Dior Dressing Tables at Claridges {Fragrance News} {Beauty Notes}
Claridges have partnered with Christian Dior to offer a supplementary luxury room service with the creation of the Dior Dressing Tables.
"The Dior Dressing Table includes a carefully curated range of timeless
accessories, including an elegant silk Claridge's dressing gown and
slippers; a cashmere eye mask; and a selection of classic Dior
fragrances including Diorella, Dioramma [sic] and Dioressence, as well as
range of beauty kit essentials.
"
The idea behind the Dior Dressing Table is also to help create a 1930s atmosphere. You can order a cocktail from the period amongst the "swizzles, daisies, sours, juleps and pick-me-ups" from the hotel's Fumoir Bar. They are served in Lalique
glasses. Books and music come complete the picture with works by Evelyn Waugh and
Nancy Mitford and songs by Josephine Baker and Fred Astaire.
Sounds to me like a perfect recovery plan for someone stuck in a hotel room with a cold or prevented from shopping due to a storm or alternatively for people who cannot resist things being brought to them on a tray.
Challenges of the Perfume Industry in Grasse {Fragrant Readings}
For those who can read French (you can also try using Babelfish or Google Translate to get the gist of the online articles) there is an informative report on the state of the perfume industry in Grasse in L'Express.fr.
There is apparently a move to put Grasse more firmly on the national and international perfume-industry map and a push to encourage its members to become more politically involved and learn to lobby more aggressively.
New Serenascent is Undetectable but Relieves Stress & Anxiety {Fragrance News}
A team led by Dr. Nick Lavidis from Queensland University Australia has developed a scent that smells of cut grass at higher doses but is virtually undetectable by the nose at lower levels yet impacts the functioning of the brain to relieve stress and anxiety symptoms.
Serenascent "...is a mixture of hexanals, hexenols and pinenes in very specific ratios."
It was tested on animals to positive effects and will be first launched
as a room spray that can be applied to clothing and bedding...
Bond No. 9 will release a new fragrance in March of 2010 inspired by yet another corner of New York City. This time the subject of inspiration is the original idea of the reconverted High Line into a green public space. The perfume is said to be a "marine green floral" composition created by perfumer Laurent Le Guernec of IFF.
The scent takes inspiration from the duality of the High Line setting. There is the rural charm of the re-conceptualized rail road, whose gardening design by Dutch horticulturist Piet Oudols is said to be particularly rustic peopled with a majority of local breeds, which ensures longer blooming seasons...
Monocle x Comme des Garcons Scent Two: Laurel (2009) {New Perfume}
Magazine Monocle have released a second fragrance created in collaboration with Comme des Garçons following Hinoki in 2008. It is called Scent Two: Laurel. Interestingly, the creative team cites as a source of inspiration one that is often decried by niche perfumery aficionados often on the lookout for rarer sensations, that is soap...
New 2009 Opium Advert Featuring a Redesigned Flacon {Perfume Images & Ads}
Yves Saint Laurent have released their new advert featuring the redesigned flacon of Opium EDP, which I mentioned earlier. It is a true beauty in person.
The redesign is credited to Stephano Pilati and Fabien Baron. The model is Karen Elson.
Costume National Homme (2009) {New Perfume} {Men's Cologne}
Last October, Costume National released a new masculine perfume called Costume National Homme described as "a new approach to fragrance". Founder of the brand Ennio Capasa said "The harmony between natural and rare elements creates an original,
sensual and charming fragrance, for an essential and timeless man".
The Eau de Parfum was composed by perfumer Dominique Ropion and features notes of cardamom, bergamot, cinnamon, thyme, clove, patchouli, sandalwood, labdanum. Predominant notes are said to be bergamot, cinnamon and patchouli.
Glade Limited-Edition Holidays Candles: Pomegranate & Cranberries, Fresh Pine & Cedar {Home Fragrance Reviews}
The Glade folks sent me a couple of their new candles, namely Pomegranate & Cranberries, Fresh Pine & Cedar and Jasmine & Wild Orchid from The Fragrance Collection. I haven't tried the latter yet but thought better to plan ahead for the Holidays. So, I wanted to let you know that I think that especially Pomegranate & Cranberries is a great choice for an affordable, festive holiday-feeling candle and not just because it is colored red. Fresh Pine & Cedar, which I thought at first would be wafting more of the note of Christmas turned out to be less atmospheric than Pomegranate & Cranberries.
