at least not on me.

On me Like This becomes spicy in a subtle way, pale in an interesting way, citrus sweet, soft, caressing, sensual, gourmand, lovely odd and different and a little, little hint of naughtyness. There is something hotspicy beneath the creamy, soft surface. Actually it´s really suitable for a pale redhead like Tilda Swinton. A scent for strawberry blond hair, pale frequels, soft clothes in creamy nuances, a comfy chair in front of a fireplace and a ginger colored housecat in the lap while reading an adventure novel...

Like This isn´t what I expected, it is at least as good as I hoped. I´ll use it a lot even though I´m not a pale redheaded beuty. At least I can pretend to be when I´m wearing it.

This is so interesting and each time I use it I discover new things about it. There isn´t much left in the little sample I ordered some weeks ago. Like This have manage to get a spot quite high on my wish list, maybe I´ll go for a decant at first, but eventually I want a big bottle of Like This.

Like This is great to wear this time of year, but since it´s quite subtle I think it could work all year round. Somehow it reminds me of Bois Farine, as uniqe and different, still soft but still longlasting. If you like Bois Farine I think you really have to try Like This! Lasting power is good and sillage is medium (from my dab on sample).

Maybe you allready have tried Like This? What´s your opinions about it? I suspect it can be that kind of fragrance you either like a lot or not care for at all...

Pic: Flaming June

A small give away of samples from Shahrzad Palace Perfumes

2010-11-16T06:23:00.000-08:00

Since I´m quite alone with this scents from Shahrzad Palace Perfumes I´ve decided to have a small give away of 4 sample sets with all the five scents, Royal Ambar, Musk, Jasmin, Violet and Lotus Flower.

Just leave a comment below before friday 19/10 in the morning (CET) and I draw a total of 4 winners both here and at the Swedish blog.

And I am really curious about what you think about the different scents so prepare to tell me that if you´re one of the winners.

It could take a while before I can post the sample sets since I´m not sure if I have enough sample vials for now, but you will get your set eventually if you´re one of the winners.

Good luck!

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes - Jasmin

2010-11-16T02:34:00.001-08:00

Just like the violet from Shahrzad Palace Perfumes, Jasmin is also a bright high tuned and clean scent. The top notes are almost piercingly vibrant and radiant. Despite that this is some kind of perfume oil, is reminds a little of Thierry Mugler´s Alien, but more natural.

Once again I´m strucked with the fact that something that had been tucked in in the bottom of a wardrobe for many years can smell so fresh, so good and so new! Shouldn´t oils been spoiled eventually!? Apperantly not these anyway. I really enjoy the top notes on this jasmine scent, they are like listening on some kind of opera in a strange but very beautful language.

The heart of this fragrance is a little more laidback, with sweet notes of juicy peach and some dry flower petals. As the violet scent, this isn´t the most complex jasmine to be found. Rather a jasmine svent for people prefering natural, clean and simple jasmine.

I become almost most impressed by the Jasmin of the five, since the top notes are so extremly high tuned and radiant, but depsite that I think I wont use Jasmin so oiften since I´ve got a bunch of other jasmine faves.

But among the five I´m least impressed with the Lotus Flower, not that it´s anything wrong with it. But, it´s just a weak aquatic scent and do nothing for me.

I do realise that these scents aren´t likely to be tried by so many of you. Even though I like to try rare scents, it´s kind of dull not to hear others opinions about them...

Pic. flowers.c-s

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes - Unlabeled (Violet)

2010-11-16T01:04:00.001-08:00

One of the bottles from Shahrzad Palace perfumes was unlabeled. The seller belived it was some kind of citrus since the liquid was yellowish, but it wasn´t. It´s clearly a floral. Violet to be more precise.

Honestly, at first I had some troubble smelling it was violet, but when both my husband and daughter was totally sure it was, I become convinced. Now, when I sniff it I can´t understand why I couldn´t recognise violet at once... oh well.

Usually I like violet in scents, and this one is not an exception. It´s neither powdery or sweet or green, it´s just plain simple violet. A rather warm violet fragrance with elements of soap, even something vanilly and I can barely smell some little whiffs of dirt in there. Shortly speaking, it´s an easy to like and wear violet. Not as exiting and complex as Musk and Royal Ambar, but still something I´ll use if I´m feeling for violet.

This scents is probably very old, still it doesn´t smell old fashioned or old lady-like, it´s so simple and easy that it´s become timeless.

The floral scents from Shahrzad Palace Perfumes aren´t as longlasting as the Royal Ambar and Musk, but a good thing is that they´re not as sticky either. Still, they have good lasting power, about 6-8 hours. And what amaze me the most is the "height" of both violet and jasmine (I´ll come to that one shortly). The violet smells bright, clear and shiny and new, I can´t figure out how that´s possible?

The violet scent has rather good sillage but not too much. I would love to blend the violet with the musk and see what happens.

What kind of violet to you prefer in fragrances? Powdery, sweet or green or no violet at all?

Pic: outdoor.webshot.com

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes - Musk

2010-11-14T09:53:00.000-08:00

I feel almost a little "perverted" when I put on a few drops of Shahrzad Palace Perfumes Musk. Today musk in a fragrance is often a synthetic scent or in some case vegetabilic musk like scents. I can´t tell how much genuin musk is used in modern, western perfumes, maybe some reader nows more about that then I do?

But in Shahrzad Palace Perfumes Musk there isn´t any doubt about that it´s all about geuin musk. That is a fragrance extracted from some kind of gonads at the adult male musk deer. Earlier a lot of musk deer was killed in traps and no one cared if they also killed female and young deers. This way of collecting musk isn´t alloved any more. Nowadays musk can be collected naturally since the adult male animal scrub the gonads off regulary. As you can realise, this method and the fact that musk deers are rare animals explains how and why genuin musk is both rare and expensive.

This background information as well as the fact that the Musk-oil is dark brown in color and at start smells really strange contribute to my mixed emotions about this fragrance.

But, when I don´t think about that so much, I have to admit that I like the smell of this Musk a lot, it smells so good and also both interesting and odd. At first the scent matches the look of the oil, the topnotes are strong and with some medical as well as abresive and aromatic smell. It´s more like I put on some ancient tincture for some obscure health problem then a perfuemed oil...

Still, I happens to like that ambivalent feeling, but I can totally understand if some readers feels a little skeptic towards Musk. But, take it easy, after a short while Musk develops and become a really harmonic, animalic (kind of fur-smelling sort off), saturated, soft and very complex scent experience. Musk smells really good, but also with brisk and strange aromatic notes, which in my opinion deepens the scent and makes it even better. Despite the animalic feeling, it´s more sensual, indolent and comfy then raw animalic and dirty erotic. It isn´t at all as skanky as many modern musk scents.

