Is That a Gun in Your Pocket, Romano...?

"The woman always come first," he confirms.  Some polite laughter bubbles up a little too slowly.  After all, it's a genuine 'lost in translation' moment.  Or is it?

Romano Ricci is presenting his Juliette Has a Gun brand in the lower ground events space of the gorgeous new Les Senteurs store in London.  In a chronological trot through each scent, accompanied by speedily distributed blotters, he describes notes, composition and creative processes with welcome clarity and brevity and, more importantly, he explains the inspiration behind each scent and behind the brand as a whole.

It's all sex, basically.

Each entry in the range, from the original pairing of Lady Vengeance and Miss Charming to the outstanding Citizen Queen and Calamity J, all are inspired by imaginary seductresses.  They all appear to Romano in different outfits, all have something different to say and they all handle his gun in different ways.  I'm paraphrasing, of course.

I'd sniffed and thoughtlessly appreciated some of the scents in the past but within the context of the brand creator's frank explanations (not to mention the lovely environs of the new Les Senteurs store) they all became so much more.  Understanding enhances appreciation, apparently.  Who knew?

Romano's trademark headwear may be a little ill-advised but he's every bit the the charming Southern European lothario incarnate.  He's bright, handsome and very amusing, both intentionally and unintentionally.  When he emphatically declared that he would never create scents for a man, his effortless machismo instantly reminded me of that infamous Berlusconi quote.  But it would be impossible to hold that against him for a moment.

Ricci's perfume pedigree is impeccable.  His great-grandmother's first fragrance is a distinct childhood memory and it would be a tragedy of Shakespearean scale if his own scents couldn't live up to that.  Thankfully they do.

          [By ANDREW]

My Big Fat Gypsy Perfume Industry

Last night, BBC4 aired the first instalment in its new three-part series on the perfume industry.  Peter was unable to watch so I quickly posted a short review on his Facebook page as soon as the show had finished.  It read: "Goodness, Chandler Burr gets lots of samples. Jean Paul Guerlain is a mad, racist old coot. The rest of the industry is run by dollies who genuinely thought Hilfiger Loud was a good idea and not a ridiculous, patronising 'dad dancing at a wedding' take on youth-oriented fragrance."

Let me elaborate...

Mr Burr does indeed receive a great many FedEx deliveries.  Every perfume fan must have turned green at the sight of his freebie stash.  He probably came out of this film as the most sensible, objective contributor, appearing only faintly ridiculous when he rolled up his trouser leg for more scent-testing skin space.  He didn't like some unnamed Bliss fragrance but he loved Thierry Mugler's Womanity.  Later, he kindly explained the dilemma of drugstore distribution for designer fragrance brands.

The venerable but thoroughly unpleasant Jean Paul Guerlain represented the industry's old guard. Of course.  He struggled from luxury car to luxury home to luxury offices, tottering on an ivory-handled walking stick, making misogynistic comments, openly showing his disdain for mass marketing and searching for his ratty little dogs.  Later, we witnessed his monumental fall from grace when he told a TV interviewer how he had "worked like a n*gger" on his scents (although the actual incident wasn't shown or quoted). Demonstrations outside the Guerlain store forced his resignation and replacement by Thierry Wasser.  I suppose it was pleasing to see that some French people do have a concept of egalité after all, despite their monstrous legislation against the freedom of religious expression.

But the bulk of the show seemed to be dedicated to the creation and launch of Hilfiger's Loud fragrances and it all played out like some ridiculous French & Saunders parody of the perfume industry.  In a misguided scramble to combine fragrance with music and bottle "liquid rock and roll" for Mr Hilfiger, Veronique Gabai Pinsky and her international team at Estée Lauder bludgeoned their simplistic strategy home with all the finesse of Pete Townsend finishing up a live set.  As a marketer, I watched incredulously as they struggled to verbalise and realise the concept with any depth or originality.

The flacon was created by Chad Lavigne, "the Picasso of bottle design" apparently.  His mood board appeared to include any old clichéd rock imagery and name-checked acts that haven't troubled the charts since the old king was on the throne.  His design is a heavy-handed reference to a vinyl LP with a volume-control cap.  That the majority of the target demographic may never have even seen a vinyl record, let alone have any emotional connection to them, and are far more likely to adjust the volume of their music with a swipe of a touchscreen rather than twisting the kind of nob found on a Marshall amplifier, didn't seem to matter or even occur to anybody. 

When the concept was presented to Tommy Hilfiger himself, in a brief and inarticulate presentation, raising some concerns about the legibility of the bottle and a quick spritz of the fragrances on blotters was all his go-ahead required.

My dog may have appeared in one of their videos (yes, really) but even I know the Ting Tings were only cool for about a nanosecond a few years ago.  But Veronique squeezes the last gasp of vague credibility from their career by getting them to sell themselves in the Loud advertising campaign. I clenched my buttocks and looked away.

As preparations for the press launch got underway, one particularly hilarious scene saw Trudie Collister from the London Estée Lauder offices berated via speakerphone for failing to secure some patchouli plants, the key note in the fragrance.  When a sorry-looking near-seedling of patchouli did appear, it was odourless.  No matter - they vowed to make it look "pretty" and "extraordinary".  Trudie briefed her staff to ensure that everybody was 'on message' for the press event - apparently the message is that young people use their iPods quite a lot. 

Of course, documentary film makers usually approach their work with some kind of agenda and judicious editing can easily prompt a sneer or a snigger at their subjects.  Here, we saw the "give 'em enough rope" approach, the kind of thing that Louis Theroux does so well.  I'm afraid it left just about everybody involved looking rather silly.

Loud is already available on the discount sites.

          [By ANDREW]

Planet of the Oud: PART ONE

I'm loath to admit it but the whole oud explosion passed me by somewhat.  And I'm not sure why.  I like Yves Saint Laurent's M7 well enough and the noble rot of agarwood is a particularly pleasing thought but I suppose it was the sheer number of oud scents out there that stumped me, really.  I couldn't smell the wood for the trees, so to speak.

