Tag Archives: World of Perfume

SOTD: Palais Jamais by Etro

Sample of the day, World of Perfume June 1, 2010 Comments: 10

Sometimes a day goes by and I wonder how come I couldn’t find a little time to post a short review of a perfume, book or a sample. Today it’s the sample day and I finally have a little time to post my thoughts.

I love this. 🙂 I could end here with – it’s a mimosa-vetiver cologne for me and I love it.

I thought of it as a cologne but it’s actually an EDT which is basically the same.

Notes: tuberose, jasmine, ylang-ylang, mimosa, violet, tangerine, sandalwood, vetiver, musk, leather, tobacco, oakmoss, civet (there are some variants on the notes but not much).

As I already said, it starts as a green cologne to me (cologne meaning it’s citrusy for me) with something familiar that I just couldn’t figure out until I read the notes. It’s mimosa! This is the best mimosa for me so far. Ok, so I didn’t try that many but this one is still the clear winner.

And for an edt, it has some serious lasting power (more than the last 2 samples I tried).

I read somewhere it has some spiciness, and I agree. At some point, you feel that tingling in your nose that tells you there are spices in it but out of the notes, I cannot figure out what can it be. Besides, it doesn’t last long. It goes on to some white flowers peeking through but I can’t say I actually smell one of those listed. What surprises me is that for an edt, it goes through a lot of phases. At some point it gets really flowery until settling down into a vetiverish mimosa (I can still feel it a little in the drydown) with a salty sandalwood drydown (I have no idea what it this with me and salty drydowns, I promise I don’t sweat much).

I find this a wonderful summer fragrance and quite long-lasting. It’s really good I tried this before summer so I can get some before it starts (it’s raining and quite cold these days so there’s no hurry yet).
P.S. It reminds me of Guerlain Vetiver with some mimosa on the side that turns it into summer freshness personified (not that the Guerlain Vetiver is not like that, I love that one as well).

SOTD: Eau d’Italie, Paestum Rose

Sample of the day, World of Perfume May 31, 2010 Comments: 6

OK, I realized today I will have to give Havana Vanille another go. Because it’s obvious to me that whatever Mr. Duchafour creates, I’m going to love it. 🙂 There must have been a mistake in my nose when smelling HV because it just can’t be. 🙂

As you probably know by now, I’m not a huge florals fan, rose especially, but there are always exceptions, and this is one of them. Oh, I really like this one (I think that the boozy opening helps). 🙂

Notes: davana, cinammon,, black pepper, pink pepper, black pepper, coriander, black currant buds, Turkish rose, peony, incense, osmanthus, elemi, tea, papyrus, benzoin, myrhh, opopponax, vetiver, patchouli, cedar, wenge wood, amber, white musk.

As you can see, there is a wealth of notes which I do not plan on getting entangled in. I love the beginning and I didn’t miss the rose this time (probably because it’s there in the title). It smells boozy (having this rum, thick quality to it) and slightly sweet. Of the notes in the beginning, I can smell the particular juiciness of black currants and the pink pepper – which I believe I am smelling due to the process of elimination. I’ve been finding this around a lot and learned to recognize the particular scent it brings with itself so I think I know it now (it gives the rose in Very Irresistible the same type of freshness). Anyway, I get a healthy dose of tea (I tend to lean toward black but that may be caused by black currant buds).

It smells like an idea of a wet rose, not aquatic but more like a rose inundated in fresh water. Quite lovely really. And totally wearable for me (I’ll try and locate a decant on MUA).

I lose the black currant and most of the rose in the drydown but I’m left with a drydown that is quite nice but doesn’t come close to the opening. I mean, it’s easy on the nose and smells warm and dry (all that wood, incense and benzoin which I love) but is only a drydown.
Pic and notes by: www.luckyscent.com

SOTD: Juste un Reve by PdN

Sample of the day, World of Perfume May 27, 2010 Comments: 7

It’s been a pleasurable day smelling this on my arm. 🙂

But, it’s been a bit problematic getting the notes.

Notes by PdN: coconut, apricot, jasmine, tuberose, sandalwood, vanilla

Notes by Luckyscent: jasmine, rose, iris, hyacinth, monoi

As you can see, not much overlap (what an understatement). For me, it’s a mix of both, even though I didn’t locate rose and jasmine but hey, nothing new there.