I can also find floral, powdery and something aromatic like hay in the scent. On me the powdery note becomes quite obvious after a while and quite feminine, but it´s much more animalic and sexy on my husband (all kinds of musk become so sexy on him!), so of coure men could wear it as well. I wonder if people anosmic to some of the synthetic musk fragrances can smell genuin musk? Anyone knows?

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes Musk is more of a skin scent then Royal Ambar, but the lasting power is at least as good, ie. last a really, really long time. Just like Royal Ambar, but even more, Musk is a sticky oil and the dark brown color is also dark on the skin and I wouldn´t wear it with light or sensitive clothes, I suspect it can damage them.

Pic: borealforest

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes - Royal Ambar

2010-11-14T04:47:00.000-08:00

A reader commented that bargains could be the worst enemy of a perfumista. And I partly agree, I do have my share of bottles bought or swapped unsniffed that turned out to be not my cup of tea. But, I also got bottles I didn´t had any high expectations about that from nowhere suddenly manage to become a personal favorite.

Roayl Ambar from Shahrzad Palace Perfumes is such a scent. Unfortunatly this is the only of the five bottles that haven´t stand the test of time so good, the cap is broken and almost half of the liquid has evaporate (or been used?), but of course that makes the remainings even more dear.

Susprisingly, Royal Ambar is so similar to another favorite, Ambra Nera from Farmacia Annunziata. The same kind of complex, warm and animalic amber scent. As long as I have something left of Royal Ambar there´s no need for me to invest in abottle of Ambra Nera (whish is on my toplist). I don´t have much left of my sample of Ambra Nera so I havn´t compared tghe two side by side.

Royal Ambar is an erotic, warm, comfy and glowing oriental scent with elements of creamy coconut and sun salt skin, dark sweetness and sensual delight. A perfect comfort scent during the dark time of year.

Not so good is the fact that Royal Ambar has kind of a sticky oil base and also that I discover a weak note of something chalky when smeling it up close, but that note isn´t noticable from some distant. Besides that I have nothing but good things to say about it. Lasting power is amazing, at least 24 hours or even more, a little amount goes a long way and the two animalic scents in the colection is almost thick.

Pic: spermwhale, itsnature.org

Shahrzad Palace Perfumes

2010-11-11T00:26:00.000-08:00

When my perfume interest started it was modern and almost provocative brands like Comme des Garcons, Etat Libre D'Orange and CB I Hate Perfumes that got most of my attention. A lot of things has happened since then, and those brands don´t even seem to be that modern and/or provocative any longer? And you find other and/or new brands leading the development now.

Of course my perfume interest also has changed during these years, I still aprreciate scents that are fore runners and edgy, but also scents that just smells very, very good and most perfumes in between.

Vintage scents are a relative new niche in my perfume interest. Suddenly, within a few months I happened to get togehter a small (very small) collection of vintage scents. It´s a small beginning, but as good as anything else...

One thing not changing that much is that is still searching for bargains at Tradera (Swedish ebay). But, Tradera itself has changed a bit. More and more odd scents are showing up, niche perfumes, fragrances not longer in production and some really nice vintages. But, also obviously more of both sellers and buyers seem to know a lot about perfumes. Today, it´s not likely that a Comme des Garcons perfume would be sold for about 8 €. But still, you can make some really great bargains on scents a little below the common perfumista radar. For instant I bought a vintage bottle of Caron Infini for a little over 10 €, not long ago. It was re-formulated in early 70'ies and now has been re-made again, but I belive my bottle is before 1970, I would guess late 50'ies. I´ll write more about Caron Infini some other time.

Today it´s going to be about my latest bargain, the small set on the pic above. It´s really a bargain, maybe one of the best I´ve ever made on Tradera (and I´ve made quite a few bargains there by now). Anyway, this kit was sold as Egyptian perfume essences, and guess what? I won it for 24 kr ( less than 2,5 €). For that price I think it´s fun just to have the bottles and the box, if the perfume smells like sh*t, so what... I´ve got them for free.

I´ve got my set and realised when I opened it that it was almost un-touched. I wouldn´t call them essences, it´s some kind of really thick oil, ready to be used, but I think you can blend them with each other or even other kinds of perfume oils. The different scents are: Musk, Royal Ambar (with broken cap and some if it has evaporated), Jasmine, Lotus Blossom and un-labeled, but it´s smells like violet. And all of the scents smells like if they where made yesterday!

I haven´t yet tried them all, but Royal Ambar (an ambergris scent) smells so incredible jummy I can´t hardly belive it and Jasmine is so pure, clear and high tuned that it´s amazing! In my opinion this oils must have been made out of the finest raw materials.

This kind of bargains make me so excited. And curious. I can´t find much information about Shahrzad Palace Perfumes on internet, the only other thing I find is another kit sold for 70 £ in a webshop. I wonder when my set is made? The box is covered with some kind of waxed paper, and it feels likeit´s along time ago that kind of paper was in use. The bottles are of pressed glass which almsot make them look like citrus fruits. About 1 dm of height. The caps are made of bakelit I think but inside there are stoppers of plastic, so maybe they´re made during the 50'ies?

Anyone else that are good in estimating this kind of sets? Or known of some similar set of perfume oils? If you have anything to contribute with about this set, please tell me, I´m so curious.

I´ll write about the different oils and how they smell. And I will hand out some sample sets so others can try them and share their opinions with me. Don´t miss that!

Pic: private

Amouage - Memoir Woman

2010-11-09T01:09:00.001-08:00

Today I´m going to write about Amouage´s Memoir Woman, but before I do I just have to chatter a little.

First of all I´ve become an aunt again, to a sweet little baby girl, born on the other side of the world, in Chile. I´m so happy that everything went well and both mother and baby is feeling fine. Now I have to wait and see how long it´ll take before I´ll meet my newest little relative. Anyway, I have allready see pics of her, Facebook is great!

And, me and two of my daughters vistied Stockholm this Saturday and had so much fun. Times really fly when you have fun and we didn´t really manage to visit all the shops we had plan to visit. I almost didn´t test any perfumes at all! But, I had plenty of that on my latest trip to Stockholm anyway.

And, last but not least, I bought a set of "Egyptian perfume essences" on Tradera (Swedish Ebay), for about 2,50 €. For that amount of money I don´t really care if the scents are stale and old smelling and waisted, the bottles and the box are worth the money alone. But my little set arrived yesterday and I´m so excited about them that I can´t hardly think about anything else! They (all five of them) smell amazing! I´ll write more about them some other day and probably I´ll hand out some samples of these amazing "essences" (some kind of perfume oils in my opinion). Don´t miss it!!!

Oh well, Amouage... any returning reader knows that I haven´t fallen that hard for Amouage´s exclusive and rich charm. In fact, I have only really liked one scent from Amouage this far, and that is Reflection, which after all isn´t really my kind of scent, and even though I like it, I have never planned to buy more of it. The others I´ve tried are without doubt very rich smelling, well made and smelling really good, but not really my style. But now, I´ve found an Amouage suitable for me, Amouage Memoir Woman.