Then on a recent trip to my local 99p Store, I noticed a strange offering amongst the air fresheners.  In a bold green can emblazoned with arabic text, there was an oud scented Airwick aerosol spray.  Obviously a Middle Eastern import, I snapped up the remaining few. And I was very glad that I did.  "However," I thought.  "You can't base an appreciation of oud on a pleasant, woody aerosol room spray, Andrew.  It's time to embark on a journey through the crowded world of oud for real..."

I started with Tom Ford Private Blend Oud Wood.  Like a 21st Century Coco Chanel (remember, she dabbled in movies too), Ford is the arbiter of style and taste that some credit with initiating the oud explosion through his creative direction of M7 - so surely his Private Blend offering must be the real deal?  And yes - it's very, very pleasant.  In fact, it's nudged its way on my 'To Buy' list - as long as I can find it heavily discounted.  It's a kinder, more polite M7 - less heavy-handed and medicinal.  But still rich and hearty.  "OK," I thought.  "So far, so good."

"How about an interesting oud combination?" I mused.  "Placed against something more familiar, I could probably pick out the distinct character of oud."  So I doused myself in Leather Oud from Christian Dior's La Collection Privée.  Hmm.  Good stuff.  Dark, sweet, animalic...  But rather complex and a little too self-consciously 'perfumey'.  I think I need to spend a little more time with this beast to appreciate and understand it fully.

And then almost as soon as it had begun, my oud journey took a major detour.  In fact, I think I was kidnapped by a large, sweaty, swarthy man and held against my will in some salacious Midnight Express perfume fantasy, like the Fry's Turkish Delight girl in jeans and a casual shirt.  L'Artisan Parfumer's Al Oudh is a fragrance dream come true.  It's heavy wood with an enormous shot of cumin.  It's big, burly and almost disturbingly human.  It's a while since I've been this excited about a scent...

So, I think I'll languish here awhile and continue my oud expedition at a later date.  I know I must tackle the ouds of Le Labo, By Kilian and, of course, Montale.  And seemingly a million or so more.  I'm girding my loins...

          [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'M/MINK' by Byredo

I call my miniature schnauzer 'The Mink'.  She's a lovely gunmetal grey colour.  Clipping rather than stripping has removed all the coarseness from her coat so she's soft, velvety and very cuddly.  Regular bathing means that she rarely exudes that 'doggy' smell.

Byredo's M/MINK is an animal of an entirely different nature.

As I first inhaled this bizarre exercise in scent-as-art, an old Depeche Mode lyric popped into my head.  From 1986's Stripped: "You're breathing in fumes I taste when we kiss." M/MINK is the thick, smoggy air above a futuristic cityscape, all burning oil drums,  crumbling zombies and scuttling rodents.

M/MINK is a mechanical animal.  Commissioned by Paris-based art and design duo M/M (Mathias Augustyniak and Michael Amzalag), the original brief was a block of calligrapher's ink.  And there's certainly a dense, inky darkness.  But there's also a shrill metallic scrape in the the opening.  Then the low call of a dirty animal in distress. It's PETA's worst nightmare as scent.

And it's brilliant.

The expectations of bloggers and reviewers are so often dashed by high-concept scents. It's the major criticism levelled at Etat Libre d'Orange.  Great idea - decidedly ordinary fragrance.  Byredo's own Fantastic Man, created in association with the Dutch style magazine is a case in point.  Well, M/MINK is a rat right up your drainpipe.  You couldn't ask for more creativity and originality.  Whether or not it's a wearable fragrance is another matter entirely.

I need a reassuring cuddle from my dog.

          [By ANDREW]

ANGER MANAGEMENT

Deep breaths, deep breaths, deep breaths...

There are many things in this world to get angry about.  Poverty, hunger, injustice etc, etc, etc.  But I just tested a fragrance that made my blood boil in a way that a photograph of a maltreated donkey in Spain has never quite managed.

A major, major release.  A huge campaign - print and TV.  A pretty good, seductive campaign.  Every stupid man from Newcastle to New Jersey will be buying this scent.

They would do far better to buy a can of Lynx.  Any of the trashy varieties.  They're all far superior to this cruel, ridiculous joke.  This scent embodies everything that's wrong with the fragrance industry today.  It's nasty, cynical and ultimately pointless.  It's an insulting afterthought to the marketing.

OK - I know, I know...  I'm off to get a life.

           [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'Un Jardin Sur le Toit' by Hermès

Oh dear...  My reverence for Mr Jean Claude Ellena has been seriously shaken by his latest creation for Hermès - Un Jardin Sur le Toit.

I'll happily admit to being a JCE fanboy.  It's not that I believe he can do no wrong.  I just find myself loving or at the very least appreciating all of his work.  His artistry.  His light, joyful touch.  His whispered evocation of mood or geography.

Either he's taken his eye off the ball or the commercial imperatives of Hermès have focus-grouped him into submission on this one.  Ellena's scents are often deceptively simple - just when you think you've understood the road they're on, they swerve into a different territory and you realise there was a whole lot more to the journey all along.  I'm afraid Un Jardin Sur le Toit is just simple.

It opens with an almost offending smack of fake apples - the kind of apple that flavours cheap confectionery.  The kind of scent that you know should be apple, but isn't at all.  As that slowly exits, the rose takes over.  Not a pretty, dew-soaked or photorealistic rose but a nanna's handwash tea rose.

And that's about it.  No sign of the promised earthiness.  No Ellena subtlety that I could find.  And I tried.  It dries down to an almost-pleasant, vegetal musk but remains too contaminated by that horrid rose to enjoy.

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear...