I saw this mentioned as a perfect summer scent – for me it’s more than just a summer scent. Yes, you cannot skip the summer with coconut and monoi but the florals are quite a bit important as well. At one point, they are all you get.

For me it started fresh, irisy and floral, slightly grassy-sweet and happy – it brought a smile to my face. Imagine my dismay when reading notes by PdN and seeing no iris. But Luckyscent helped with that.

This one gives you a feel like you are smelling your skin warmed in the sun – you smell the perfume of flowers and tropical stuff, and you are smelling it warmed in the sun (even though I’m in the office all day).

I kept looking for the apricot but in the end I decided it combined itself with sandalwood perhaps to give this an aura of apricot suede powderiness (this sounds wrong).

Anyway, this all gives way to some flowers and I cannot claim I smelled hyacinths but I did smell flowers of a particular type I recognize. It could be that the real life hyacinth and the perfume one differ sligthly…

But the end is just as great as the rest, sweet monoi and salty iris turning into coconuty and salty smell of sandalwood. It’s at the same time simple and brilliant. Not simple as an easy, straight-forward thing, but easy as in, it gives off a feeling of being easily wearable and enjoyed.

Puredistance I – my story

World of Perfume May 10, 2010 Comments: 19

And where to begin this story?
How about, here is what true niche house and exclusivity are. One perfume, not many places to buy it in the world but available to anyone with an internet connection. Well, available might be putting it a bit optimistic – you know, the cheapest bottle goes you can buy is 165 Euros. But there are always samples…
Ok, this doesn’t tell you much about what I think about it. I will try and do it justice but you know me, I sometimes (often) lack the words to describe things as accurately as they appear in my head, so I can only say I will do my best.
Honestly, the first sniff and my initial thought was, this is of the type of perfume I usually don’t wear (due to the fact that I haven’t actually smelled any of the classics I find wearable). And believe me, it won’t take you long to realize it’s a classic, even though not the classic as I seem to have understood it before Pure Distance I came along. You know, it’s hard writing about something which creates new associations each time you smell it. 🙂
I will follow Suzanne’s lovely example and skip the notes. They are really not that important, they can never describe the actual feeling. You might already be impatient to hear what that feeling is and now I’m going to say that the booklet I got with my bottle is completely correct and quote them:
“A lady stepping into a room crowded with people. Conversations stop. Everybody loooks at her. It is not here serene face.. there is the elegant, natural way she mover. And her simple, stylish white dress… So beautiful. Beautiful in a pure and natural way.”

“The name Puredistance originates from this dream. What makes the lady stand out from the crowd is her understated elegance. Which is the essence of Puredistance.”

I’ve been looking for the right words to describe this and then I read the booklet and there they were. But not only elegance. For me, Puredistance is exactly the way a woman seduces. It is a bit austere and cold at the beginning, with flowers hinting at femininity but not so much that you can be sure before she slightly smiles at you five minutes later. And still, you enjoy the company so much, the talk is gentle and intelligent, the atmosphere relatively relaxed but not really completely at ease. You can’t say she likes you yet, you are already falling a bit for her and she is standing there elegant, relaxed and with a little smile curving her lips. But after a while, you can see the signs telling there is warmth underneath that smile and the woman behind that elegance is the one you will never find tiresome.

That is what Puredistance I smells like to me. It’s there one minute, the next I’m wondering where did it go, only to find that it’s playing with me, seducing me with each new sniff I take.

And just so you know how strong a character I am, it took 3 tries for me to fall in love, while my boyfriend only smelled it from the bottle and asked me instantly: Are you going to wear this? For me? (with that knowing look). 🙂
I wish I could have given you more with my review. You can always go read Suzanne’s (she did it wonderfully).
I also had this serious doubt – you know, they were so kind to send me a bottle of this expensive perfume, what if I don’t like it? But I shouldn’t have had doubts. 🙂
And since people from Puredistance were so generous with me, I want to give you 2 samples from my bottle. Just comment and you will be entered. I can’t give more, I already promised my good friend a decant. 🙂
P.S. I remembered while getting to sleep I didn’t put the date until you can enter, until May 17 when I’ll randomly select the winners.

The smell of gardenias?

World of Perfume April 30, 2010 Comments: 7

I still don’t know what they smell like even though I was testing two gardenia named scents, Chanel Gardenia and Guerlain Cruel Gardenia. That didn’t help much. 🙂

It’s great how much decants and samples I managed to accumulate even before starting this blog and now I rumage through them and come up with things I smelled 2 years ago and completely forgot how they smelled because at that point I still wasn’t writing anything down (that is one of the reasons I started this blog, to make myself write down what I think, otherwise I forget).