Memoir Woman is different from anything else I´ve tried from Amouage which have been huge florals with some kind of golden feeling to them. Memoir Woman is nothing like that at all...

With top notes of absinthe and citus folowed bu jasmine, rose, cinnamon, cardamom and clove, Memoir Woman is called a modern chypre, even though I don´t really agree with that.

On me it becomes strangely dreamy, floating, dusty (in a good way), spicy, aromatic and fairytale-like. A scent for a goth princesse, with pale powdered face elegant funerals and lingering mountain roads with dramatic cliffs. This scent is what you should wear if you where invited to a party at Count Draculas place. Oh no, Memoir Woman isn´t a happy, bubbly kind of scent, at least it doesn´t ewoke such emotions at me. No this is melancholy, yearning and a woman standing in the storm on an abandoned dock and waiting and waiting and waiting for that ship that never arrives. The sad queen wandering the empty hallways and rooms of the abandoned castle morning her dead king kind and all the dead little princes...

Amouage´s Memoir Woman triggers both imagination and sadness for me, this is a scent I would wear if I ever tried to write some horror novels, actually Memoir Woman inspires me to write that kind of litterature. A muse for horror writers is fairly accurate...

It´s suggestive and adorable in an un-expected way. On me the note of clove can be too dominating, either smelling to much of dust and smoke or to spicy and antiseptic, but in Memoir Woman it manage to stay away from that road. Insted it´s creating a caressing weil together with cinnamon and cardamom, both subtle, sensual and sad at the same time. Like a fragile and grey butterfly.

memoir Woman is a scent worth trying for anyone having some weak spot for darkness and melancholy, but also a must try if you haven´t really manage to find any fave among the other Amouage offerings. There is also a Memoir Man, but I haven´t tried it. Anyway, I belive Memoir Woman can be worn by man to, it isn´t that feminine. It last really good, almost all day and sillage is also good but not to much (at least not from my little dab on sample).

I´m having troubble to smell the musk, oakmoss and leather in the base, on me Memoir Woman is fairly linear but at the same time swirling.

Which is your favorite Amouage scent this far? Do you think they are over prices and not really worth that much money? I belived so before, but however, Memoir has changed my mind, even though I doubt I´ll ever have a big bottle of it, but a big decant would be nice.

Pic: whatthefuckiswater

Frederic Malle - Geranium Pour Monsieur

2010-11-04T01:27:00.001-07:00

I belive that almost everyone that´s trying Frederic Malle´s Geranium Pour Monsieur for the first time says "Toothpaste!" when they first sniff it. And yes, you are greated by a onvious minty note when you first put it on. But, when the toothpaste note has settled you will discover other sides of this fragrance, at least I do.

The man behind this scent is Dominique Ropion and I think he has succed to create something both fresh, clean and modern in an amazing way. Geranium Pour Monsieur becomes much more complex and interesting on me then what I´m used to find in other clean and fresh scents. Honestly, I find Geranium Pour Monsieur almost as complex and interesting as the lovely Dans Tes Bras.

Geranium Pour Monsieur makes me think about a serene, deep and stunningly beautiful underwater world. A world in complete silence, but with viewer impressions so fascinating and strange you could as well be in outer space. In my imagination I can also smell this unique surroundings. The cold minty note would be the ocean itself, because it´s a very wet and big kind of mint. The geranium is aromatic with some warm elements and for me it´s the smell of gorgeous milky half see through jellyfish with sher veils and all different kinds of strange shapes like flowers, clouds and living popcorn. If jellyfishes was flowers maybe they would smell like Geranium Pour Monsieur?

There is also some woody and spicy notes in Geranium Pour Monsieur, showing up from time to time. On me the mint note is very longlasting, but on my husband it´s only last for a short while. I belive Geranium Pour Monsieur is quite different on each and everyone, just like the wonderful Dans Tes Bras.

Geranium Pour Monsieur is also suitable for women. It has good sillage and great lasting power. I appreciate it a lot becasue of it´s unique and complex character, but it´s really not my type og scent. It´s possible I´ll take a spray now and then when I want to visit the strange underwater world, but just like Dans Tes Bras it´s a demanding scent that need a lot of attention. Something I´m not always in the mood for.

It´s also nice with a scent where geranium is geranium and not only a cheaper substitute for rose. A lot of people not liking geranium note in rose scents will probably get a different view of geranium if they try this fragrance. Geranium Pour Monsieur is a must try for everyone looking for different, unique and well made scents.

pic: backgroundbandit.com

Escentric Molecules - Escentric 01

2010-11-03T01:49:00.000-07:00

Quite often when I´m going to the local store or in to town I think about what if any stranger would ask me of what perfume I´m wearing. Since I use perfumes every day and also quite different kinds of scents, I guess there is a somewhat bigger possibility that someone would notice my perfume than for the average person. But however, it doesn´t seem to matter at all what perfume I´m wearing, no stranger ever ask me about my scents!

There are for sure a lot of different reason for people not asking about other peoples perfumes, I think Swedish people are a little shy and would feel uncomfartable and pushy if they asked, also I belive a lot of people never actaully smell my fragrance and also there´s a possibility that common people not at all think that my scents smells good.

Of course my family members, close relatives and friends ask me about my fragrances, but that isn´t really the same. As far as I can recall, it has happened one time that a stranger asked me about my perfume, and that was a long timer ago up in Umeå, and the scent I was wearing was Kenzo Jungle.

Anyway, I´ve got a decant of Escentric Molecules Escentric 01, and I have never read reviews of any scent that seem to give the people wearing it as many compliments and questions. Another cool thing about it is that people wearing it don´t seem to like it THAT much, but still wear it since they got so many compliments. Hmm.

Unfortunatly I suspect I have to bath in it to get that kind of compliments. On me, Escentric 01 wears very subtle and etereal. The opening is spritzy, peppery and kind of fun, but then it become very silent and shy. When I´m wearing it I think of it more like a kind of vague aura then like a fragrance. I think Escentric 01 would be really nice to layer with almost any other scent. It has a strangley nice scent, but at the same time faceless and easy to forget.

One interesting thing with Escentric 01 is that it during day comes and goes. Sometimes I can´t hardly smell it at all, and then shortly after I re-discover it. After the spritzy opening it develops to a subtle, clean woody scent with some very soft incense features. As a scent I think it´s easy to wear for people of all ages and sorts, but also not so easy to really like. Still it has a strong precense, but lack of warmth, heart and deepth. Maybe not so strange since it is all built around a synthetic note of ISO E Super.

To me, there isn´t anthing to dislike about Escentric 01, but not really anything to like either. But maybe, I would think different of it if someone asked what scent I´m wearing! :)

Weak, but vary sillage and the lasting power is good but also a bit un-even.