          [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'Nuit de Tubereuse' by L'Artisan Parfumeur

My fragrance-loving friend Darren recently discovered the delights of Robert Piguet's Fracas and told me excitedly that he was going to buy a bottle without delay.  The exchange went something like this:
Me:  "It's gorgeous, isn't it?  But you realise it's considered one of those feminines that a man just can't wear?"
Darren:  "I'm wearing Chanel No. 5 today."
Me:  "Fair enough."

I thought about my own tuberose struggle.  I have a beautiful little black and gold compact of Fracas solid perfume and whenever I slip it from its veleveteen pouch to look at, I'm powerless to prevent myself from anointing my wrists and neck with its amazing, juicy, fleshy, loud floral joyfulness.  It's that old debate again...  I certainly subscribe to the school of "if you love it, wear it" when it comes to the battle between masculinity and femininity in scent, but there's something so immediately, so self-consciously feminine in tuberose scents and in Fracas in particular that it simply roars "WOMAN" - like a top-heavy Russ Meyer vixen in twin-set and pearls.

So I was particularly excited when I read that Bertrand Duchaufour's Nuit de Tubereuse for L'Artisan Parfumeur might actually be that most elusive of scents - a tuberose-led creation that really has some masculine leanings.  And it almost is...

I sniffed it, I loved it and I had to have it.  The tuberose is right there, not hidden behind its other facets of subtle tropical fruitiness and dusky, smokiness, but it doesn't drip and ooze its feminine nectar in the vein of Fracas, Carnal Flower et al.

It is indeed tuberose behind the veil of night.  There's some dry, dusty earth, some woods, the light spice of cardamom.  It's tuberose in a smart, well cut grey suit.  I wear it often.

          [By ANDREW]

(Photograph features the wonderful Californian drag star Tammie Brown.)

REVIEW: 'Jules' by Christian Dior

I only became aware of this wonderful old 'powerhouse' scent fairly recently.  It was launched in 1980, clearly fell out of favour and was discontinued  - then reformulated and repackaged and became available in limited supply.

Jules (in its original formulation) is a voice that shouts loudly in the masculine vs. feminine scent debate.  It's from an age when men were supposedly men and their fragrances could unabashedly broadcast that fact.  It's from a time before reedy, weedy, watery, soapy, 'sporty' scents found their way into the male bathroom cabinet and consciousness.

In character, Jules is not dissimilar to Equipage by Hermès.  It shares that rich woody and leathery heartiness; that poised formality and politeness vs. devil-may-care strength and brutality.

But Jules dares to take a step further.  It's even darker and richer.  It's animalic in the best possible way - not overly 'skanky' but sleek and powerful, like a big cat with its muscles rippling just below a shimmering pelt.  It's warm with life; tough and confident.  It purrs.

And yes, it has great sillage and lasting power - a little goes a long way and the initial crack of the whip settles handsomely into a second skin of decidedly refined yet feral masculinity.

Mark Jacob's Bang was roundly panned when it appeared last year, criticised for its woody, peppery simplicity.  But I was pleased that a modern, mainstream men's release was in some small way harking back to those big, butch scents of old - those tough masculines such as Jules, the likes of which I doubt will grace department store counters again.

          [By ANDREW]

Heresy

One still sees young ladies scuttling around the perfume halls of Liberty or Selfridges with Perfumes: The Guide propped open in one hand, the other wrist clutched to nose, frowning, smiling, or mentally justifying a £200 purchase.  Luca Turin, the enormously gifted Emperor of Scent, along with his default Empress, have done more for fragrance appreciation in recent years than any writer, blogger or even perfumer could.

Turin's humour, good taste and wonderfully imperious grandstanding not only make for an enormously entertaining read, his expertise and insights are incredibly educational.  Actually, never mind his imperious dictates, Turin has seemingly been placed at the head of the Church of scent appreciation.  His words are gospel.

So, it is with trepidation that anybody disagrees, especially when his five star reviews are so illuminating, explaining the greatness of certain scents in such a beautiful, artful manner or introducing the enthusiast to some unexperienced wonder (like Parfum de Nicolaï's amazing New York).  But on one particular review I must disagree, trepidatiously but wholeheartedly.

Turin gives Estée Lauder's Beyond Paradise Men five stars.  He says that it "works like music more than fragrance... All other masculines (and most feminines) seem loud, course and bare by comparison."  WHAT?

I may have nowhere near the skill and experience of Monsieur Turin but are we really smelling the same scent here?!  Beyond Paradise Men is simply awful.  It's one of those bog-standard aquatic monstrosities, cynical and bland, designed to be as inoffensive to sheep-minded consumers as possible.  It's so basic and boring: the best I can say about it is the bottle's OK and that the ghastly melon / cucumber accord doesn't shout as loudly as it might.

Perhaps I shan't go to scent heaven, or indeed beyond perfume paradise for saying so, but Turin demeans the rest of his wonderful writing and analyses with this bizarre hyperbole.

Now I'm off to say five Hail Jickys and two L'Air du Temps, just in case.

          [By ANDREW]

The Emperor's New (Old) Pebbles - Armani Privé

Hot on the heels of JCE's Hermesscences range, big old Giorgio presented some supposedly special scents in lavish packaging (hard wood refillable bottles and resin pebble stoppers) that could possibly apologise for the monstrous (but monstrously popular) Acqua di Giò and all that Beyoncé-fronted stuff.

Of course, that was ages ago and the range has swelled considerably since the first four offerings appeared in late '04.  But I've only just lived with enough of them for long enough to form an opinion...

Pierre de Lune could and should be so much better.  It's taught me that a good, whopping dose of iris isn't enough to guarantee quality.  Violets and a strangely medicinal dry-down make this a competent mainstream rather than a £165 per 50ml refined delight.  Shame.

I own Ambre Soie - it was a generous gift.  It certainly packs a punch.  All the requisite oriental notes are assembled beautifully - ginger, clove, cinnamon, patchouli - but it's bitter rather than sweet.  It has a strange MSG quality; an aftertaste, if you will.  It's like Lady Gaga - looks good but it's not really goodlooking.

