Perfume Pen Pals: Annick Goutal Encens Flamboyante vs. Armani Prive Bois d'Encens

Katie,

My Annick Goutal Encens Flamboyant arrived in the mail this afternoon and it smelled differently than I had expected it to, more crisp autumn woods than priest swinging a censer. Why did I think I was getting a priest swinging a censer?

I re-watched your review and re-read Tania Sanchez's review and neither of you mentioned any priests.

Perfume Pen Pals: Frederic Malle Vetiver Extraordinaire, Chanel Sycomore and Christian Dior Vetiver

Katie,

Have you ever worn Frédéric Malle Vétiver Extraordinaire? It's exactly as Luca Turin describes it in Perfumes: The Guide: vetiver with a cedar/pencil accord and a touch of lemon.



It's fuller and more sentimental than The Different Company Sel de Vétiver, which I still like but which rarely begs me to wear it. It simply sits on the shelf and gloats at how good it is. Sel de Vétiver doesn't need me, KP, not like Vétiver Extraordinaire does.

Dan

Perfume Pen Pals: George Clooney and the Perils of Organizing Your Perfumes

Dan,

I smell gross. I really do. Not because I'm wearing anything ugly, but because I've gone "Coldstone Creamery" on my own ass. It started out innocently enough, with me contentedly sorting out my perfume decants like George Clooney re-filing headshots of his conquests.


Actually, Clooney just gets the interns to do it.

I organized my CB I Hate Perfume samples, and sprayed I See a Flower on a wrist. (Very nice: grass, dirt, then some actual springtime flowers bloom.)

Then I assembled my By Kilian samples, and sprayed Love on the back of a hand (mildly boozy divinity fudge.) Then I ran across a clump of Kenzos, and Flower Oriental went on the back of the other hand (a clunkier, harsher, more synthetic-smelling version of Miller Harris Fleur Oriental.)

Finally, a few drops of Frédéric Malle Carnal Flower spilled from a vial on my arms. Let me tell you, in this bunch, Carnal Flower is the alpha female. And Carnal Flower's showdown with Love is nauseating.

That'll teach me to not pay attention to matchmaking my perfume friends!

Katie

Hanae Mori HM

...ridiculous but insanely catchy.

Hanae Mori HM plays out like a compilation album of perfume's greatest hits. Hits that, while they might be standouts in their own genre, have the potential to be a little iPod-playlist-jarring when strung together. With its tart lemon, bracing lavender, giggly blackcurrant, soothing vanilla, masculine cedarwood, childish chocolate and sensual amber, HM should be a mess, but it isn't. Like the best pop music, it's ridiculous but insanely catchy, due to the nuanced engineering that allows the frosted fruits not only to coexist with HM's deeper amber and woods, but also encourages devil-may-care fraternization across its magical cocoa bridge.

The waters under the magical cocoa bridge are known to be treacherous.

It would be hasty to dismiss HM as mere kid's stuff, though there's no doubt that its ADHD zig-zagging between notes make it a good match for fired-up young fellows caught between the nostalgia for childhood candy and the desire to impress young ladies. Let's say that HM is sophisticated kid's stuff. In my video discussion of HM, I reference three other YouTube fragrance reviewers (fumetubers?) and their takes on the scent: Robes08, CutlassSupremeSL and Guinea54. HM: distinctive enough to project over Guinea54's cigarette. Guinea54 is an unexpectedly sensitive New York/Joisey kind of regular guy (watch him write in to protest that he went prep school in Connecticut) who often punctuates his reviews by gesticulating wildly with a lit cigarette. At the end of one of his first video reviews (Angel Men Pure Malt), he confesses:

I wasn't going to do any more videos, but some people seem to like my weird style, I don't know how. I don't know how some people don't find my voice totally obnoxious, either. I can't even watch my own videos.

In YouTube's universe of instant gurus, Guinea54's self-deprecating admission is disarming. And as one those instant gurus, I should know!

HM is available from Amazon.com, Sephora.com and FragranceNet.com, starting at $33 for 100ml

Image from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

Perfume Pen Pals: Frederic Malle Portrait of a Lady and Gorilla Perfume Orange Blossom

Katie,

I've been wearing Frédéric Malle Portrait of a Lady for two straight days and I have a headache, and it smells like I'm wearing industrial-strength Stella. It's that rosy-winey-headache-y accord turned up to eleven and it hurts me right behind the eyes.


Dan's agony is reduced to clip art.