Do you get questions about your perfume all the time? Compliments? And now I mean from strangers or people you don´t know that well, as the woman working at the local store, not your hubbie, wife or sweet little mother. Which scent, if anyone, have get you the most attention?

Pic: Emelie Ohlsson

Some autumn favorites 2010

2010-10-27T23:35:00.001-07:00

While the wind is amusing itself by blowing all the leaves from the trees and the rain is amusing itself by turning the same leaves to a brownish gunk I amuse myself by thinking about what fragarnces I´ve used most during this autumn (september-october that is).

Autumn is a perfect season for perfumes, maybe the only time of year when I don´t think about or longing for the perfumes I will wear next season. Then I don´t care about seasons and scents at all some days, it´s a question about mood.

It feels like a lot of things have happened since last autumn. I have "discovered" oakmoss and suddenly that note is in a lot of my favorite scents. Even scents with quite prominent oakmoss character! Safron, milky notes and a lot more perfumes with floral notes then last autumn is also among them.

Most of them all I think I´ve used Costume Nationals 21, I´ve got a big spray sample but it´s almost empty now and are waiting for a decant, which I hope arrive any day now! Anyway, I´ll need a big bottle of this eventually.

Super expensive and super wonderful Cuir Beluga has also been of much use, my little decant have not much left. Tonka Imperiale that I bought at the same time haven´t been used at all as much. I msut have more of Cuir Beluga, it´s worth every cent!

All different Poison-varietys have been used a lot (most maybe Pure Poison, but not so much Hypnotic Poison) My stash of Pure Poison was enhanced this week also!

And my vintage Zibeline, what a hit! This is pure comfort and also both elegant and classic, pure bliss.

I´ve also used La Sirena from Carthusia almost of the same reason as Zibeline, warm, comfy and very rich smelling.

My birtday present Shiloh has been of much use as well, not so much a comfort scent as a pick me up scent, perfect to use in the morning when it´s dark and gloomy outside. The basenote in this is to die for. I wonder if oakmoss is addictive?

24 Faubourg from Hermes is something I discovered just recently even though I have had it for a long while, now it has clicked.

Serge Lutens Un bois vanille and Muscs Koublai Khan I have used a lot also and as usual Frederic Malles Carnal Flower.

I´ve jts got a wished for sample of Paul & Joe´s Blanc and it seem promising. I also can´t stop using Andrea Maacks Sharp and now they are available at COW in Stockholm, I have to go there and watch them the next time I´m in Stockholm (which will be next weekend hopefully!).

I haven´t used L'Artisan´s Nuit de Tubereuse SO much, but I´ve thought about it a lot. Some L'Artisan scents seem to behave this way, I don´t think that I like them SO much, but still I can´t stop thinking about them. I know Nuit de Tubereuse becoming a little masculine on me, but hey, I don´t think I give a damn about it any more!

perfumes I used a lot last autumn, but not this: Borneo 1834, Le Labo Labdanum 18 and By Kilian´s Back to Black.

What have you been wearing this autumn? New faves? Old darlings? If you would recommend only one perfect autumn scent, which would it be?

Pic: Winter trees without leaves, layoutsparks.com

MCMC Fragrances - Hunter

2010-10-27T00:05:00.001-07:00

Sometimes I "skip job". Yesterday I planned to write on the blog, but when I waked up I knew that I had to wear Ormonde Jayne´s Ormonde Woman. I couldn´t imagine wearing any other perfume right then. I don´t have any deadline when I blog, but I try to plan my work and have some control when to finnish it. But, from time to time I just have to wear the scents I like the most...

Otherwise I have the last days testing myself through MCMC Fragrances different scents, Noble, Maui, Maine, Hunter, Humanity and Garden. the last two are parts of charity project and a big part of the profit goes back to charity (50% and 100%). A part from that, MCMC Fragrances is a new indie perfume house, situated in Brooklyn, New York.

All the different scents are simple, bright and clean compositions. They manage to feel both old fashioned and eclectic modern at the same time. In comparision to more established perfume houses I find them a little similar to Annick Goutal and I´m sure they could attract about the sam audience.

Among the six scents I´ve tried, Hunter is my biggest fave. With notes of tobacco, vanilla and fir balsam that isn´t perhaps so surprising. When reading about it, it´s suggested to be worn with a flannel shirt and that is 100% true.

Hunter is that kind of soft comfort scent for indoor days in october or november. But it´s also a good companion on autumn forrest walks. Hunter, as the others, are a unisex-scent, and I think it´s really suitable for everyone looking for a not so complicated and cozy scent. With tobacco and vanilla, Hunter could be sweet, heavy and almost cloying, but it isn´t at all. Hunter gets a clear, almost transparent and vibrant pureness thanks to the fir. This feels lika quite an original blend, and in a very adorable way.

During it´s middle phase the tobacco become just a little smokey. The fir goes from fresh to slightly woody and resinious, but the development is very subtle and soft.

If some of Annick Goutal´s scents is like japanese haikus, MCMC Fragrances are more like love letters in the sand, they are evanescent, but honest and devout. In other words, they do have quite short longvity, with exception of Noble (The one least liked by me). Hunter remains on my skin after a few hours, but just suggested, the sillage wears of in some two hours.

To some this is not at all a good thing, while others are looking for discrete scents that are also unique and creative, if that is the case, I recommend all of MCMC Fragrances scents. Hunter is a must try, and Maine (with notes of rose, sage and seaweed) or Maui (ginger, star anise, frangipani and tuberose) are also original and pretty scents.

You can read more about MCMC Fragrances at theur home page

http://mcmcfragrances.com/Home.html

Pic: flickr.com

Acorelle - Wheat Almond and Amber Vanilla (Bio Cosmetics)

2010-10-23T00:39:00.001-07:00

Like -probably- a lot of other women I´ve a somewhat complicated relation to clothes and shoes. When we get our dog I had about 15 or 20 pairs of not so practical but oh so beautiful high heeled shoes, but I didn´t had a single pair of sneakers. I had to borrow a pair that my son had outgrow. And when it was rainy I had to borrow my husbands big rubber boots.

Outer graments I had lots of, a bright red trenchcoat, leather and velvet jackets and even a wonderful red down jacket (that isn´t so much of use since the winters here are normally quite mild, with exception of last year). Other dog owners I met seem to have their wardrobe filled with comfy and practical outdoor clothes...

In my wardrobe there is a lot of clothes hagning that I´m hardly use, and that I´ve loose weight by running in and out with the dog makes the clothes not even fitting anymore.

So finally I have start to become a little more practical when it comes to clothes and shoes. Nowadays I´ve got not one pair of trousers in my wardrob e but 3 or 4 and I even got me two pairs of comfy sneakers for long walks. And I also have rubber boots my own size. I have cut two corsets into pieces and tried to make some necklaces of them and my red feather boa is hanging in a corner and looking lousy...