Btw, I slightly like better the Chanel’s Gardenia – but Cruel Gardenia is great too.

Notes for Gardenia: tuberose, orange blossom, gardenia, jasmine, sandalwood, patchouli, musk vetiver

Initially (this time for a minute), I thought Gardenia was going to be an austere, serious and iris-like smelling perfume. That didn’t sound terribly appealing but it didn’t take long for me to start wondering if what I smelled initially was just a figment of my imagination (I believe not and blame it on vetiver).

And then you get this sunny flowers of the meadow variety (but not as happy, sweet and colorful as Ninfeo Mio), with a slightly bitter or root-like undertone (my guess that’s vetiver peeking out, probably some patchouli giving that off even though I didn’t smell any patchouli).

The combination is so wonderful it practically leaves me without words to describe it, and since I was smelling it in combination with Cruel Gardenia, trying to force the gardenia out, I have to say, I think Cruel Gardenia might be more appropriate for the Chanel variant. It was terribly cruel to me, it didn’t let me approach closer that the general feel, whenever I tried to get to the individual notes, it wouldn’t let me. 🙂 So the best I could do was guess that the root quality came from vetiver and the saltiness in the end couldn’t come from iris (where I usually get some) so I think that it was the sandalwood (which I could detect) combination with white flowers. I’ll have to get some more of this once my decant is empty.

Notes for Cruel Gardenia: damask rose, peach, neroli, violet, ylang-ylang, white musk, sandalwood, tonka bean, vanilla

Well, Cruel Gardenia started in such a lush manner that when sniffing it first, I thought I will prefer it to Gardenia.

It starts warm and creamy and tuberosish. I know that’s not a word but what I smell feels like it. Like slightly sweet white flowers. I thought it smelled like fat, creamy, lush petals. And then I read the notes and got angry with myself. What is wrong with me that I can’t recognize rose when I smell it until I read it among the notes?! I recognize the smell and each and every time I’m asking myself whati sthis? I know this and until I read the notes I cannot for the life of me remember. Now that I know I have this problem, rose will be the first thing I will think of even if it’s nowhere near. Just to eliminate it. 🙂

So, if it smells creamy, it doesn’t smell cruel to me. I think I might be missing the point here. But at least it’s a great smelling point.

The drydown is actually similar to Gardenia, slightly less salty and more sweet but quite alike.

The bottom line, I have no idea what gardenia smells like but since it appears in stuff that smells great, I’m sure I love the way it smells.

That’s all from me – have a great weekend everyone! I plan to.


Seduced by mint

World of Perfume April 11, 2010 Comments: 12

I keep thinking about how to write about this perfume and decided to start from the pepper mint. The thing that was escaping me while I was smelling it for the first couple of times. And then it hit me – that it was mint I was smelling and then I went to check the notes. And here they are:

Notes: majoram, pepper mint, sage, serpolet, jasmine sambac, grapefruit, clementine, patchouli

I cannot tell you how happy it makes me when I figure out a note by myself. I am still learning how to distinguish so many stuff that it makes me so happy when I realize I learned to discover something new.

I had time to think a lot about this. It smell more like a cologne to me than a perfume, but I love it so much. The mint and majoram opening just plain do it for me. They make this green, springy, bough smelling perfume into one of the best scents I imagine in the spring. It reminds me of dewy morning cool grass (in the spring).
I just simply love it.
I had to go and check what exactly is serpolet – it turns out it’s thyme. And the name of the perfume made me think I might be understanding something wrong, but it turns out it does mean Charmes and Leaves, and it is charming (very much so) and it does smell leafy. 🙂
I love the fact that sometime after you out it on, it sortb of spreads around you, like you are standing in a meadow smelling it, and then it gets timid and sort of sticks to you. Later it gets into this late spring/early summer sweetness, like some white and yellow flowers blooming on that meadow you are standing in.
I’m lucky that for the time being I have two 2ml samples from TDC but once they go, I will need a bottle of this. It just feels like I’m putting on some herbal perfume healing remedy that speaks to my soul. It makes me smile each time I wear it and makes me so happy I almost get tears in my eyes from it.
And it made me realize I need to get to know the work of Celine Elena much better.