The weird thing about Cuir Amethyste is that it actually smells purple.  That's a nice, little psychological trick.  Violets, crushed blackcurrants and unworn suede slingbacks.  It's very good.

But the crown remains with Bois d'Encens.  Deep, dark, endangered woods slaughtered for your delectation on the smoke-obscured altar of high fashion.  Delicious.  I love incense fragrances but I have absolutely no understanding of Catholic excess.  I've not so much as fingered as a cassock.  That's probably why I'm able to enjoy them

There are now loads more in the Armani Privé range to explore, I know.  And they're all supposed to be great fragrances because they're expensive.  Armani brought a tasteful understatement to Italian fashion and I suppose these scent offerings are there to do the same for his glitzy fragrance range.  But remember that this was the culture that gave us both Florence and Donatella Versace.  Beauty is so often a matter of taste.

          [By ANDREW]

On the Couch with Pierre Bourdon

I vividly recall the moment that my sense of smell became very special to me.  Some twenty years ago, I was struggling for early childhood memories; fumbling through the early 70s to better understand my relationship with my father.  A man who was mostly absent and then completely absent just a little later in my life.

From hamster cages and tom cat indiscretions in my gym kit to my grandmother's bars of Camay soap and the childhood craze for scented erasers, I'd always loved smelling things.  But nothing could prepare me for what struck at that moment.

Like a punch to the side of the head, my father's personal smell physically appeared to me.  A day's sweat in a polyester shirt.  Oil from the factory on the Slough Trading Estate in which he worked.  The tiniest remnants of Old Spice fighting against the stale smoke of a Pall Mall cigarette.  All experienced as I sat on his lap at the end of his working day, my head pressed against his hairy chest, vegetables boiling nearby.

It was there and then gone instantly.  And I suddenly understood the power of our sense of smell - what a truly great gift it is.

A little while I ago I realised that some of the scent compositions of perfumer Pierre Bourdon had a particular significance to me, most notably 1981's Kouros.  I find it terribly difficult to talk about Kouros without revealing far too much of myself.  Kouros is a psychology session in a bottle for me.  It grips my formative years in the manner of a very stubborn, very beautiful man with ripe, 10pm armpits.  I stole daily spritzes from my older brother's bedroom in the early 80s before I owned my own bottle.  He's now dead.  I recall my first visits to gay clubs in the Midlands and the North where Kouros and Ralph Lauren's Polo literally hung in the air above the dancefloors, along with amyl nitrate, perspiration and possibility.

Kouros is the smell of the ideal man.  It is the smell of sex.

I was given a bottle of Cool Water as a gift in the 90s and therefore felt I should love it.  So I did until I realised that I didn't like it at all.  And then came to despise it for what it's done to scent over the past couple of decades.  I respect its greatness but I don't want ocean freshness.  I hate calone.  That I prefer the smell of petrichor, puppy breath and mossy logs to chemical cleanliness says something significant about me, I hope.  I'm not sure what...

Monsieur Bourdon provided another scent sensation recently.  I wore 2000's Biotherm Aqua Fitness Pour Homme for quite a few years and I loved it.  It elicited a great many compliments.  It was citrus and wood cleanliness and never made me feel like I was beachcombing or picking a limpit from a groyne.  Its blue glass flacon and bright happiness were suddenly stolen from me when it was discontinued after just a few years.  I read that Bourdon's Live Jazz for YSL was a close match and a good friend who shares my love of scent bought it for my birthday last year.  One spray transported me back to an old favourite.  It's not exactly the same, of course.  But there's enough mint, grapefruit and light wood blended into a composition sufficiently similar to plug the gap of a loss.

Bourdon's final compositions were for Frederic Malle.  He's now retired.  French Lover gives me a smug smile.  I don't love it but I can see a master at work and clearly observe the individual pillars of frankincense, vetiver, cedar and iris, all connected by garlands of genius.  His Iris Poudre seems to suit my current tastes more closely.  Like a Julian Fellowes dowager in a large wig thrust into a Hoxton drinking den, it's timeless and contemporary, tasteful, classy and panderingly dumb...

Ask for your friends' advice and you'll discover that everyone's a psychologist these days.  Thank goodness for my sense of smell.

          [By ANDREW]

Goodbye, Elizabeth...

:'(

Oranges, dirty and otherwise...

Orange squash, orange Wine Gums, the orange-filled Fry's Chocolate Cremes and Quality Street sweets from the enorous tin at Christmastime...  As a child, orange was definitely my favourite flavour. My predilection stopped short of the fruit itself, leading my mother to genuine concerns about scurvy and rickets, but an orange sweet or treat whilst grubbing around in the garden is an enduringly wonderful childhood memory.

It's no wonder then that orange and all things citrus are notes that I have long-enjoyed in my fragrance choices.  Orange is such a happy scent.  Indeed, Clinique created a scent bursting with oranges, in a bright orange flacon with their 1999 Happy For Men.  But I'm afraid this is one of the few orange fragrances that doesn't work for me.  Like seemingly every other men's release from the nineties, Happy For Men is swathed in that calone-freshness that makes it far too dull and conformist.

No, it's big, unashamed oranges that I like in my scent, like Jean Claude Ellena's Cologne Bigarade for Editions Frederic Malle (and the slightly better Bigarade Concentrée).  This was a must-buy as soon as I smelled it.  It's full-on, bitter, zesty orange, propped up with a bit of light wood.  Wonderful.

Orange also seems to work for me when its bright cleanliness is put against the foil of something more dirty or sinister.  The 1951 classic Eau d'Hermès with its fetid orangey-leather and cumin-sweatiness is amazingly schizophrenic.  It was created by Edmond Roudnitska whilst Ellena was working as his apprentice and JCE's Déclaration for Cartier from 1998 is definitely his modernist take on that 'dirty orange' theme.  Déclaration isn't obviously an orange scent and its skank is quite subtle too but it's that understated, cryptic interplay alongside the cardamom and woods that makes it so uniquely interesting.  Arguably, Terre d'Hermès is another development in this vein too.

