Playing at Sephora

Yesterday I happened to be in downtown San Francisco with a little time to spare, so I popped into Sephora and played. A few notes follow.

1. Eau des Merveilles and Elixir des Merveilles

I remembered that I had sampled Hermes' Elixir des Merveilles at some point, and hadn't liked it, but I didn't remember why, so yesterday at Sephora I succumbed again to the name, the pretty bottle, and the rave reviews at various online sources, and spritzed the Eau and the Elixir at point up my hand and arm.

Eau des Merveilles starts with a happy frivolous blast of chemical orange, but then--and now I recall why I rejected the Elixir last time--it turns to bug spray. The stuff that your mom spritzes on you to keep the mosquitos off? That stuff. I can't even analyze the smell. It's bug spray.

Elixir des Merveilles does not even bother with the happy citrusy top notes. It goes straight to bug spray. I kept waiting to see if something else would develop, but it stayed bug spray, even after I scrubbed the back of my hand with the antibacterial foam Macy's provides in little dispensing machines by the elevators. This stuff has some good staying power.

I kept sniffing periodically all the way home, trying to see if I could get past the DEET and find anything else. Maybe kind of a woodsy smell? Whatever it was, the bug spray prevailed, above and below, and I have written this family of pretty bottles off, unless I need an elegant perfume to spray mosquitos with at some point.

2. Un Jardin en Mediterranee

However, happiness was mine not six inches away from the site of the mosquito-repellent disaster. I had ordered a sample of Hermes' Jardin Apres la Mousson, and while I like the watermelon opener a lot, the whole thing gets sort of musty and dry, and wasn't that great for me. Expermentally, I checked out the other two Jardins--Sur le Nil and Mediterranee.

Sur Le Nil smelled nice, and I will have to go back to it some day. Mediteranee got the whole back of the hand that wasn't covered in des Merveilles horror. I MUST HAVE MORE.

It starts with that bergamot blast thing that's apparently required by law for any fragrance that references the Mediterranean region--but already I was liking it--and then it just MELTS into softly sweet tree-flowerness, and woody herbs. There's a fig note, and I realized that I really like fig when it is just a note, as opposed to, say, a political statement. (Premier Figuier is a political statement. They grind up an entire fig tree, soak it in some alcohol, and present it to you. "Here. FIG. It smells more like sex than anything in the vegetable kingdom. You will WEAR it. You will LIKE it.")

Anyway, the Mediterranee just goes on being spectacular, and then it becomes more woodsy and herby, but still spectacular, and then it slowly, slowly fades away--and I want some. This is an official full-bottle purchase as soon as I get employed again.

Shaal Nur Frustrates My Schemes

I will admit, I had high hopes for Etro's Shaal Nur. For one thing, I liked the name. This is a general annoying perfume trait o'mine--I like things that have nice names, or are packaged in a way that's appealing to me--and it should be all about the juice, no? No way. I am too verbal for that. I'm Irish. Deal.

Anyway, it's named after a Mughal princess, and it's a citrusy floral incense, and it sounded good and I got a vial and dabbed it on.

And the top notes hit me, and my heart soared. And I KNEW, KNEW that I was going to get a bottle of this stuff and wear it for the rest of my life. Lemony, flowery incensey goodness. Wow.

Five minutes later the top notes wore off. And I ended up with something that smelled like dried-out preserved lemons--sour citrus and must. UGH.

I have tried twice more, with the same results. The first rush KNOCKS ME OUT, but when it's gone, minutes later, I'm left with something that smells sour, old and unused, and totally wrong.

Crud!

Safran Troublant

Splashed Safran Troublant by L'Artisan all over me, and went about my business.

First things first--Safran Troublant makes me smell like a Persian dessert, with all that saffron and the rose backup. I have no problem smelling like a Persian dessert. It was pleasant. I like saffron in food, and I found it kind of nice to have floating around me.

I do not understand the name. 'Troublant', if I understand correctly means 'troubling', 'disturbing', something like that. L'Artisan translates the name as "Saffron Spell". All of this led me to imagine something deeper, more acrid, more intense. Naah. Iranian dessert treat. I think Mashti Malone makes an ice cream that tastes exactly like this smells, with pistachios in it. It's sweeeeet saffron, that's the strongest impression I get from it. Innocent. Kind of charming.

I like it, I do. The saffron smell is awfully nice. I guess I was expecting something dryer and darker. I can see wearing this again--it's a nice sort of weekend smell. It's also inspired me to make risotto milanese some time soon, so this is an all-around win, no?

YOSH? OMG!

So, OK, somehow I become fixated on descriptions of the YOSH Winter Rose perfume oil. Everyone keeps commenting on how expensive it is, and indeed $200 bucks seems quite expensive for a full bottle, but I figure it sounds really good, and I should smell it, so I order up a sample from Luckyscent.


Now, eight bucks is more money than I have ever spent on a perfume sample, but what the heck, so I order me my sample, and they deliver it, and I notice, you know, that it's a very small sample.


Oh hell, smell it, says I, so I smell it. And I hope, by now, that it will not smell nice, so that I can stop being obsessed with this stuff.


But it smells nice. Dear God it smells nice. Apparently cardamom and rose is, like, the world's most inspired combo, like chocolate and peanut butter, or Lucy and Ricky.

It makes my heart yearn and calm at the same time. It smells super. And I smear on a bit more, and go about my business.

And the smell vanishes.

I mean, vanishes.

Now I normally do not like perfumes to stick and stick, but this stuff simply vanishes off the face of the earth, like five minutes after application. So I apply some more, and it is really nice. But after about two minutes I can smell the oil base more strongly than the rose and cardamom and this continues until the scent completely vanishes at about minute seven and a half.