Don't try to blame it on my recent pneumonia (the rare pneumonia that my doctor told me I should feel complimented to have because it usually only attacks very healthy young people, and it apparently mistook me for one of those.) Anyway, 1) pneumonia doesn't cause headaches behind the eyes, and 2) I'm certain I won't like the smell of this on my healthiest day.

It seems silly to disparage a $300 Ropion perfume of irrefutable quality, one that's received almost unanimous gushing online, but, gosh, it's like dating a woman whom everyone insists is brilliant and beautiful and then feeling apathetic afterward.


Grace Kelly: guaranteed to induce apathy in Dan.


Sorry for my whining. I'll try to get to the bottom of why it smells/feels just like Stella to me.

Dan

Perfume Pen Pals: Parfums MDCI Invasion Barbare, Bond No. 9 Madison Soiree and Karl Lagerfeld Chloe

Katie,

Today I went with my one MDCI masculine, Invasion Barbare. Invasion Barbare is almost unbelievably bright, and at first smells more like a female MDCI than it does a masculine cologne. But the masculine part quickly starts banging down the door and, I don't know, when it comes to these classic scents, I prefer the female ones. Women were just fine the way they were. It was men who needed tweaking.

I think this is why I like big fat gorgeous ladies' perfumes and weird post-modern male perfumes. I never liked Clark Gable and I don't imagine I would've liked the way Clark Gable smelled.

But what I wouldn't give to smell like Myrna Loy. Myrna Loy always looked like she smelled great! Some actresses look all perfumed, whereas Myrna Loy looks like she might be wearing nothing, or her man's cologne, or just whatever strikes her that day.



And if I can't smell like Myrna Loy, then I'll smell like sooty vinyl. But I will not smell like Clark Gable.

After I showered off my Invasion Barbare (and it was no small task), I tried a sample of Bond No. 9 Madison Soirée, a fragrance that enjoys the distinction of almost unanimously consistent descriptions.

Everyone agrees it smells like shampoo, although opinions are split on whether or not that's a good thing. "It smells just like shampoo. Ick!" Or, "It smells just like shampoo. I love it!"

It's like the split-screen scene in Annie Hall when Annie and Alvie are talking to their respective therapists about their sex life, and Annie reports to having sex constantly, like three times a week, and Alvy says they almost never have sex, like only three times a week.


What I'm saying is Madison Soirée comes down to perspective because it definitely smells like shampoo (with a touch of gardenia) or, as one reviewer astutely pointed out, not only shampoo but specifically shampooed hair. It smells like wet, freshly shampooed hair. I've been smelling it all night and I might be the one person who has no opinion. Except that Bond No. 9 has a lot of nerve to charge $200 so its customers can smell like Johnson & Johnson No More Tears. Dan

Perfume Pen Pals: Parfums MDCI

Katie,

From now on, I'm getting all my perfumes from Parfums MDCI. Check this: I ordered my seven samples and received a very nice note from Monsieur Tussel, the assistant to the MDCI president, thanking me for my order.

Then I received a second note reminding me that Friday is a French holiday, but he would try to bottle and package my order for shipment prior to that. And when it arrives, I should look for a plain white box.


Le box.


Then this morning, I got another email from M. Tussel, announcing that indeed he managed to get my perfumes mailed (he even included a scanned copy of the postal receipt!), but apologizing. For what you ask? Because MDCI had run out of white boxes and was still waiting on new ones from its supplier, so now I must be on the lookout for a black box instead.

Apparently, color aside, the shipping box is not dissimilar, as M. Tussel writes, "But be reassured: this box is not that bad."

Katie, he sent an email apologizing for the color of the shipping box! We should only do business with the French. Until the rest of the world gets its act together.

Dan

Perfume Pen Pals: Favorite Functional Fragrances

Katie,


There's no way of announcing this and maintaining my dignity, but I'm loving this Febreze Moroccan Bazaar Air Freshener.



I had to get something for the room with the cat litter boxes and I saw this in the supermarket: it's got ginger and nutmeg and a bunch of other spices.

Air fresheners always smell like cheap crap, but not this one. It literally smells like a spice market and when I catch a whiff walking by the room, I'm not displeased at all. Whoever created this scent should be very proud.