Orange remains a staple note in perfumery and Andy Tauer's Orange Star is a wonderful reworking of its capabilities, packing more of a punch than you'd imagine.  Orange is one of those smells that always seems to 'reach' you - when somebody's tackling a satsuma in the office or on a train carriage, chances are you'll smell it sooner or later.  Orange Star seems to be one of the few scents that really draws upon that power.

Last summer, Cartier released a flanker for their wonderful Eau de Cartier which replaced the fizzy Parma Violets of the original with a smooth, clean orange scent - Eau de Cartier Essence d'Orange. It's very good, if resolutely 'fake' in its oranginess.  However, this year's big mainstream newbie Boss Orange is, like every other Boss fragrance, a cynical "don't scare the straight boys" shower gel concoction that flirts with a bit of nondescript fruit.  It's just dull.

No, I like my oranges with at least a nod to reality but preferably with a bit of dirtiness as well.  I wonder why...

          [by ANDREW]

"Please Sir, can I have some more?"

When Hermès announced that it was extending the Jardins Collection with the imminent release of Un Jardin sur le Toît, I immediately hoped that Sir Jean Claude Ellena had a new cologne composition up his sleeve too.

The Jardins are OK - the fig-fest of Un Jardin en Méditerranée is of its time, Un Jardin sur le Nile made for a good book but I have an aversion to watery scents so Un Jardin après la Moussin is a bit of a scrubber for me. But with their smart orange boxes and green glass bottles, it's the Colognes collection that I love...

I discovered Eau d'Orange Verte in an airport Duty Free shop some time in the early 90s and had gone through a couple of bottles within a year. Has JCE tweaked it? Probably, but it's still wonderful. Eau de Pamplemousse Rose is utterly joyful with its fleeting stab of real grapefruit that settles into the sedate, assured smell of wealth.  But it's Eau de Gentiane Blanche that I love the most, Ellena's leftfield contribution to the "neglected" genre of eaux de cologne. It's all mulchy and vegetal, fresh and outdoorsy yet metropolitan and strangely sophisticated.

So, what could he add to the line-up? A revolutionary treatment of lemons? A lavender to end all lavenders? Lime? Yuzu? Geranium? Any or all of those would be most welcome from the schnozzle of Mr Ellena. But I wish he'd just get on with it.

          [By ANDREW]

Moiya is Not a Perfume Tart

But I am.  An unashamed perfume tart...

Moiya is an old friend of mine who's very successful in the Beauty Industry.  In fact, her Little Black Book could make a fortune on eBay.  And she has been loyal to just one fragrance since its launch nearly two decades ago - Dolce and Gabanna Pour Femme.

I find the idea of complete loyalty to a signature scent both bewildering and astonishing. Or deep down, am I just jealous of such fidelity?  With me it's Mitsouko one day, Quorum the next; a dash of Derby, a dousing of M7...  I can't imagine removing that daily choice from my life.

On a recent day out with Moiya, we combined a trip to Titanic - The Artefacts Exhibition at the O2 with an impromptu interview.  I wanted to press her on her decision to remain with just one scent for so long, especially when she works around so many fragrance options every day.

The Titanic exhibition is breathtaking.  So many direct links to that most famous of tragedies.  I could almost hear Celine Dion warbling in the background.  When I asked Moiya to delve into her perfume past, she revealed that, like many, many women, her first scent experience was with Charlie:  "I loved it.  I must have been about thirteen, and could afford to buy it with my pocket money. I loved the advert, and the jingle. I wore it for years."

She couldn't recall the name of her next, 'transitional' scent, just that it came in a grey, ribbed bottle, but her first big designer fragrance was the original Armani Pour Femme. "I wore it for about six years. It was elegant, and sophisticated. Shame they discontinued it."

At the exhibition, you get the chance to smell samples of fragrance that were being taken to New York on that fated voyage. Perfumes that have spent nearly a century under the ocean.  How amazing and moving is that?  Actually consuming something that went down with the Titanic...

I continued to coax the Beauty Industry Insider for her own perfume heritage.  "I discovered D&G Pour Femme in 1994 and it's been my fragrance ever since," she happily explained, peering at the Titanic's steering wheel.  (Are they called steering wheels on ships?  I should have read the board next to it but I was conjuring the smell of D&G Pour Femme in my mind.)

"I love the bottle - its classical simplicity appeals to me.  I hate bells and whistles and things hanging off bottles. They put me off.  I want something timeless and elegant.  But I'm afraid I hate the velveteen box. It gets really dusty."

And how does she find the strength; the lasting power of her signature scent?  "I do two squirts, no more. Even in the evening. Less is more.  I've tried all the body preps but I don't really like them. I find that it makes the overall effect too strong and I hate strong fragrances - Giorgio makes me sneeze!"

But why does she love it so much?  Why has she stayed so loyal for so long?  "It's elegant, subtle and soft... And one of the main reasons that I love it is that every time I wear it, somebody notices. Kate Beckinsale only commented last week how lovely it smelt!"  She dropped the name in a totally unassuming fashion.  Naturally, I wished it had been Kate Winslet who had complimented her.  That would have been far more fitting.

I came away with many a spine-tingling insight into the sad fate of the Titanic and a much greater understanding of why some people remain loyal to their chosen signature scents.  If you find something that is so magical and perfect for you, why not stick with it?

No, loyal Moiya is most definitely not a perfume tart.  But I'll always be one.  Now, where did I leave that Bang sample...?

          [By PETER]

The Rochas 'Globe' Mystery

Discontinued?  Officially, it seems.  But Rochas' 1990 or possibly 1991 men's scent Globe is one of those fragrances that crops up on eBay or in online discount stores every once in a while.  Either there's a lot of stock still out there somewhere or it's being produced secretly - how exciting.

