Perfume Pen Pals: What Clooney Wears


Katie,

Today I spent a good long time with the rep in Barneys, talking about various Frédéric Malle perfumes. She HATES Lipstick Rose, isn't crazy about Carnal Flower, and kept urging me to pick Musc Ravageur because a certain actor favors it, which she knows because he recently bought a bottle from her right here in San Francisco.

She wouldn't reveal his name so I said, "We all know it's George Clooney." Her eyes lit up and she said, "How did you know?!"

Afterward, my friend Beth whispered to me, "I don't know what's creepier, the woman going on about this mysterious actor and his perfume or you knowing who it was."

Dan


Dan,

How amazing that we've now confirmed that Musc Ravageur is what Clooney wears! And there's Luca Turin in The Guide positing that George wears classy shit like Chanel Pour Monsieur.

George Clooney wearing Musc Ravageur is like me layering Le Labo Labdanum 18 with Jean Desprez Bal à Versailles: way too many animals in the barnyard! Talk about gilding the lily! Talk about over-egging the pudding! Go on -- just talk about it!

Katie



Katie,

Favorite KP Smells YouTube comment of the day:

After being informed that KP doesn't in fact shave a "little nick" in her eyebrow, that it's a scar from a childhood accident, peacelovecoexist writes:

"It looks super cool, even if it is an accident! Maybe you'll start a new trend!"


Does she mean a trend of childhood accidents? Will friends of peacelovecoexist start hurling their children into rosebushes so they can be cool like KP? I hope not. And, by the way, was there ever a question about peace and love being able to coexist?

Coincidentally, I'm wearing By Kilian Love tonight. (And I'm not engaged in combat.) And while I strongly suspect you'll hate it, I urge you to open your mind. Sure, it smells like a marshmallow meringue, but it also possesses this cold screechiness that moves it slightly to the left of the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

My favorite contemporary writer, maybe my favorite writer of all time, Geoff Dyer, often speaks of his fictional work as being an inch away from reality, but he says it's within that inch where all of the art occurs. It's the same thing with Love. Though I'm sure Mr. Dyer wouldn't appreciate his line being re-applied to a marshmallow perfume.

Dan


Dan,

I like the idea of the "inch of art". The crack with all the good stuff in it. Like in between the sofa cushions.

Katie

26 comments:

  1. Fool me once, shame on you! Fool me twice, shame on me! Sure, you lure me in with tales of a scented George Clooney and instead we get eyebrow quirks and Stay Puft Marshmallow Man. That actually sounds like a suh-weet date, (ha) but really, more about George. And why is George going to San Fran to buy his cologne? I know Italy has some perfume so why go to San Fran for his olfactory needs? And for some reason, I imagine that no matter who Dan suggested as the actor in question, the SA would have said, "How did you know?" I think that PLCE is probably a tween and therefore hopefully has no children of their own to hurl into a nearby rose bush. But if they want to start a trend a little shaving could more easily achieve the look. I also like the "inch of art" and even more, I like Katie's comment of "the crack with all the good stuff in it". That makes me chuckle in a particularly evil way. (heh, heh, heh, you so funny!)

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  2. SoS - I'm just serving the broad specter of perfume-lovers, ranging from animalic Clooney-lickers (I tried to type "likers", but that's how it came out) to gourmand Fluff-lickers (I meant to type "lickers" that time). And that's what happens when you try to please everyone: you create an angry mob. I'm just going to go hide in the crack with all the good stuff.

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  3. guys at my high school would always shave little knicks into their eyebrows. if it became a trend, it wouldn't be new. although, i s'pose, it would be new for women.

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  4. Very astute, ScentsofSmell. Sounds like you've been around the block with a few SA's. I've no reason to believe Mr. Clooney ever visited the dreary SF Barney's perfume bunker. And even if he had, Musc Ravageur? Seriously? No one was impressed with that exchange.

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  5. Wha-what, Dan? I was impressed with that exchange! Are you telling me celebrity magic can't happen in San Francisco? What about Joe DiMaggio and Marilyn Monroe getting married there? What about Nicolas Cage meeting his waitress soon-to-be wife there? What about the acid tests? Are you trying to gently tell me that Clooney isn't buying his bull testicle perfume at SF Barneys?

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  6. I should also mention, on a more recent trip to Barneys, the SA went on about perfumes purchased by the coach of the Cleveland Cavaliers basketball team, a substantial step down from Clooney. It seems the recession is affecting everything.

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  7. Have you been in that Barneys basement, Katie? Clooney would surely feel trapped down there. Plus, it looks like it hasn't been remodeled since the days of DiMaggio. And, yes, Clooney and Musc Ravageur is excessive, like a civet cat wearing vintage Jicky.

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  8. Hate to obsess on the scar like some YouTubetweenie, I just had a random thought about how many 'fumeheads have had close encounters with rose bushes. I went HEAD FIRST into a pruned rosebush aged 5 (by all accounts I looked like Carrie), and yet I adore roses beyond all knowing.

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  9. Sarah, I'm obsessing too, but mainly out of jealousy. My only significant facial injury at age 5 was the result of an overly-eager encounter with a swing-set. And all I had to show for it was a broken nose. Which just isn't as cool as an eyebrow scar these days. Bar fights are just so passe.

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  10. I have to say Katie I never noticed your eyebrow until someone in a post mentioned it and I read your fab book and found out how. The only thing I ever noticed was ths sparkle in your eye when you talk about scent and that devious smile.