The first one is very good, even great - I would offer it to friends and family or recommend it - the other one, good - I would smell it and find it pleasant but would not buy it myself or recommend it over other candles necessarily and I will explain why...
Crabtree & Evelyn New Platinum Membership: 20% Off Each Month for 7 Days, & More {Shopping Tips}
Crabtree & Evelyn are proposing a new, economical way to shop with them. If you purchase their new Platimum Membershipcard, currently at $5, you get the following,
"Platinum Membership Benefits for One Year online and instore:
20% off storewide* at time of sign-up
20% off storewide* from the 1st - 7th of every month
Birthday bonus email offer: 25% off a single item* in birth month if provided at sign-up."
Their style to me is very Laura Ashley, English and fresh, with a bath-and-body slant which means they could become a fixture in your bathroom.
Using the Brain (Not The Nose) To Smell by Stephen Douthwaite {Fragrant Reading}
There is an article well-worth reading in the December issue of Perfumer & Flavorist. Written by Stephen Douthwaite of PerfumersWorld, it makes the point that even professionals in the industry do not necessarily possess the right techniques or work in the right conditions to smell perfumes and flavors. The piece then proceeds to present a number of technical and methodological approaches. Here is a particularly eloquent passage to pinpoint one aspect of the problem,
"...please take a moment to consider this question: "Where is the worse place to smell a perfume compound sample? Places that likely come to mind include kitchens, bathrooms, coffee shops and smoking rooms. Few people would cite the truly worst place, the place where most professional perfumers actually do their initial smelling evaluation of samples -- the odorotheque, the perfumery laboratory. There may be hundreds of perfumery materials lining the shelves in these spaces, all of them emanating tiny amounts of odorous molecules. Trying to smell analytically in such an atmosphere would be like trying to listen to Eric Satie's "Gymnopes" piano piece on a noisy playground. Yes, it's possible to do so, but not truly conductive to getting the most from the music."
Marc jacobs Splash Collection Apple, Pomegranate, Biscotti (2010) {New Fragrances}
As I was already writing in my review of Wanted by Helena Rubinstein, macaroons are the new Swarovski crystals. I did not phrase it this way exactly but for anyone who is living in Paris and paying attention it is hard to escape the fact that macaroons or macarons in
French are the new iconic signs of luxury. Even art galleries use the
icon to advertise their artists. Isabella Blow is credited for having had the idea of introducing the widespread use of Swarovski crystals in the field of fashion as a means to add an affordable touch of luxury. Today, macaroons are studding the fashion and beauty scenes as well.
Marc Jacobs will launch a new trio of oversized Splash perfumes next summer " inspired by an array of macaroons in a Paris patisserie," They are called Apple, Pomegranate and Biscotti...
North-American Originals: Perfumers on Fall & Winter -- Part 3 {Scented Thoughts} {Perfume List} {Shopping Tip}
End of a fall day in Paris
If you missed the previous installments, here they are: Part 1, Part 2
Today, we continue to follow the thoughts and experiments of Anya McCoy of Anya's Garden, peruse the fall perfume catalog of Fabienne Christenson of Perfume Possets who announces an upcoming perfume Elegance and intrigues us with her Cambienne which changes with the seasons. We meet with Ayala Sender of Ayala Moriel Parfums, an independent perfumer from both Israel and Canada who also makes tea, chocolate and offers among other things a very Canadian-smelling perfume inspired by the maple syrup festivals.
"...I needed to determine what do the cool temperatures do to
the intake of air in the nasal passages in the absence of humidity? How can a
perfume be constructed that would work well in that atmosphere when I live in
the tropics and cannot walk outside and test? Well, a huge bowl of ice cubes
held under my face while sniffing the progression of the drydowns on MoonDance
and StarFlower helped!
The cool, floral softness of MoonDance can be paired with slightly chilled
nights and mornings when you wake up and find frost on the ground. A light,
very, very light touch of mint, cooling and refreshing, starts the MoonDance,
almost imperceptible, but a great combo with the woody violet flower and dusky,
dry rose of true Rose de Mai from Grasse. A slight splash of apple-scented
Roman Chamomile appeals to the engrammes of those raised in northern climates
where the apple is a true harbinger of Fall. Since I do not use synthetic
scents, and there is no natural aromatic yet available with an apple scent, I
used the Chamomile to that advantage. It's more like a slightly dried,
concentrated apple scent with a bright edge, and it plays off the tuberose
heart/base note as the perfume slides into a warm, cozy, skin-hugging sensual
drydown.
