Shahrzad Palace Perfumes - Jasmin

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)

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

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

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

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