Queen Alexandra Loved to Wear......{Celebrity Perfumes} {What Celebrities Love to Wear} {Scented Quote of the Day}
Queen Alexandra (1844-1925) was Queen Consort to Edward VII of the United Kingdom and was reputed for her beauty as well as her sense of style (see center of the photo). She reportedly had an influence on the fashion of wearing scents which had at one time fallen into disrepute. Here follows an excerpt from an article that gives us an insight into the taste of the day, that is that of 1904, and mentions a perfume worn by Alexandra of Denmark, to which I will add another name that I saw mentioned elsewhere. It is also interesting to note that the current higher level of intolerance for perfume-wearing in public spaces that exists in some areas finds an echo in that era......
"The smart woman of to-day has her own special perfume. It is made from a recipe invented to suit her taste. With perhaps the odor of her favorite flower as a foundation, and the chemist is bound to keep the secret inviolate and dispense the preparation to no other customer.
The fashion of individual perfumery has had a vogue in Paris for several seasons among the luxurious women who had astounded their generation by adopting hand-painted lingerie and jewel-embroidered hose, but no less a personage than the conservative Queen Alexandra now has her own special scent, made for her by a Parisian perfumer. It is called coeur de jeannette, and costs about six guineas a pint-$30 in our money. Many an American woman pays double this sum for her perfumery-that most expensive of all toilet belongings.
The new age of beauty-doctoring brought back the use of perfumery. For years the slightest scent or suspiscion of perfumery upon one's clothing was considered wretched taste, and the practice was relegated to that limbo in which colored note-paper and imitation jewelry were consigned for so long. But the beauty doctors perfumed their lotions and massage cream delicately, and by degress the use of flower extracts came into vogue again. [....]
Later perfumery came to be frowned down, and the sanctimonious sniff came into vogue. Scented soaps wer banished, and a horror was cultivated against toilet odors. Extremists of both sexes grew faint if the presence of any perfume was discovered in a social gathering, and the culprit was forced in front of an army of uplifted noses to withdraw. But the era naturally did not last. The use of a delicate perfume no longer is considered vulgar in these days of indiscriminate travel and crowding of public vehicles, of microbe-breeding cabs and unventilated shops. [....]"
Coeur de Jeannette is a perfume by Houbigant. Please note that some give its date of creation as being 1908, but that this article is from 1904. An earlier date which is put forth is 1900. Queen Alexandra is also known for having worn a perfume called "essence of white rose".
Photo is from 1905 from answers.com
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The memoires of Lillie Langtry mention Queen Alexandra also wearing a specially formulated VIOLET perfume by I think Atkinson or some other English perfumery.
Does anyone know anything about that?
Posted by: Christopher Easton | July 10, 2007