Perfume Pen Pals: BLOOD Concept O, A and AB

Katie,

I've been enduring some difficult days of perfume sampling, my worst stretch in a long time. Yesterday was my introduction to the BLOOD Concept line and so yesterday was terrible. First I tried O, which is primarily raspberry and leather and that cheeky metallic note (because it's blood, get it?). It's like someone superimposed the Teletubbies onto a James Dean movie.

Etat Libre d'Orange Secretions Magnifiques

Katie,

Have you tried Etat Libre d'Orange Sécrétions Magnifiques yet? You should do it on camera. If for no other reason than I want to see someone's face when they first put it on. And then desperately try to wash it off. (And this one seriously clings!)

I made my friend Diane try it. Diane is predictable in her tastes in that she likes pleasant things. Which made convincing her to put on a few dabs of Sécrétions Magnifiques all the more gratifying. She was only mildly repulsed at first, but the following morning at 6 a.m. I received an email saying, "I smell like I had crazy sex with a stranger last night. And I just him to pieces!"



I almost want to buy a bottle just to have it around, the perfume equivalent of a whoopee cushion, I guess. But also because I almost like it. And it makes me a little sick to my stomach. It's a little like going on a roller coaster, where you're laughing and getting sick at the same time.

Wouldn't that make a good episode of KP Smells: "Tonight on Katie Puckrik Smells, Katie smells, laughs, and then gets sick on herself!" Think about it.

Oh, and if you're brave, you won't just smell it out of the vial, you'll actually apply the stuff to your skin.

Dan

Sécrétions Magnifiques is available from LuckyScent and Les Senteurs

Etat Libre d’Orange Putain des Palaces

...the dirty musk of a femme fatale with funk in her trunk.


Ask any human behavior expert about the real purpose of cosmetics, and it all comes down to sex. Blush mimics the flush of sexual excitement in the cheeks, and a lipstick-rouged mouth is a pretty good stand-in for an engorged vulva. The beauty industry prefers to put a euphemistic gloss on lipstick’s base intentions with flirtily allusive names like “Passion Fruit Squeeze” and “Sensual Rosebud”. After all, “Engorged Vulva” comes a little close to the bone as a name for a product designed to create that very scenario. I mean, you want to cloak your intentions with a little bit of mystique, right?

Wrong -- at least as far as frisky indie perfume house Etat Libre d’Orange is concerned. This provocative French line includes concoctions like Secretions Magnifiques (listed notes of blood, milk and sweat), Delicious Closet Queen (fruity leather) and Don’t Get Me Wrong, Baby, I Don’t Swallow (sterile floral). While Etat Libre d’Orange delights in shattering hollow propriety, it also makes an effort to ensure that a number of their vulgarly named scents actually smell, well, decent.

My current favorite from ELO is Putain des Palaces, composed by Nathalie Feisthauer and gleefully translated on the packaging as “Hotel Slut”. Putain des Palaces is a powdery rose, violet and leather combo that teeters just on the edge of day-after mustiness. It’s the dirty musk of a femme fatale with funk in her trunk. This olfactory hologram of "unwashed Pretty Woman” is assisted by the alchemy of milky rice powder and ginger notes. Something about their creamy sharpness really puts the beast in the bouquet.

But if you banish the name “Hotel Slut” from your mind, you can experience the eau de parfum in a positively wholesome way: an almost-gourmand; a spicy rice pudding. This fluctuation between edible and f*ckable is what makes Putain des Palaces so fascinating.

Fumeheads, what are your favorite "glamorous hooker" scents?

Etat Libre d’Orange Putain des Palaces is available from LuckyScent.com, at $80 for 50ml

"16th Arrondissement" by Helmut Newton

Perfume Pen Pals: Getting to Know You

Katie Puckrik!

In the middle of the night, desperately bored with myself (I'm working on a book project) and trolling the perfume blogs, I linked to your YouTube reviews.

I'm obsessed with perfume (much more than writing, obviously), I own too many bottles to count, and seeing you talking perfume, well, it felt like my life was suddenly complete. But then everything gets blown out of proportion at 3 a.m.

Still, the videos are great, and if you ever want decants of some fabulous niche stuff, just holler.

Eau d'Italie is making some great scents (I saw you liked incense). I have a few of the By Kilians, which, yeah yeah, are overpriced, but incredible. And everything I've bought from Etat Libre d'Orange is weird and great, especially Jasmin et Cigarette. Plus, I have another hundred or two.

Dan Rolleri

Dan,

Thanks for the props on my channel! I, too, enjoy procrastinating on writing deadlines by trolling the perfume blogs.

I may well be drawing on your reckless offer of Etat Libre d'Orange decants in the future.

Katie

Katie,

Re: Etat Libre, I've got full bottles of Jasmin et Cigarette, Vraie Blonde and Encens et Bubblegum, and samples of the rest, including the notorious Secretions Magnifiques, with which I'm happy to part.

Off the top of my head, I have a few of the Hermessences, a few Chanel Exclusifs, a couple Tom Ford Private Collection (Black Violet and Velvet Gardenia)...oh gosh, this is depressing. Is this what life has come down to? My father would slap me across the head and tell me to go dig something up or haul something.

Dan

Dan,

Perfume love isn't depressing! It's a portable sybarite pleasure that doesn't pack on the calories or destroy our families.

Not to be grabby with an almost-stranger (but virtual friend!), but I'd love to have dinky li'l samples of all the Etat Libres you have. And Ambre Narguile is the Hermessence I want to try.

This is so kind of you to offer, and possibly extremely gauche of me to accept, but it's wartime...or the depression...or something, and needs must.

Katie

Katie,

Ambre Narguile is nice and sweet and comfortable but I can only imagine wearing it during the holidays. It's the pumpkin pie of perfumes.

Oh, and if you haven't already, try Parfums MDCI Enlèvement au Sérail. Sadly, I sold my bottle because it was too feminine for me to pull off. (And, let's face it, because my girlfriend had left me.) But, wow, if science ever advances to the point it can create a woman beginning only from a scent, that's the scent I'd choose. That or pumpkin pie.

Dan

Dan,

I know you're busy, buying perfume, watching my YouTube reviews, occasionally working on your book. But do not deny fellow fragrance lovers your wit, insight and untoward personal revelations.

Would you consider writing on my blog? Just think of it as a social obligation, like volunteering at a soup kitchen. You could be like Rodrigo the Perfume Dog -- in other words, much more interesting, cute and popular than I am.

Rodrigo the Perfume Dog.

Katie

Katie,

Sure, yeah, I'll contribute. I'm more comfortable as a trusty sidekick. I will not do the Rodrigo high-five, though. I don't high-five.

You'd think I'd be more at ease with the jocular elements of life. But no. Whatever allows one to high-five, whether it's a protein or a hormone or a gene, I'm missing. I don't want to slap hands with a total stranger, even in the midst of a grand celebration.

By simply refusing to engage in a perfectly acceptable social gesture, I can ruin the moment for anyone. And I'll ruin it for you, too, if you make me high-five like you did with Rodrigo.

Dan

Dan,

I don’t make Rodrigo high-five. He makes me high-five. And he’ll make you high-five too, you wait. His warm little paw pads on your palms will just melt you.

Welcome aboard, Perfume Pen Pal. High five!

Katie

Dan Rolleri is a guy who likes perfume and music and baseball, and most days he sits around the house working on a book that regrettably includes none of these things.