Dan

Seduction Scents

Valentine's Day isn't the only time of the year romance is in the air -- especially if that air is filled with the scent of a come-hither perfume. I packed a few of the boldest “open for business” fragrances into my scent satchel and paid a call on Erica Fox and Raoul Martinez at the Fox 5 San Diego Morning Show. The topic: “Seduction Scents.” Enhancing your smell definitely enhances your appeal. The question is: who are you appealing to? The man who wants his ladeeez to smell of strawberries is not going to be smitten by my bawdy barnyard of Maison Francis Kurkdjian Absolue Pour le Soir and Frédéric Malle Musc Ravageur. And that's just as well. Nothing like relying on “o-dar” to send and receive messages about who you really want to put a tiger in your tank. Make like the flowers and bees and hone in on specific targets by wearing smells that broadcast you-ness, and only you-ness. Even allowing for natural diversity in what flies our freak flag, smell-wise, there are classic sexy perfume ingredients with a universal appeal: “Your skin but better” fragrances: animalic cocktails of musk and amber and sandalwood. There's an old Moroccan tradition where brides-to-be flavor their food with musk before the wedding, so that every pore, every little nook and cranny, is perfumed with musk. Lucky groom! Foody fragrances: perfumes that are sweet with vanilla and chocolate, which are aphrodisiacs whether eaten or smelled. White florals: indolic “glow-in-the-dark” blooms like jasmine and tuberose are seductive because they smell overripe and physical. Rose perfumes: the classic flower of romance. Roses have aspects of wine and fruit in their smell -- a seduction picnic sure to end in “splendor in the grass!” I chose my love potion fragrances for their dramatic expressions of different facets of hornifyin' raw materials. It didn't occur to me until later that they are all -- with some give and take -- perfectly unisex in their appeal. Get ready to bust a gusset:

L'ARTISAN PARFUMEUR SAFRAN TROUBLANT

With its saffron, rose, vanilla and sandalwood, “Disturbing Saffron” is an unusual variation on a gourmand. And sexxxaaaayyyy....hoo boy. Put it this way: in ancient Rome, the expression “sleeping on a bed of saffron” referred to a long hard night of making whoopee. Safran Troublant is $135 for 100ml from L'Artisan Parfumeur.com and Amazon.com

FRÉDÉRIC MALLE MUSC RAVAGEUR OIL

I prefer the oil version of this concoction of musk, spices, sandalwood and vanilla -- it's quieter, more personal. What's the point of wearing a sexy scent if your target can smell it from across the room? In that case, there's no need for them to come closer! Musc Ravageur starts at $85 for 30ml from EditionsdeParfums.com and Barneys.com

PENHALIGON'S CASTILE

This delicate dance of orange blossom and musk is my concession to the large segment of fumies who prefer to cloak their animal nature until push comes to shove. As it were. Castile starts at $80 for 50ml from Penhaligons.com and Amazon.com

MAISON FRANCIS KURKDJIAN ABSOLUE POUR LE SOIR

The blend of cumin, ylang-ylang, rose, honey, incense and sandalwood is a little “B.O.”, a little “uh-oh!” Or as news anchor Erica would have it, “a forest-y tree.” (She must've picked up on the incense, right?) Whatever, all I know is that Absolue PSL smells like it's started the monkeyshines without you. Playing catch-up has never been so frisky! Absolue Pour le Soir is $185 for 70ml from FrancisKurkdjian.com and LuckyScent.com

Katy Perry Purr

Sappy fruity floral, instead of saucy fruity furry.

The debut perfume from cheesecake pop tart Katy Perry, insinuatingly entitled “Purr”, both does -- and doesn't -- smell the way it should. It doesn't smell the way I think it should, anyway. When I hear “Purr”, I think furry kitten contentment, along with a smidge of Puss-in-Dominatrix-Boots vampiness. After all, Katy P's done a marvelous job of channeling a Saturday morning cartoon version of pin-up icon Bettie Page, and I'd expect a little of the minxy mischief of Katy's persona to color her perfume.

But I'm wishing for the stars, here, instead of merely wishing for the top of the satellite dish on a suburban tract home, because Purr smells the way it “should”: a state-approved fruity floral with a side of vanilla. Of course it does. What a fool I am to expect otherwise. (Any bets that Lady Gaga's promised/threatened “blood and semen” signature scent will also turn out to be a generic fruity floral?) After getting out my forensics kit to scrape the microscopic silver flakes clinging to the inside of this particular cloud, I can report that while Purr may be boring, it isn't bad. Unless by “bad”, you mean “boring”. In which case, it is bad. But Purr's montage of teen hit parade notes -- apple/shampoo/popcorn/vanilla -- is effectively composed and hangs together satisfyingly from first spray to drydown. I can't reasonably ask for any more than that. But unreasonably, I yearn for a kooky surprise, a naughty wink from Purr to conjure Ms. Perry's brand of teasy-weasy titillation.

Katy reconsiders her cone size.