Like many discontinued scents, it appears to be achieving some kind of near-mythical status as a lost, beloved, trailblazing men's fragrance - a dangerous floral leather that was way ahead of its time.  Negative reviews on Basenotes are scarce and the forums urge you to snap it up if you spot some.

Which I did.

It's currently available at one of my favourite online discounters, Cheapsmells and in a 'one weekend only' sale just a couple of weeks ago, it was going for a ridiculously low price.  Unfortunately, the bottle delivered was not the Limited Edition metal flacon that they pictured but, hey, they've since rectified that and I was just glad to own this 'lost classic'.  And I like it.  It's not a Holy Grail scent - it's not even a five star composition - but it's very good, original, well-made and it develops handsomely over time as a fine scent should.

But the mystery is further compounded by the perfumer to whom the fragrance is attributed.  Variously, sources assign it to Nicolas Mamounas and the real emperor of scent, Jean Claude Ellena himself.  In fact, JCE bashers use it as a prime example of how the revered minimalist used to be capable of more complex and successful compositions.  Chandler Burr says it's Ellena's work in 'The Perfect Scent' but Basenotes says it's Mamounas'.

So, is it really discontinued?  Is it being produced in tantalisingly small quantities by international fragrance counterfeiters who then sell it on the cheap?  And who created it in the first place, Mamounas or Ellena?

With a little more poking about I'm sure I could find some concrete answers.  But it's a niggling rather than a genuinely worrying mystery so I'll just remain relatively pleased that I now own a bottle, even if it's not the metal edition, and one day I'll probably stumble across the truth.

          [By ANDREW]

What Befits a Legend?

It's not every day that you get to have lunch and a good gossip with a living legend. Yesterday, I had a delightful five hours with Miss Martha Reeves.  Younger readers may be thinking "Who?"  I advise them to YouTube "Dancin' in the Streets", "Jimmy Mack", "Heatwave",  all staggering examples of the joyous Motown sound that delighted the world nearly five decades ago.  What's amazing about that music is how fresh and exciting it still sounds today. These are tracks that work on every level, and I always think that Motown is the one style of music you can put on at a party without a single objection.

As an unashamed fan, I wanted to give the delightfully naughty Miss Reeves a fragrance worthy of her, and it was agonising.  What perfume encapsulates glamour, longevity and style, with a bright commercial appeal?  It had to be Youth Dew, albeit the slightly-tweaked Tom Ford remix, Amber Nude.  Swathed in fox fur, the irrepresible Martha's eyes twinkled as she opened the packaging...  "My, what a pretty bottle!" was her first response, then a quick spray on her still-fabulous cleavage led to that famous grin. "Just the one spray, honey?" she asked.

The truth is that one spray, at lunch, will suffice. We are educated into not smelling too heavliy, not smelling too strongly, and this is totally appropriate around other people, particularly over food. Youth Dew has a regality about it, perfect for one of the Queens of Motown.  In small doses it beguiles, intrigues.  In large doses, this behemoth is like a Siren, luring men to ontold carnal pleasures.  I love its very heavy-handedness, its inability to slink in the background like a Vera Wang perfume.  It's made to last, looks amazing after all these years, and sings a beautiful melody. Wear it, and smell rum and Coca-Cola (from a cold glass bottle, naturally). Wear it, and take a little journey back to when women smelt unashamedly divine, and strong, and passionate.  If you find yourself dancing in the streets with joy, don't blame me.

          [By PETER]

REVIEW: Body Shop 'White Musk for Men'

A little light snobbery can be fun and self-affirming as long as you don't take it too seriously.  Yes, I'm allowed to criticise one fragrance because there's another in my cupboard that cost an obscene amount of money.  Ultimately that's just silly and meaningless, isn't it?

I don't hold with guilty pleasures and I'm patently not a music snob - you should see some of the monstrosities in my iTunes library.  And I like to think I'm not a perfume snob either.

May I present some concrete evidence for that...?  Alongside my bottles of (excellent) Old Spice and my (cheap and amusing) Denim shower gel, I'm really rather fond of Body Shop's White Musk for Men.  At £16 for 100ml, you know you're not getting high art or gold standard quality but what you do get is very, very good and has become one of my 'spray with abandon' staples.

The bottle is a handsome block of glass, bleeding from clear to a deep purple and the scent itself is a bright, cheerful blast of cleanliness.  Of course, it's not the rich, animalic, spicy musk of Frederic Malle Editions de Parfums 'Musc Ravageur' or Calvin Klein's 'Obsession', the kind that sends captive big cats crazy in experiments; rather it's the soapy, nitro-musk of fresh laundry, a skin-friendly, freshly-scrubbed, undersexed musk.  Lasting power's minimal but it's so inexpensive that you can just reapply freely.

If some of your scent choices are big, baroque, bombastic tunes then White Musk for Men plays a bit of undemanding pop music that can provide some welcome light relief.

          [By ANDREW]

Give it Some Wood: The 'Tam Dao' Layering Experiment

It's a drizzly evening in London.  The schnauzer's curled up next to me on the sofa, the TV's on without sound, wasting electricity and the new Lucinda Williams album is growling and twanging in the background.

A rummage around my samples box doesn't show up anything that I don't feel fully familiar with so I decide to have a bit of an experiment; do a bit of mixing or layering and see if I can come up with a new smell sensation.  Or at least something to stave off the boredom.  I scour my cupboard of scents for some ideas...

Diptyque's Tam Dao is an excellent fragrance but ultimately it's just wood.  Very woody wood, like I imagine a walk through a sawmill would smell.  It's very nice wood indeed.  But just wood.  So I select a few scents that I think may benefit from a good, strong wood at their base, apply them to my arms and smell the results over the course of the next couple of hours...

Monsieur Balmain
It's an inexpensive reformulation of the Germaine Cellier original (that I'd love to locate and sample) but Monsieur Balmain isn't half bad - if you like lemons that is.  With pancake day approaching, I slaver some over a Tam Dao base and see what happens to the super-bright, creamy confection of very lemony lemon when it meets very woody wood.  And it's good.  It all feels deeper and more complex with a bit more zestiness up top.