At 40+ I´ve realised that comfy and practical clothes are quite useful and yes... comfy. Oh well, middle age ta

kes us all eventually... Resistance IS futile and also a bit ridiculous I imagine.

A lot of different perfumes aren´t that fitting for casual wear, it´s in within the nature of perfumes to be somewhat luxurious and to spray on a lot of strong perfume becomes more and more controversial. Acorelle offers 100% natural products, among the products are some eau de parfums as well.

http://www.laboratoire-odysud.fr/

http://www.acorellebeauty.com/

Acorelle products are available both in Europe and USA.

Among their scents, two have captured me the most, Wheat Almond and Vanilla Amber, Wheat Almond is balancing and Vanilla Amber is dynamizing.

To me, Wheat Almond is most about comfort, it´s a scent to wrap yourself up in. Perfect this time of year, and a scent equivalent to a soft velour set. The scenst from Acorelle isn´t that complex, but they sure are refreshingly comfy and soft. Wheat Almond has a sweet, spritzy top note almost candylike, but that fades rather quick and leave a soft almond scent togheter with something that smells like floury wheat. And that is unbelivable nice and also quite unique. The texture of the scent reminds a little of Bois Farine even though they don´t smell alike. During heart and base there isn´t so much going on, it is soft, cuddly and with some soft woody notes and just a smallest dash of something fruity. The only negative about Wheat Almond is the somewhat poor lasting power, not over two hours on me.

Vanille Amber on the other hand has really nice lasting power for an all natural scent. Vanilla and amber has been made over and over again, but still Acorelle´s Vanille Amber seem to have found it´s own niche. I´m a lover of ambery scent, but still can I find them to be to sweet and almost cloying sometimes, or some amber scents has a dusty smell that thickles my throath. Vanilla Amber avoid all that, this is a vanilla amber scent that is soft, refreshing and light. If a lot of amber scents can feel like golden, thick and honeylike, Vanille Amber is like a glass of a sparkling golden refreshing drink. Really, this is kind of vanilla amber scent, for people not usually so found of vanilla and amber. Besides vanilla and amber, I can find some woody notes and a soft smokey scent also occur in the base. Vanilla Amber has better sillage then Wheat Almond, still this is a very discrete scent.

Both scents are intended for women, but I think they can be worn by men to. You may not turn to Acorelle scents if you´re looking for dramatic and splendid scents for evening wear, but if you´re looking for a snuggly comfort scent to spend the autumn/winter with I can recommend both Wheat Almond and Vanilla Amber.Wheat Almond is the more unique of them, but on me Vanilla Amber is the winner in the long run.

100% natural scents has become increasingly popular, what do you think about natural scents?

I have great respect for noses and perfume producers that chose to work with all natural ingridiences, but still I don´t have anything against some synthetics in my scents. Often this components make the scent last longer and there are so many new chemical notes with unique scent. At the same time there is to many bad put together 100% synthetic perfumes out there. If I had to chose between smelling like a syntetic strawberry soda mixed with hairspray or Wheat Almond or Vanilla Amber it´s really a very simple choise. :)

Pic: stefanpoon

Ines send me your address!

2010-10-21T23:42:00.001-07:00

I´ll send the sample set of CnR Create Star Sing Scents for men to you, since no one else was interested.

Send your address to my mail. :)

What about the boxes?

2010-10-19T00:19:00.001-07:00

For most of us perfume lovers the juice is the thing that matters. Some perfumistas don´t acre about the bottles at all, while some only collecting perfumes in purple or see through bottles.

Usually the bottles aren´t that important, but of course, a beautiful bottle is always a plus. Personally I kind of hide the not so good looking bottles or keep them in the back. But, after all, what is looking good and what´s not is a matter of taste.

You can also find perfume bottle collectors, people that don´t care about the scent, at least not that much. They want only the bottles and maybe try to collect everything from a certain brand or period.

Anyway, most people seem to forget about the boxes. Almost all our scents comes in an outer box. And, most boxes are made of cardboard or paper and a lot of them are being throwed away as soon as we have open it. If you after all is saving your box, that´s the one getting worned out first. So old perfume boxes in great shape must be quite rare? Still, I haven´t heard of anyone collecting them...!?

The pic above shows some of my perfume boxes, I keep them, even though I buy and swap a lot of perfumes that comes without box. The boxes is also a part of the wholeness, maybe the bottle is the first thing we noticed, but in most perfume stores the boxes are kept right behind. To come home with a new perfume and gently wrap of the cellophane and carefully open the box gives me a feeling of pure luxury. It´s something very special about a totally new fragrance and a new box. Still, we tend to forget about the boxes almost at once, still perfumes with boxes are more sought after then perfumes without...

When taking a look at the boxes, they can be as nicely designed as the bottles and they do tell us a lot about a´what we can find inside the box. You should hardly find a Serge Lutens kind of bottle in a Lolita lempicka box and the other way around. Maybe I should become the "worlds first" perfume box collector? Even though I´m convinced there must be some of them out there somewhere?

How do you feel about perfume boxes? Do you throw them? Do you save the most appealing/ luxury one´s? Do you keep them all? Maybe you´re one of them only buying perfumes that comes with a box? Maybe you even got a favorite box? Which?

Personally I like almost all kinds of boxes, the variety if a part of the charm I think. And the box tell us as much about the scent as the bottle...

Well, when I´m not thinking about perfume boxes, I´m about testing some scents from a French 100% natural brand, and at least one of them has become a wonderful autumn favorite. More about them soon.

Pic: Some of my perfume boxes

L'Artisan Parfumeur - Vanilia

2010-10-18T00:18:00.000-07:00

When I was looking for pics with mothers and daughters looking like sisters, Madonna and her daughter Lourdes was a common hit. Sorry, but I can´t see that. In which way should they look like sisters? Firstly, they are´nt that similar looking, especially not since Madonna started to inject pig fat or whatever in her face. And, Madonna does look quite much older then her daughter, which of course is totally natural since she was about 40 when Lourdes was born. And yes, how many sisters do you know of that are 40 years apart? Anyone? I know Madonna is (was) a beautiful women, but she can be happy that I didn´t wrote that I think that she looks like Lourdes grandmother, oh well now I wrote that anyway.

This must really be a longshot, what has this with perfume to do? It isn´t that weird really (not for me at least). I´ve got a bottle of L'Artsian´s Vanilia, one of the oldest members of L'Artisan family. Vanilia was born 1978, and therefor has deserved to be called a classic. Last year another vanilla scent was born in L'Artsian famile, namely Havana Vanille. It´s said that Vanilia is done and will be replaced by Havana Vanille, but at least at COW in Stockholm, the two of them are sold side by side (anyone know about this, please tell me).