StarFlower is a chameleon-like sexy gourmand fragrance, almost deceptive in the
almond, cherry and lemon opening, then raising the temperature quickly with
tuberose that melts into a chocolate, maple and patchouli drydown that seems to
pair beautifully with leather coats, turtlenecked sweaters and boots. It's dry
and serene, not sweet at all after the initial topnotes, and utterly enveloping
in its warmth and sensuality. That to me is Winter up north, being wrapped in
something new and comforting, the promise of wintertime romance and snuggling
by a fire."....
First, it's true that there are many scented strips in US magazines. And apparently, this has led to a backlash from customers. As the magazine market is struggling to adapt to the new, more pluralist media scene, they thought it was perhaps better not to irk further those who are intolerant of perfume strips. It was also an opportunity for them to demonstrate a higher level of service.
So, this morning when I went to cancel a few subscriptions that had been renewing themselves all by themselves, I happened on this service graciously offered by Hearst Communications: Request Unscented Issues.
Helena Rubinstein Wanted (2009): Are You Wearing a Cherubato, a Lactone, a Milky, an Angel Milk, also called in French a Lait d'Ange ? {Perfume Review & Musings} {Celebrity Fragrance}
Helena Rubinstein Wanted was first launched in August 09 in Paris at the Printemps and on November 5 in the US. I thought, walking into the department store back in the summer, that it was worthy of a bottle purchase for a blog review, then got a richly illustrated press release, then left on a holiday, then smelled a string of milky fruity-florals in between now and then.
I feel at this point as if it requires a certain amount of discipline, even stoicism, not to falter at the mere thought of having to review one more milky-floral (I am channeling the Stoics here). It is unfair to Wanted, because my initial impressions of it were fresher (it's a good thing I jotted down my impressions then).
Fortunately, I have been used in my past to doing tedious, repetitive and necessary systematic gathering of anthropological data and this is no different in a sense. So I try to remember how exciting it felt to ask the same questions for the umptieth time because I was getting closer to the bigger picture. But that was when I was interested in detecting patterns and regularities. With perfume, it still remains interesting and even necessary for me to look at it from a social perspective -- I have been doing that from the start of my blogging days -- but since there is nevertheless this floating idea that creativity is expected and even encouraged, it feels at times downright grueling.
Are You Wearing a Cherubato, a Lactone, a Milky, an Angel Milk, also called in French a Lait d'Ange ?
Having said that, one has to temporarily conclude that the milky fruity-floral has become a genre in and of itself, like chypre is. We can be playful and propose names for it: a cherubato (cherub + rubato), a milky, an angel milk. I cannot imagine that with the number of, nay, the onslaught of releases in this category, it could be considered just as an accident of taste.
One of the early, isolated then milky perfumes was Yin by Jacques Fath (1997) created by perfumer Anne Flipo....
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Claridges have partnered with Christian Dior to offer a supplementary luxury room service with the creation of the Dior Dressing Tables. 
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A team led by Dr. Nick Lavidis from Queensland University Australia has developed a scent that smells of cut grass at higher doses but is virtually undetectable by the nose at lower levels yet impacts the functioning of the brain to relieve stress and anxiety symptoms. 
Bond No. 9 will release a new fragrance in March of 2010 inspired by yet another corner of New York City. This time the subject of inspiration is the original idea of the reconverted High Line into a green public space. The perfume is said to be a "marine green floral" composition created by perfumer Laurent Le Guernec of IFF. 
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There is an article well-worth reading in the December issue of Perfumer & Flavorist. Written by Stephen Douthwaite of PerfumersWorld, it makes the point that even professionals in the industry do not necessarily possess the right techniques or work in the right conditions to smell perfumes and flavors. The piece then proceeds to present a number of technical and methodological approaches. Here is a particularly eloquent passage to pinpoint one aspect of the problem,![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=1cbad3d4-5526-47da-998f-95917d83e5ef)
As I was already writing in my review of![Reblog this post [with Zemanta]](http://img.zemanta.com/reblog_e.png?x-id=ef3bcb48-002b-491c-94a7-02f31c720062)
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