OK, so it's a lovely smell, but not really suited for wearing, and expensive--strike this one off the list, reluctantly. But then, somehow, I go back to Luckyscent to read the reviews--discovering in the process that I am not the only one this fades on--and I suddenly realize something.

That $200 bucks? That's for EIGHT MILILITERS.

OK. This is simply a scam.

But the rose/cardamom is amazing, really amazing, and I may try to recreate it with cheaper oils at some point--it's kind of wonderful.

White-Out

I ordered a sample of L'Artisan's Passage d'Enfer, because I am starting to think I might like incenses--or I was, now I'm starting to wonder--and because everyone raved over it. Try it out, says I. Teeny tiny decant on the way.

Basically, to this untrained nose, it smells exactly like the incense they use at my father's parish church. Which is nice, definitely. Attractive, and with pleasant memories of Christmases and Easters past. But I cannot see wearing it as a fragrance. When I close my eyes--I've taken to trying to define fragrances by color--I get pure white light, which is cool and everything, but I'm not an archangel, and I don't think I can pull this smell off.

Piment Brulant

How could I resist? L'Artisan's Piment Brulant is supposed to be inspired by xocolatl, the Aztec forerunner to hot chocolate. Think unsweetened cocoa mixed with hot peppers, vanilla and other spices, and thickened with cornmeal. Sometimes, apparently, they added honey, and annatto, and Lord knows what. Good, whatever it was, and associated with the fertility goddess Xochiquetzal, which is probably why legend has it that the Aztec emperors drank fifty cups of the stuff a day. They must have been jittery as hell, with all that caffeine, but I guess it was worth it.

The word xocolatl apparently means 'bitter water', but the cocoa bean's Latin name is Theobroma cacao, theobroma meaning 'food of the gods'. This is one of the very few times you will catch me suggesting that the Latin for something is preferable to the Nahuatl for something.

If it's Mexican it gets my attention--even if it's Mexican as interpreted by a snooty French niche perfumer--so I had to order a teeny tiny vial and check this one out.

Piment Brulant smells like hot peppers and green tomatoes and chili powder, vanilla and sweet spices and a warm trace of bittersweet chocolate. It smells like the best dessert enchilada in the world, or something, and if you sniff your skin too closely right after applying it, you get a sharp little capsaicin blast to the sinuses. It's rich, and lovely, and WOW. Hot, but not at all overheated or stuffy. I can imagine wearing it year round.

It's like--women in black lace mantillas, and women in blue jeans sitting around a table together. The Cathedral Metropolitana in Mexico City. Aztec hot chocolate in Spanish china. Tangled green gardens. Papel picado and TV antennas. Ancient, old-fashioned and modern things all happily coexisting in a wash of sweet spice and chili powder.

I think what appeals to me most about this is that there is something sophisticated and feminine about it, but without the powder and heavy florals. It does have a black lace quality to it, but not blatantly sexy black lace. Black lace and flan and chocolate mole. And tomato plants. And beautiful women.

Two Plum Fragrances

This Is Just To Say

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast.

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.

-- William Carlos Williams

I have now sniffed something from L'Artisan. (It's a momentous moment in a wannabe-perfumista's life.) The something that I sniffed is Voleur de Roses, which is apparently a rose/patchouli fragrance with a plum 'note' or hint. At least that's what I get from various online readings. You couldn't tell by my nose, which informs me that this perfume basically smells like a plum. A superlative plum, with some rose and patchouli making it even better.

The straight juice in the teeny-tiny vial smelled awful to me, chaotic and very alcoholic, but as soon as it was on my skin it relaxed and began to smell wonderful, plummy but, at this point, with a fair amount of rose, and something I identified as violet-like. It smelled goooood at any rate, mysterious, but simple and serene.

I spent a few minutes sniffing my wrists while I did my morning before-work stuff, and determined that all the bloggers who said L'Artisan scents fade quickly seemed to be right. (This is OK with me. Perfumes that cling and cling tend to make me crazy.) I put on some more, several dabs more, and headed off to work, smelling serene and mysterious.

By the time I started work, the smell had turned into a clear, vibrant, plum scent, sweet but with a sharpness that reminded me of that sour taste that stays around a plum pit no matter how sweet the fruit. Just a little floral, and a little patchouli. It smells amazing, fruity but not too sweet, like the smell of an orchard with rose bushes and cold dew-soaked grass under the trees, with just a little wet dark earth.

Somehow it felt like a very deep and emotional smell, but serene, super serene.

Later that evening, after the last of the vibrant, emotional, plum serenity had wafted away, I tried Keiko Mecheri's Ume. This is a totally different plum, spicy and salty and reminding me a great deal (as I had hoped), of the little sweet-and-salty plum candies I remember from when I was a kid, that they still give you after your meal at the King of Thai noodle places. Definately a plum candy rather than the straight plum off the tree. It's rich, and has a kind of deliberately exotic smell to it--sort of 1920s Orientalesque adapted with a little modern Asian-American irony. It's cheerful and sexy, maybe even sassy, and it made me smile.

Oddly enough, thinking about where I would wear these, I came up with New Years', but in a very different context. Voleur de Roses, I thought, would be great for Rosh Hashanah, with that harvest-fruit scent, and the deep calm that goes with it. Ume I could see wearing either to a secular New Years' party, or for the Lunar New Year in February. It would be a great winter smell, as spicy and warm as it is, and I can see wearing it while eating Chinese food and toasting the new year with plum wine that smells a little like my perfume.

Funny, I never thought fruit perfumes would be something I would go for.