Notes and pic by: http://www.thedifferentcompany.com/

Bal d’Afrique – it’s your turn

World of Perfume April 7, 2010 Comments: 7

After wearing it for some time now (in really small and carefully applied quantities), I think it’s time to tell you what I think of it. The Bal’s turn has finally come.

Notes:

Top: Bergamot, Lemon, Neroli, African marigold, Bucchu

Mid: Violet, Jasmin petals, Cyclamen

Base: Black Amber, Musk, Vetiver, Moroccan cedarwood

OK, the notes are here but I don’t know where to start. First, I want to warn you to try it sparsely for the first time because this is one serious sillage monster. The other day I put 2 small sprays on and put another sample on my wrist but that was no use, I couldn’t smell what was on my wrist. I think this is the most heavy sillage perfume I own. I’m not much into sillage usually but I can live with this one.

I have quite a lot of notes on it, but the thing is, it still sort of escapes words. It has many faces, and I think I will keep discovering them.

Yesterday for example, the opening reminded me of cotton candy, in a good way.

Anyway, it starts so strong I have problems distinguishing what I smell (ok, I have problems until the end but I’ll get there). 🙂

It starts citrusy fresh but not in any cologne manner, I think the flowers subdue that citrusness and it’s just this strong, slightly sharp, floraly-sweet, happy and spring-like scent. And this is not even close to describing how it smells.

By now I’m used to that sharpness , it used to scare me because I associate that with musks that get stuck in my nose and won’t go away, but it never happens here. I do believe it is the musk-neroli combo that gives it this sharpishness but it’s really well done.

As it progresses, I keep getting upset because it smells complete, I cannot make a not stand out. I realized that there was a juicyness hidden inside it and kept looking at notes trying to find a fruit. This is where google comes in handy – bucchu is some kind of a plant that smells of blackcurrants. Yes! Something finally appeared out of this ball.

It really is a strange concoction, it’s fresh but not airy or light, it is sweet but not girly, it is serious but it is flirty as well.

In the end, I smell the amber and musk but cannot access cedar. I know other people smell it but I just can’t. I think it cannot get through the amber and musk on me.

Pic and notes by: http://www.byredo.com/

I have a problem

World of Perfume February 20, 2010 Comments: 14

I realized it only today. I know that the Chicken Freak wrote some posts about de-cluttering and how to get rid of stuff, and now it seems I will have to give this some thought. As in how to apply it in my own life. I’ve been swapping for over a year now and I have so many samples and quite a lot of decants. That wouldn’t be a problem usually, but since I really like most of the decants I have, I tend not to use them. Which kind of makes no sense because what’s the point in liking them and keeping them on the shelf?! The problem is what if I use them up and decide I need a bottle? I can’t buy so many and I like having such a wide choice swapped decants give me. Anyway, today I decided I will no longer keep them so I wore my New Harleem decant 2 days in a row. It is one of my favorite Bond No. 9 scents (along with Chinatown and Lexington avenue).

So I’m going to talk about it today.

Notes: bergamot, cedarwood, coffee, vanilla, patchouli, lavender.

The notes really cannot prepare you for what you smell when you spray New Harleem on. To me, it starts with slightly citrusy burnt coffee caramel feel. I mean that in the best possible way, it does smell like coffee caramel but like the caramel was slightly burnt (I guess that comes from the patchouli). On me this caramel burnt feel is more prominent than on my boyfriend (I told him to try it since it is not listed as a feminine scent).

I’m looking at my notes now and realize that I haven’t mentioned cedarwood in them. Hmm, I was focusing more on the coffee/patchouli/lavender idea, cedarwood just went past me. The thing is, whenever I real lavender as one of the notes, I get scared. Lavender is such a strong and distinct smell that I’m scared will take over everything else. It never happens here, after the initial coffe/caramel feel subsides, it takes a while for lavender to become noticeable and it is never too much. Just right to give this relatively rich and sweet concoction and interesting twist. New Harleem lasts quite long and it took some hours before I finally got vanilla (still slightly tempered by coffee). But don’t let that coffee fool you – it is never too much. Now i think of it, I don’t remember smelling anything similar to this. Does anyone know of anything that comes close to this – I would like to smell some more variants of these notes.