When I first tried Vanilia I was surprised by the similarity between it and Havana Vanille. This is where I start thinking about mothers and daughters, they are after all about 30 years apart. But they really are mother and daughter that could be sisters.

The rivalty between them must be a family problem. Will old faithful Vanilia have to leave the spotlight totally now when young, trendy Havana Vanille has make her entrance? Is the classic beauty of Vanila replaced by Havana Vanilles more youthful look? Does really Vanilla still work?

I say that Vanilia is a typical L'Artisan, light, sher but still interesting. Vanilia is also among the L'Artisan scents that have decent lasting power on me (about 4-5 hours). When I was trying Havana Vanille alst year in a beautiful snow fall I come to think about the scent of snow flakes falling and slowly melting on my tounge. This feeling I´ve got from Vanilia also, but it isn´t snowflakes but bright colored beautiful tropical flowers slowly raining from the sky. Somewhere in the outskirts of my attention a fire is burning letting of a soft smoky scent. The vanilla in Vanilia is kind of slippery, elusive and not very sweet.

I think Vanilia is still working, even though Havana Vanille feels a little more modern. The presence of vanilia is also stronger on me then Havana Vanille. Vanilia has a steadily present vanilla base, while the other notes showing from time to time (flowers, smoke nd in the base some woody notes). On me, Havana Vanille don´t have that kind of base, but is for long times very quiet and then eventually sends of a quiet little whiff...

Still, that little whiff I prefer in front of Vanilias a little monotone floralvanilla. But anyway, Vanilia is a really nice vanilla, easy to use for people prefering a non-foody vanilla. The sillage is also quite nice, something Havana Vanille can´t really brag about.

Do you have a weak spot for vanillas maybe you should invest in abottle of Vanilia before it´s to late and they´re start selling them at Ebay for 150 €.

As long as I have Vanilia I don´t need Havana Vanilla at least.

Soon I´ll be writing about some 100% natural scents and also talking a little about thinking "outside the box" or maybe even "inside the box"...

Pic: Madonna with her daughter Lourdes, x17online.com

About our perfume meeting.

2010-10-17T09:39:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we had a perfume meeting again. We´re starting to be like a little gang, even though some that was on the last meeting couldn´t come to this one, but on the other hand some new gang members showed up this time.

It seem like most of us want´s to continue having this meeting a coupple of times per year. And I can assure you that we are a happy, mixed and easy going gang that meet during very relaxed circumstances.

Yesterday we squeezes in some hours of sniffing and testing at NK and at COW, and also we was invited to one of the participant´s for some coffee and a guided sightseeing at her impressive perfume collection.

Unfortunatly it´s a little difficult to manage everything we like to do on only a few hours. A suggestion about a perfume camp was mentioned, really cool, even though I think it´s kind of hard to have it for real. At least I think all of us could easily have different kinds of perfume activities for a week without getting bored, but maybe with a very exhausted olfactory sense.

There are some different suggestions on what to do on our next meeting.

Oh well, did I find any new favorites? Yeah, Byredo´s new M/Mink is really different and interesting, but of course needs some testing on it´s own before I can write a review. I also tried Bond No 9`s Success is a job in New York agaian, and it´s growing on me. Creed´s Love in Black was also promising. I also tried a lot of other scents.

Honestly, I can hardly wait for the next meeting.

A somewhat smaller drawing

2010-10-15T04:30:00.001-07:00

On the Swedish blog I have a drawing for two big bottles of perfume from CnR Create. This is by far the most valuable drawing I´ve held on my blog. Unfortunatly you have to have a Swedish address to entering the contest for the bottles, but however my international readers wont be totally without a little price.

I have an untested sample set of all twelve male fragrances in the Star Sign perfumes line. If you´re interested to try out this well made and interesting line, please leave a comment and I´ll draw one lucky winner next friday 22/10.

If, however, you´re reading the English blog, but are a residence of Sweden or have an address in Sweden, you´re of course welcome to participate in the "big" contest. You do so by answering this question:

Where was the idea of making Star Sign perfumes born?

You can find the right answer here:

http://www.cnrcreate.com/wbc.php?sid=25885c0106f&tpl=start.html

But, for entering the sample drawing you don´t have to answer the question. Only leave a comment and I´ll draw one winner.

Good luck and a big thank you to Robert and Canisa at CnR Create.

Star Sign perfumes - Libra (male version)

2010-10-15T00:26:00.001-07:00

If Capricorn was the first among the twelve male scents that catch my attention, Libra (24/9-23/10) could very well be the one winning in the long run. Not as directly catchy, charming or different, but still I noticed it quite fast.

Libra has notes of tuberose, violet, cardamom, cinnamon, tolu and vetiver among others. This gives a lovely dark, mysterious and all together wonderful violet scent. Sure, it is intended for men and I really like the idea of a violet fragrance for men, but why should we let the men have this wonderful violet all by them selves?

On me Libra become a mysterious, vibrant and dark violet with masculine elements, but without being too masculine. Almost kind of a gothic, melancholic type of scent. It is dry, severe and a little cold, which makes me think about old grey stone churches, little violets in the grey light of dawn, Victorian environments and a wistful piano concert. Yes, Libra seem to be a scent filled with emotions, and I think it´s very fitting to October born libras, since october (in my opinion) is a little melancholu month and libras supposedly are a emotional star sign.

No matter what you belive about astrology, Libra is a violet scent I love to return to, actually it remind me a little of another favorite violet, namely Ava Luxe´s Midnight Violet.

I do recommend Libra to anyone interested in astrology, but also to everyone usually liking violet in fragrances and are looking for a dark, mysterious and unisex violet. Libra could very well be the one you´re looking for!

Libra has good lasting power and medium sillage. Are you curious to find out more about Libra or maybe the other scents that CnR Create offers? Take a look here:

http://www.cnrcreate.com/wbc.php?sid=2419903971c&tpl=start.html

I have chosed to write about the two scent that captured me most, but that doesn´t mean the other one´s aren´t any interesting or good. But, after all this are scwents intended fpr men, and I don´t like to smell too masculine. Some of the scents didn´t suit me at all, Sagittarus and Aquarius for instant, but these could very well be the one´s most suitable for you. On my husband Taurus smells really good, masculine, warm and safe, while it don´t fit me at all, and well, yes my husband is born in taurus.

Don´t miss the drawing, coming up soon.

Pic: horoscopos

Star Sign perfumes - Capricorn (male version)

2010-10-14T04:34:00.000-07:00

I have write this several times before, when I´m trying about ten different scents, it doesn´t really matters how good the brand is, usually I tend to really like one or two scents out of ten the best. And when I try Star Sign Perfumes (for men) there is one fragrances that manage to capture my interest at once, namely Capricorn (22/12-20/1).