Hermes 'Hiris'
Hiris is a strangely sour, hissy kind of iris rather than a sweet, earthy, rounded one and she doesn't seem to like a big old block of wood invading her space.  She turns her back and stands firm and Tam Dao just paces around her.  The combination doesn't work at all and I can smell the two scents quite separately.

Matthew Williamson 'Incense'
Wood and incense is a natural combo and whilst I certainly wasn't expecting anything like the stature of Armani Privé's 'Bois d'Encens', I thought this pairing might work out.  And it did.  The Williamson scent is just sheer enough to allow Tam Dao to shine through and they rest atop one another very pleasantly.  The biggest success of the three, definitely.

And the point of all this?  Well, none really.  I may bolster up my Matthew Williamson with a bit of woody Tam Dao the next time I wear it.  I may not.  Boredom, eh...?

          [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'Yatagan' by Caron

Celery is my bete noir.  Along with cucumber.  I'm not a fussy eater and I'll give anything a chance, but celery and cucumber are those foodstuffs about which people ask incredulously: "But why can't you eat them - they're 95 per cent water?!"  Yeah, and five per cent pure evil.  I'll grudgingly stir a Bloody Mary with a celery stick but our relationship ends there.  Or at least it did until I discovered Caron's Yatagan.

When it comes to scents, the more interesting or challenging the better as far as I'm concerned.  I love the dirty nappy and lavender accord in Jicky and the ageing French libertine with poor personal hygiene that is Kouros.  And I thoroughly enjoy the rasping,  threatening, celery-spiked evil of Yatagan.

Caron's 1976 classic manages to be sharp and high-pitched yet blocky and butch at the same time, like the Child Catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang combined with Popeye's arch-enemy Bluto.  It's another of those fragrances that could never be launched into today's market - and we're richer for its continued existence.

          [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'L'Air de Rien' by Miller Harris

Jane Birkin means very little to me.  A few breathy vocals on what amounts to a porn soundtrack and suddenly she's an icon.  I suppose the legendary Hermes Birkin Bag helped but now she complains that its use over the years has caused her Repetitive Strain Injury.

The blurb that accompanies this rather wonderful scent created for her by Miller Harris, the deliciously skanky musk of L'Air de Rien, explains that Mrs Gainsbourg could never, ever find a fragrance that she liked.  Of all the beautiful, artful perfumes created through the years, not one worked for her.  Poor Jane.

But she lucked out with this one.  It's supposed to evoke the smells of Jane's childhood - her father's pipe tobacco, floor polish and old, wooden furniture - and there's definitely a unique, other-worldly air to it.  But it's also sweet and fecal, louche yet rather refined, like a wet dog bounding into a trustafarian's 1960s party, all viewed through the haze of a Camberwell carrot and an extra large whisky.

It's also available in a lighter, toned down version, the slightly more approachable Un Petit de Rien.  That might be a good starting point if the thought of a dirty, old afghan coat in a stale, wood-panelled room doesn't sound too appealing to you.  If you enjoy that then step up to the original.

          [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'Nostalgia' by Santa Maria Novella

This is amazing stuff. Like a rough kiss from a sweaty, unshaven mechanic whilst being pushed up against a pile of old tyres... *sigh*

The petrol spill, 'pit-stop' opening dissipates rather speedily and you're left with a dry, subtle, synthetic leather and wood drydown that's eminently wearable.

The name Nostalgia refers to classic cars and the fragrance commemorates some famous race or other. I'm afraid I was a little distracted by the scent itself and scrabbling for my credit card as the lovely lady at the Santa Maria Novella Pharmacy in Florence told me the story.

The wooden bottle cap is totally hideous but this is a beautiful, clever fragrance. Challenging, unabashed postmodernism from an old, refined, established fragrance house.  Excellent.

           [By ANDREW]

REVIEW: 'Mat; Male' by Masakï Matsushïma

After a couple of hours, the base of green, sappy wood - bamboo, I suppose - with some dusty, fruity florals hanging on in there, is really, really good.

But the shrill opening, like an animated, brightly coloured confectionery counter, commandeered by some frightening ninja lychees and a samurai watermelon, attacking your nose with a shower of sharp little citrus swords and badly-aimed berry nunchucks, is enjoyably strange but not enormously pleasant.

          [By ANDREW]

The Scents of the Bathroom

My only experience of fragrance for men as a child came in the shape of talc. Sandalwood talc. Even now, I remember the absolute joy of opening a new one, normally from St Michael (I had no idea that there was a link to M&S) and the delicious anticipation of squeezing the slightly-giving metal sides until a mini dust cloud came out.  It's weird to remember the simplicity of a seventies lower-middle class bathroom. They were empty.  Anything gorgeous was reserved for the Dressing Table, an area out-of-bounds for the son of the family.  Again, is that why I love those little bottles of perfume, because they were away from my clumsy hands?

So, what was in the bathroom? Soap, of course. Solid, or the remains of solid soap. I don't remember us having Carbolic Soap, but maybe it was there for garden-induced stains.  I do recall the life-affirming joy of Zest soap, whose lemony-lemonness can never be replicated for me. I remember a Christmas stocking with a bar of Zest in it, probably from 1977, and I was filled with the most heady joy that I owned a soap. A simple pleasure perhaps, but also key to me resenting the underfed citrus hit of CK One nearly two decades later.

Shaving cream. Oh God, if anything else represents the uncomplicated male it is that. Clean, crisp, medicinal and wholly masculine, it is something that I want to smell right now, as a 42 year old urbane man. There was something about it that told you everything would be OK if your Dad was there, shaving bare-chested in the bathroom.