I think I kill the roses

World of Perfume February 13, 2010 Comments: 6

This week has been really hectic for me so I didn’t have time to smell anything (let alone review it). I decided to remedy that today and since I loved Santal Blanc, I took out of my bag of samples Santal de Mysore by SL.

Notes: sandalwood, spices, cumin, styrac balsam, caramelized Siamese benzoin.

It opens very similarly to Santal Blanc (there’s no way you can miss the sandalwood), but since I associate sandalwood after SB with white, the way I smell this is white, woody and vanillic. And warm because there’s no way around cumin. But I don’t mind, I love the warmth it brings to perfumes.

As always, I dabbed it and tried to guess what I smell, and I got the sandalwood, cumin, and benzoin, but the whole spices thing just went past me. I read the review of this at NST and realized Kevin was able to differentiate all these spices and all I got was cumin. Not that there aren’t spices in there, but just I don’t really know what they smell like. 😦 Well, one more thing to add to the list of things to learn…

Even though I enjoyed this very much, I am more happy with Santal Blanc. This one gets too sweet on me and although I like the sandalwood, I prefer the less sweet version of it. This one seems to be the middle ground for me between Santal Blanc and Spiriteuese Double Vanille by Guerlain. And although I do crave a bottle of SDV (and given the price, it’s going to remain a craving), and have a bottle of SB, I don’t really feel I need a bottle of this. Or want. If I had it, I would use it, but I don’t really think at this point I’ll be getting one.

Which brings me to the rose. Maybe it was my subconscious working (there have been many postings on roses the last week – Valentine’s day being tomorrow) but when I chose Ta’if from my sample bag, I didn’t know it was a rose scent.

Well, the initial smell set me straight on that point. 🙂 Before I got interested in perfume, I had a bottle of Very Irresistible by Givenchy (the first and original one). I was totally in love with it and wearing it for some time before I learned it was actually a rose scent. And I always thought I didn’t like rose scents…

So, when I smelled Ta’if and it reminded me straight away of Very Irresistible, I knew it was a rose. And what a rose it is! It smelled intoxicating and I realized why rose scents tend to be so loved by some.

Notes: pink pepper, saffron, dates, rose oil, freesia, orange flower absolute, jasmine, amber and broom.

So, after getting my initial, oh, it’s a rose, I went in search of notes. What can I say? I didn’t get much further than rose. Actually, no further than that. I couldn’t smell any of the notes (this doesn’t seem to be my day for smelling). It is so well blended, it seems like a fantasy rose story that starts with intoxicating you and then you just enjoy the ride. Unfortunately for me, it didn’t last that long. I seem to have killed the rose in the drydown and it went somewhat sour on me. I still can’t believe that happened! It was so great and I already say myself ordering a bottle and then this happened. It wasn’t terribly bad but it wasn’t what it was before. I am definitely going to give it more tries because it might just be a bad day for my skin chemistry (please let it be that).

What I liked about this is that it is much less jarring than Very Irresistible and doesn’t feel like it enters the room before you but with you. I would say it is a terribly sexy smell and I wonder is someone going to wear it tomorrow? 🙂 To tease their partner terribly with things to come hinted by the intoxicating rose…

I wish I could.

Almost strangled by tuberose: L’Artisan Tubereuse

World of Perfume February 5, 2010 Comments: 18

The title might sound as if I didn’t like what I smelled and that would be very wrong. But it isn’t that simple.

I wonder what tuberose fans think of this one? I only dabbed it on my wrist and I got hit by a tuberose wall (for a lack of better description).

Notes: tuberose, ylang-ylang, coconut milk.

As you can see, there aren’t really that many notes to decipher but I still didn’t smell coconut milk. 🙂 It’s camouflaged in all the tuberose.

Anyway, my nose was almost glued to my wrist after putting it on – it actually smelled narcotic to me. And I think this is the first time that my mind instantly associated tuberose with smelling tropical. The smell is actually so strong and saturated that I could feel the imagined tuberose jungle lianas winding around me while I stand there dazed and keep smelling it.

And although I really enjoyed smelling it, I’m not sure I would be able to wear it. I just can’t imagine smelling like that (not that that might not happen, who knows what will be my favourite note year from now?).

I guess I did smell ylang-ylang because I got the feeling of tropical lushness. This is the first scent for which I can say that it grabs you by the neck and doesn’t let go with its intensity. I’m sure if you’re not careful with applying, you are definitely going to give yourself a headache. But you will probably be drugged by the smell, so you might not care. 🙂