If I ruled the world, and Katy Perry had asked me to creative direct her perfume (just one of my many important duties as ruler of the world), I'd line up bottles of Parfumerie Generale L'Ombre Fauve, Givenchy Organza Indecence and L'Artisan Parfumeur Traversée du Bosphore for inspiration. Instead of fruity floral, I'd give her “fruity furry”.

A robot kitty bottle for a robot kitty perfume.

Purr is available from Nordstrom starting at $45 for 50 ml.

Perfume Pen Pals: Parfums de Nicolai Maharadjah and L'Artisan Parfumeur Dzing!

Katie,

Okay, I'm back in the game! (Press release in an hour, news conference at 3 p.m.) I've tried Parfums de Nicolai Maharadjah once more, and this time, it's been a revelation.

I only remember the lavender last time and while it was a nice sharp lavender, Maharadjah was supposed to be a lavender oriental, with lots of cinnamon and spices, an odd hybrid of a proper English lavender and an Indian patchouli.

Well, this morning I smelled it, after two whole hours. And it smells great. As time passes it somehow turns less loud but more rich. Right now I smell like a real man! And a real Indian!


A real Indian man.

I'm loving this Maharadjah. It's Coldstone Creamery in one bottle. I smell a hundred different things. It's bold like Chanel Coromandel (though sharper and somehow not quite as satisfying), with all kinds of spices and incense. And the lavender is fierce at the top, almost as if to prove by comparison the rest of the perfume is mammoth, because it soon gets completely crushed by a big fat patchouli sledgehammer. The reviewers on MakeupAlley either love it or hate it, and all the ones who hate it are dead wrong.

So my order stash now includes Maharadjah and, on impulse, or further impulse, because I can't just buy one thing from LuckyScent (it hardly seems worth their while), I finally bought Dzing! (Their exclamation AND mine!) I don't know why. I don't know why!

Dan

Perfume Pen Pals: Etat Libre d'Orange Rien and Le Labo Patchouli 24

Katie,

As promised (I love making promises about things that only matter to me, and even then, only barely), my next Etat Libre d'Orange is Rien, which just arrived in the mail.

I had tried the sample and was curious mostly because it smelled like none of the other Etat Libres (which all smell sort of similarly). And because of what Luca Turin wrote in The Guide, that it's a simple animalic leather: unsweetened leather and civet and that's all. I want to get to the bottom of this civet business. (Get to the bottom of this civet business, get it? I'm on fire today.)

Having a full bottle to spray -- wow, this is crazy heavy stuff, much more imposing than out of a tiny vial. It's like Le Labo Oud 27 without the oud. And without most of the other 26 ingredients, too. It's Oud 27 with leather and the thing that makes Oud 27 smell so scary at first. It's leather and cat butt.


Turns out there is such a thing as being "too craftsy."


I can't decide whether or not I like it, or even if that's the appropriate question with a fragrance like this, but I've been smelling it obsessively for two hours and that says something. About the perfume and about me, I guess.

Dan

Dan,

Boy, you're a glutton for anal emissions, aren't you -- especially since you haven't particularly liked what you've already smelled in that department. It's the diaper pail game again.

Katie

Katie,

Yep, it is the diaper pail game again. But with leather, which is oddly more harmonious with poo than lavender and flowers are. It really is a narrow fragrance, especially considering it's so strong. Take a smell. It's in your Etat Libre samples.

I'm wearing Le Labo Patchouli 24 out again tonight, on a date this time. I've worn it around two friends and both disliked it, even more than they've disliked Chanel Coromandel.

I have three favorite scents -- P24, Coromandel and By Kilian Liaisons Dangereuses -- and the first two are unpopular with everyone I know. But people love Liaisons D. Maybe I should wear Liaisons D and not be so stubborn.

Dan

Dan,

So, I'm wearing this Rien, and I'm getting aldehydes rather than your cat butt. It smells of tarred oblivion. A little smoky sumpin'.



Sounds like wearing P24 on a date is your version of drawing a line in the sand. If they can tolerate the smoke, they've passed.

Katie

Katie,

No, sadly it's the opposite. If someone likes P24 now, I'll view her with suspicion. I secretly like that my friends don't like my favorite perfumes. I like surrounding myself with critical people. I don't attend to praise, surely because of my upbringing. So that's my line in the sand: like P24 and I'll know you're bullshitting me. (I'm not stable enough to date.)

I believe I was the one who first insisted you try Liaisons D. I was crazy about that perfume, still am, though I never end up wearing it. And, yeah, everyone loves it, which makes it somehow less enjoyable to wear. Crazy, I know.

Alright, I'm going with P24, dammit.

Dan

Fumies, do you have a perfume line in the sand?

Crochet cat butt via
Tar bubble via