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  11. ps. what do you think of Frederic Malle French Lover / Bois d’Orage as somewhere to go on my next scent adventure with miss mirabelle. His scents seem to bring out a lot of strong reaction from the crowd.

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  12. ok, what's with the SF Barney's reps doing the celebrity name dropping with the Malle's? I've been there and they told me Steven Tyler of Aerosmith wears Carnal Flower.

    Is it a sales strategy and they name a celebrity they think you will like? More importantly, did I give the impression that I'm reformed hessian who's into genderbending?

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  13. Ha, Katie, I wasn't trying to be an angry mob all by myself! I wasn't feeling the least bit angry. The mob bit, I dunno, well with an Italian last name, I could pretend... I was just taking a humorous look at the roller coaster ride of your back and forth with Dan. And Dan, thanks for seeing my skepticism for what it was, just that. My dad and brother are always springing their theories on me that I feel honor bound to poke holes in. Tho', I now think my dad is secretly egging me on - he likes to do that to us kids. He's a hoot!

    I am with dea - I think it is a sales ploy to try and figure out someone's dream celeb and then sell you a scent that they "wear".

    And in the interest of full disclosure, my childhood injury entailed me sailing over the handlebars of my bike when I tried to speed up and my foot slipped off the pedal, acting like a brake. I kept going and landed with the majority of the force on my chin. I broke some teeth, screwed up my neck, and got a big gash on my chin which is now a decent scar.

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  14. SOS-what fun. We had a rousing discussion about childhood injuries yesterday at work! It led to a realization that I liked to fall on my face and head. In addition to the swing and broken nose incident, I also went face first over bike handles and oh! Horses! Over the head, off the side...onto my....head!

    And out of trees. I fell out of one or two of them too. I don't know why my parents didn't make me wear a football helmet. I cost them a bit of money in dental procedures after knocking out a few teeth. Maybe all of those concussions led to a more acute sense of smell?

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  15. Wow - after that cavalcade of injuries, I'm glad you're all still alive! Whew! (That "Carrie" visual is a doozie, Sarah.)

    Oh and SoS, I was just teasin'. Cuz I knew you were. But you'd be surprised how many people can be angry mobs all by themselves - usually in the comments section of YouTube.

    Haha, Dea, genderbending hesher!

    onesmalldog - French Lover is a very nice "forest floor" fragrance. This one's more Dan's department - he loves it (or at least he did the day he bought it) and sent me a decant. It's more straight-ahead masculine than your recent Dans Tes Bras purchase.

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  16. Oh no, By Kilian Love is "Straight to Headache" for me!

    On the subject of childhood injuries, I have a scar over one eyebrow inflicted by a runaway swing seat and another from that era "in and around" the same eyebrow, also caused by falling into a rose bush. This mishap occurred at my friend Gwyneth's house diagonally across the road (in case you think I am one of those strange and worrisome people known as "scar stalkers"). And I say "in and around" the same eyebrow, as that one is quite hard to find these days in the ploughed field that is my forehead.

    I also have a great scar on my elbow from riding down a 1 in 4 hill at speed on a three year old's tricyle when I was 15. It was the only wheeled transport ready to hand at the time.

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  17. flittersniffer - hmm...a 15-year-old on a tricycle. Sounds like alcohol was involved. Let's hope you didn't score it from the 3-year-old.

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  18. onesmalldog, I highly recommend French Lover, though its charms are subtle. It's mostly cigar and plants and so, for me, it's precisely the smell of my dad, who was a cigar-smoking nurseryman.

    And joining the perfume infirmary, my scar runs above my lip and occurred when, at two, I catapulted through a windshield during a violent car accident. (I wasn't driving.)

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  19. i feel like I should add on...what a fun round of injuries...I was bitten through the lip when I was 8 by a german shepard....

    Hey Dan..thanks for the info and Katie....it sounds like a great scent and I love when someone relates it to their lives...that is what makes it magic for me.

    ps I love reading you and Katie banter

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  20. Good of you, onesmalldog, to give canines the benifit of the doubt after being bitten so young. Though I suspect the location of your dog bite indicates that you were perhaps snuggling up to Rover for an unwanted smooch...?

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  21. I love reading all the injuries stories from everyone. I think the rose bush is a popular one. I also have a funny scar on my knee when a well-meaning sibling offered to take me on a scooter ride. I did a Laugh-In ride down the street and promptly fell over. Busted my knee open. Oh well. Dreams are for sleeping.

    Dan, I loved that you associate your fondness for French Lover's notes with your father. I realized I had to word that carefully. But you know what I mean. Glad to hear you weren't driving when you had your scar-producing accident. That would have been hard to explain. :-)

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  22. I have a scar on my left wrist shaped like an open-crowned 4 as a result of falling off a ladder at age ten because the house we were living in was on fire.

    Musc Ravageur is hot with kinks. Too bad MR the man is such a gourmand, too much chocolate and vanilla for a light snack.

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  23. kleinzaches - yet another "lucky to be alive" story!

    Musc Ravageur is certainly an entire meal in a bottle - so much more than a snack!

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  24. Nice post, finding a good perfume is not a difficult job, but finding a perfume in antique bottle is quite difficult.

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  25. Perfume Bottles, finding an old perfume that still smells good is the hardest trick of all!

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