Capricorn is that kind of scent that I would notice among any other ten-twelve scents. Capricorn is unique, but still easy to like and wear for both men (as intended) and women...

Among the other male scents from Star Sign perfumes, most of them are more obvious masculine, so of course this makes capricorn stand out even more. Capricorn has notes of citrus in the opening, followed by rosewood, caramel and patchouli and finnishing of with amber, musk, vanilla and incense. This notes makes a lively, warm and soft oriental scent with gourmand elements.

Capricorn manage to be creamy, sweet, woody and with a lingering smoky note in the background. A man that got this scent as agift should be more the contempt, maybe with exception of men with really conservative taste that prefer more traditionally masculine fragrances.

On me, Capricorn become a quite sweet scent, really gourmand, with some elements of incense and the amber is really nice with my skin chemistry making the scent glowing and filled with life. As this is intended for men I try it on my husband as well, and on him the scent is quite different, it isn´t at all as sweet, and the smoky note is hardly noticeable on him, instead the wood note is more prominent making it dryer and maybe more aromatic, among the animalic notes the musk dominates while the amber is falling behind. Very different then on me, but still Capricorn is a scent that both me and my husband can wear without any problem.

Capricorn is a warm and cozy scent, and I think it´s really fitting since it´s intended for people born in the darkest time of winter (at elast in teh Northern hemisphere). Capricorn is also both sensual and exciting, making it very nice for passion seakers.

I would love to try it on my youngest son, since he is born in capricorn, but he is not at all interested in perfumes... (maybe he´s not even a typical capricorn?)

Lasting power is good, at least 6-8 hours, and sillage is also good. I could recommend Capricorn to all kinds of people, not onlu male capricorns. If you´re looking for a slightly smoky oriental with gouramnd elements, this is a must try! It is really, really good and you get a lot for your money.

Amont he twelve scents intended for men Capricorn is my favorite, which isn´t that strange since it´s quite unisex, but I´ve also found some other really nice one´s that I can imagine myself wearing. I write more about them any day soon...

It´s maybe not that hard figuring out that the drawing I´ll have is about CnR Create, so I think it´s about time for you to learn alittle more about the brand:

http://www.cnrcreate.com/wbc.php?sid=241748a8b81&tpl=start.htm

Pic: free wallpaper

CnR Create - Star Sign Perfumes

2010-10-13T00:45:00.001-07:00

As a perfume writer I have some contact with perfumers, perfume producers and press-people at different perfume houses. In common for those I´ve got good contact with is their entusiasm, kindness and joy. There isn´t any doubt about that this is people really burning for their company, fragrances and other people sharing their interests.

Often it´s easiest to have contact with people in small and/or new perfume companies. Of course for them it is really valuable to get mentioned on a blog, while the big one´s in the branch get their new releases mentioned on each and every perfume blog.

Robert Boehm and his co-worker Canisa is both that kind of friendly people burning for their company and for both perfumes and astrology. I have written about their brand before, but now they got something new to present, namely astrological perfumes for men.

I think it´s amazing to have two big interests and manage to combine them. The connection between astrology and perfumes are´nt that rare, but often we find it made by indie-perfumers in 5 ml bottles of perfume oil of different quality and sold on Etsy (and likes). Robert and his co-workers has chose a different path, they have fokused on high quality both when it comes to the actual scents and how the bottles and boxes are presented.

As an astrologist, Robert has ideas about how a fragrance for a certain star sign should be built up, but the actual perfume is created in Grasse by a trained perfumer. So the scents are made with fine ingrediences and a lot of skills, but however, not maybe that edgy or groundbreaking.

After all, astrology scents is a small niche. I think mostly people allready interested in astrology become interested in these kind of fragrances, but also, there is quite a lot of people with at least a common interest in astrology. Scents for different star sign is also a perfect gift or Christmas present, easy to chose, but still personal. For perfume lovers it might not be so obvious to turn to this kind of scents. We like to test "all" the scents and maybe we become a little confused when we realise that we like the scent supposed to match male capricorns when we are female virgos...

Still, when I evaluated the different scents for females, I was surprised by their quality and I really, really like the scent made for virgo (which is my star sign).

Now I´m testing the different scents for men and they´re all very well made and maybe even a little more interesting and edgy then the one´s for women. I´ve allready got two personal faves, one that is so nice on my husband, and one that I like very much for myself.

I will present the different scents soon and by the way, what is your star sign?

Pic: astrology homepage

2010-10-11T09:10:00.000-07:00

Seem like my hotmail-account don´t work as it should. If someone want´s to contact me, please use my new e-mail address torebella at gmail dot com

On the Swedish blog I talk about the perfume meeting taking place in Stockholm this coming saturday, if someone english-speaking want´s to join, please leave a comment or contact me. We had som mych fun last time, and I´m really looking forward to it.

This time I´ll be alittle better prepared, I´ll bring a pen so I can write every perfume I try, and

I´m also wondering what clothes I shall chose since bulky sweaters and coats are so much in the way when testing fragrances...

Coming up on the blog is a drawing later this week or in the beginning of next week, I´ll write about some scents for my male readers, and there will be all natural scents ahead also and then -hopefully- I have some news to present all the way from sunny California...

And that family drama will also be reported eventually...

The autumn is here for real now, and it´s high time to start wearing a little stronger and heavier scents. I think about this autumns favorites and wonder which are your autumn faves? Do you have some old one´s that you never get tired on or have you discovered some new autumn lovelies?

My preferences has change quite much during this year, I realise some of last years autumn favorites aren´t that used this year, while some other scents that I didn´t really liked last year are being of use this year.

I´ll tell you more baout my autumn favorites also later on...

Pic: huntadeal.com

Christian Dior - Pure Poison

2010-10-10T05:56:00.001-07:00

Before trying Dior´s Pure Poison I had some prejudice about it. I suspected that it was going to be a dissapointment, a member in the Poison-family created to satisfy the people looking for clean, pure and fresh scents. With other words, I thought I was going to get a Poison-member without any edge, depth or excitement.

Then of course, it is so much fun that my bad expectations wasn´t fullfilled. Oh well, Pure Poison is clean and clear, but in a intense, shining and utterly adorable way. In one way it reminds a little about Thierry Mugler´s Alien, with the same radiance, but softer and powdery.

Pure Poison is more quiet and even a little shy compared to the other Poison-varieties. Still it manages to make it´s way to the top position among the Poison´s for me, and that during a very short time also. To me, it´s easier top wear then the others, but still very concrete and with a great personality.

Despite it´s soft personlity there is also a dash of "poison" in it, there is a note hidden among the pale flower petals with a little tart note. It could be the smell of a delicate, sheer and deadly poisonous flower. As in several of the other Poison-scents, there is a feeling of deadly beauty in Pure Poison.