Toothpaste. I love to cook now, but have a terrible habit of adding too many ingredients. I have a feeling this was based on the rapid-fire introduction of colours and flavours into mid-70s toothpastes. How astonishing it seemed at the time, to see three or four colours coming out like a liquid stick of rock onto your toothbrush.  Again, a simple pleasure - but how many pleasures are complicated?

The third, and final item were the bath soaks such as Radox or Matey would appear on Christmas Day and stay, empty and defiant, until they were cleared away in The Spring Clean. But Talc was the mainstay, the only acceptable way of a man fragrancing himself in the seventies, and therefore the only way that I had.

I loved it, but loathed the way it settled into the quickly-perishing rubber foot wells of our ancient bathroom scales. I spent many evenings looking at them with real, burning resentment. My sweet, soft talc, which added so much to my life, became my enemy. It sullied an experience. I knew there was a better way - something clear and pristine that evaporated before it spoiled - but it was only a concept. The reality came years later with my first bottle of fragrance, which is something to discuss in a future entry...

         [by PETER]

REVIEW: 'Midnight in Paris' by Van Cleef & Arpels

The relatively quiet launch of Van Cleef & Arpels' six-strong Extraordinaire selection in 2009, alongside 2008's Feerie and now this masculine offering in the so-called Haute Parfumerie line, is clearly designed as a revitalisation of the jewellery and watch creator's position in perfumery, in a tasteful 'stealth wealth' fashion but firmly in line with just about every other high end brand's approach to fragrance recently.  From Hermes' Hermessences to Chanel's Exclusifs and Dior's Couturier line, it appears that expense and exclusivity are now essential if a brand wants to position its scents as far as possible from the tat churned out in the name of Paris Hilton or the like.

Midnight in Paris isn't particularly expensive or hard to come by but it certainly feels quite special - compared to most mainstream men's releases, that is.  The flacon is beautifully-designed, especially 'cute' in the handy 40ml size, and the juice speaks of excellent quality.

But...  I'd read reviews online comparing Midnight in Paris to Bvlgari Black, one of my all time favourites, and I'm afraid there's little more I can add to that.  From the very first spray, this is simply a slightly more approachable version, minus the thrill of the 'rubber' notes that put some people off Bvlgari's 1998 masterpiece.

I've also read comparisons to Dior Homme but I don't get that at all.  Apart from a sweetness and smelling nicely expensive, Midnight in Paris doesn't have that dusty, cocoa powder note.  And anyway, Dior Homme is all about the iris and there's none here.

Midnight in Paris also bears a resemblance to Kenzo Peace Vintage Edition, the limited edition scent that was released to celebrate Kenzo's 20 years in perfumery.  You can still find it online and I'd urge you to seek it out.  But guess what -  Kenzo Peace Vintage Edition was created by the perfumer Annick Menardo, as was...  Bvlgari Black.  In truth, it's just another 'lite' version of my favourite so there's no surprise that I like it.

All of this means that Midnight in Paris feels lacking in something.  It has that black tea and vanilla accord which works perfectly well on its own, and which obviously works for me, but it could support something else - another note to set it apart and make it feel more special and a bit less 'safe'. 

          [by ANDREW]

"Mum had a smell. Wish I could capture it."

I received one of the most simple and moving texts of my life this week. I sent my first blog entry to my oldest friend Graham, and got this in reply:  "Mum had a smell.  Wish I could capture it."

I think those words have an incredible power. Graham has never been prone to excess, unless you are talking wine and wigs (more of that later).  In many ways the yin to my yang, our friendship has endured a hell of a lot.  Normally, he has endured me.  I love having a friend who has been with you forever, a fairly rare occurence these days. What's truly astonishing is that our friendship, bound by memories and ties, continues to evolve. Involving wigs.  As I have said, more of that later...

In my last blog, I failed to mention that my parents are forty years older than me, which was fairly rare in the early seventies, the time of my early fragrance memories. Graham, who lived round the corner from me, was in exactly the same position, with Dad Jim, and Mum Stella. We shared a middle name - Howard - and the fact our sisters were both four years older. Stella had three main claims-to-the-exotic. She was from Liverpool, not Birkenhead. That lent her a slightly dangerous edge - had she met The Beatles?  She had a Jewish friend called Gilda, and therefore had Matzo Meal in her kitchen. I was never more jealous, and hated my parents for their bland ingredients. I wonder, is that another reason for my love of the strange, the outsider, the unusual?  Thirdly, Stella was evacuated with Frankie Vaughan. If you don't know who that is, get yourself to Wikipedia.

The fourth, hastily-added reason for Stella's exoticism is that she worked. Mums didn't work then. At least not in my tiny world. However, Stella (As I write this, I can't stop thinking what an amazing name that is...) worked in Liverpool's greatest store. A labyrthine monster of a store called George Henry Lee, but known to the population as George Henry's. It was an intimidatingly huge place to a young child, full of things that could be broken and PAID FOR if your inquisitive arms even happened to brush within five feet of them. This also gave Stella an advantage that even my Duty Free Dad could not give, the wonder of the sample. I had no idea what a sample was, but Stella had them.

This leads me to the problem I have with Stella. I want to remember that loving woman and what she smelled of. I cannot. She probably smelled of Blue Grass, and Youth Dew, and Charlie, and Jicky, and Shalimar, and Evening in Paris, and any fragrance she could charm from the Perfumery Girls. How wonderful that her love of fragrance was based on what she could find. Times were not easy then, and the chance to own three mls of something great would have been an amazing coup in the grey, dull days of the early seventies. Her daughter Rachel is a fan of the heavier fragrances, and has a great collection of dark, musky scents that rivals my own. Surely, as a fourteen year old, she sneaked into Stella's bedroom and took a quick spritz of Opium in 1979.

There are no answers, sadly. I don't think she had a signature scent - why would she with a library of fragrances at her disposal?  Graham, I cannot tell you what she smelled like. But I have a sneaking suspicion that her fragrance would be full-bodied, larger than life, and utterly lovely.  Just like your Mum.

          [by PETER]