I´ve always pictured Hypnotic Poison as a white scent, the scent of powdery white poison, razor sharp paper, ice crystals, and the inner of a red apple or a bitter almond. Pure Poison is also a white scent, but the most fragile white, like almost transcluent petals on a small white flower with soft pink edges, the palest skin, the lightest blond hair and little beautiful poison mushrooms with pink gills.

Pure Poison, like the rest of the bunch, has good longvity, but the sillage is a little more discrete, especially during drydown with a delisious powdery note.

When I compared different Alien and Angel varieties by Mugler I also scaled them

http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2010/03/thierry-mugler-angel-liqueur-de-parfum.html

Here comes a scale for the different Poison´s

Hypnotic Poison (former fave) 6 of 10, but a 10 when I´m in the mood for it

Midnight Poison 7 of 10

Pure Poison 8 of 10

and

Poison 8 of 10

This isn´t a scale to take too serious, probably I´ll have a different view in a year or two.

And, someone MUST have tried Tendre Poison? How is it???

Pic: flickr.com

Christian Dior - Midnight Poison

2010-10-09T01:21:00.001-07:00

When I first tried Dior´s Midnight Poison I didn´t find it that special. I had a mini bottle and when I got it, it was only some tiny drops left. I didn´t think it was anything wrong with it, but I didn´t love it either. I tried it from time to time and it failed to make an impression on me...

Or at least it failed until I put the very last drops on... Suddenly the scent somehow had magically changed, I realised I liked it and a lot. I even tried to squeze out some leftovers from the bottle without any success.

Now I have found another small bottle of Midnight Poison. But, honestly, this one is tricky. Some time when I wear it it smells rosy, a little patcholuli and vanilla, really good but not heavenly good. And some time when I wear it, it smells incredible jummy, rich, warm and deep. This magic happens about every other fourth time I wear it. The scent of rose turns almsot blackish red, the patchouli is deep, dark and magnetic, the vanilla gives a splendid sweetness with some mouthwatering cramel note. It has transformed to something magic, magnetic and sexy and I can´t hardly get my nose from my wrist.

I have other scents behaving this way to, and even if it is a big surprise every time, I would of course prefer them to smell the best possible way every time I chose to wear them.

Midnight Poison is a fitting name, this scent is made for late evenings, but rather in a sensual and romantic enviroment than a party. It´s an oriental scent, but in my opinion not really. Like a scent trying to get what is best from two different sources without succiding every time. There is something clean and pure in Midnight Poison, something reminding of menthol. This makes it a little to open, to clear to be a total convincing oriental. A little like Elizabet taylor above, as Cleopatra the Queen of Egypt, she is beautiful, sensual and gorgeous, but maybe not 100% the Queen of Egypt?

Midnight Poison kinds of stop half way to the Orient, but maybe that is just as good? There are a lot of scents with the full richness, sweetness and heavyness of the Oriental, but maybe not as many standing in the doorway? To me, Midnight Poison is kind of an oriental for people not really liking oriental scents.

Belonging to a cathegory of scent easy available, Midnight Poison together with most other Poison-scents from Christian Dior is among the very best you can find in almost any small town. Midnight Poison has great lasting power and on me, medium sillage (I don´t have a spray). It is really suitable for men also, some other day in some other mood I would have described it as a rose scent for men. It´s like a light-version of Montale´s Black Aoud.

Pic: Elizabeth Taylor in Cleopatra

Christian Dior - Poison

2010-10-05T23:59:00.000-07:00

Now my parents have returned home to Boden. It has been a really nice week with good food and birthday parties, the dog turned two and my oldest daughter is turning 30. I´ll talk about having children almost as old as I am some other time...

As usual when I have a little break from writing I can´t wait to start writing again. Some time now I have tought about presenting and reviewing Christian Dior´s different Poison-fragrances and now it´s time for that. Hypnotic Poison is allready done:

http://perfumenerd.blogspot.com/2009/10/christian-dior-hypnotic-poison.html

I´ll start with original Poison and then I´ll write about Midnight Poison and Pure Poison as well, unfortunatly I haven´t get hold on any Tendre Poison. One of my blog readers wished that I would write more about "common" frags, and to that cathegory I count the Poison-scents.

Poison has been around a while, since 1985 actually, but I don´t have any old history with it. When it was launched I wasn´t that interested in perfumes and was contempt with my Opium. A littel later my brothers girlfriend had it, and I thought it smelled wonderful on her, but I wasn´t curious about it for myself, since I belived I only could wear oriental scents. I know better now, thankfully...

Anyway, now I do like Poison. Some readers may say that OK, then there is another tuberose scent that I like, but Poison isn´t that much about tuberose on me. It is blended so it become a wonderful, warm floral with elements of something berry, but also spicy and woody on my skin. These notes together smells like some kind of drink to me. A magic potion, an elixsir, an exciting bottle with strange contents that´s waiting to be drinken. Exactly like Alice above, I´m far to curious for my own good sometimes. I would of course also drink from a bottle with a sign on it "Drink Me", what if the result was that I become extremly tall or small or pink with green dots, if it smelled so good as Posion I would easily drink it anyway. Oh, and how exciting to wait and see the result...

For some reason I belive that Poison smells like apple juice. Some magic kind of apple juice, maybe if the evil stepmother in Snowwhite would offer Snowwhite juice instead of an apple, the juice would smell like this...

Yes, Poison takes me to fairytale land, it´s unbeatable if you want to escape the grey october feeling for some hours. Even though it is 25 years old I think it is modern, but also timeless, people in any age could wear this. It might work on men to, anyone out there that have tried it?

My Poison is in esprit de parfum in a small minibottle, so it can be quite different from edt or edp in spray. It has good, but not killer sillage and nice lasting power, about 7-8 hours.

Which is your fave among the Poisons? For a scent with so many flankers, I belive the flankers are quite good, at least the one´s I´ve tried.

Don´t miss some more Poison´s, and also some family drama, astrology and eventually some 100% natuarl scents. Both well knowned and others not so well knowned brands will show up...

Pic: Alice in Wonderland

Perfume meeting in Stockholm 16/10 and some other things.

2010-09-27T23:14:00.000-07:00

On Saturday 16th october we´ll have another perfume meeting. I suggest that we meet at NKs perfume department around 12. Any non-swedish speaking that is interested to come can either contact me with a comment or by mail if you want to know more about this.

Later today my parents are coming, and I will not write so much on the blog the coming week.

I also realised that I have had this blog for two years now. Time goes by. I looked at my old bloggings and found a pic on my perfume bureau, and it has happened a lot with my perfume collection since that, and it haven´t get any smaller. Of course other things then my perfume collection also has developed, I can detect more notes now, and different styles and perfumes that are similar to other perfumes. When I started with the blog it felt like I was writing right out in the air, but now it feels like I´m writing to friends, which I do, at least partly. I know there is a lot of people reading and never leaving any comments. Please, stop by and say hello some time.