Photographer Alice Austen wearing a hat decorated with white lilacs, June 1888,by Captain
Oswald Müller, courtesy of the Staten Island Historical Society
En Passant by Olivia Giacobetti at Editions de Parfums by Frédéric Malle (2000) - Perfume Review & Musings
Official notes: white lilac, orange leaves, cucumber absolute, wheat absolute
What they say: the scent of a lilac whipped by the wind and carried by the spring air near a garden; an impressionistic fragrance; a play on one note (white lilac); captured at an instant in time; a glorification of the scent of nature coupled with watery notes; radiant and serene (Source: Editions de Parfums French website).
I was probably unconsciously attracted to the words "En Passant" (While Passing By) on New Year's Day to want to review this scent. We have crossed into a new year, 2009, a symbolic benchmark which reminds one of the transiency of things and makes one think of what might lie ahead at the other end of the passage, as we come out of one little tunnel of time and enter another.
En Passant is like a soliflore but with a sense of dramaturgy Although
the predilection for transparency that Olivia Giacobetti is famous for (an oversimplification in fact when you look at all her work)
is apparent in this composition it seems to play second fiddle here. The nucleus of meaning of the
scent appears more to be a paroxistic remembrance of a moment of folie
amoureuse for an aroma, a scene, a moment in a day. The white lilacs anchor the other scents that may have converged towards them (are they all real, are they imagined, we don't know and it doesn't really matter). Without that defining central aroma, the bread smell, the watery cucumber scent lose meaning. If En
Passant insists on the transiency of the event, integrating a sense of the passing of time in the composition like an olfactory clock that waxes and wanes, it by no means signifies
that the event was subtle, brief, or only partly experienced or imagined. It is the full
experience of an olfactory apotheosis as passed through the filter of the
perfumer's imagination...
White Lilacs from a Practical Handbook of Trees Shrubs Vines and Herbaceous Perennials by John Kirkegaard
After the debut signature fragrance of famous Lebanese singer Elissa called Elle d'Elissa, which was launched in 2007, Georges Stahl Parfumswill introduce a new perfume-flanker called L'Eau d'Elissa in January of 2009.
Body-care news from L'Occitane en Provence, which will introduce new scents in January 2009 in its Shea Butter range: rose, vanilla, frangipani,
ylang-ylang and acacia. Each item is priced at $21 for 3.4 oz. The original Shea Butter cream gets repackaged, $38 for 7 oz.
In February an eau de toilette ($46), will join the Honey Lemon collection featuring "sweeter base notes of apricot and vanilla" together with a massage oil ($17) in the same scent as the edt.
No name is given thus far, but it sounds like a flanker rather than a frankly-announced reformulation although the phrasing is a bit ambiguous. Also expect to see a new lip gloss for $9 and a
candle for $23, in the same range.
L'Occitane is having a big sale right now: up to 50% off on 150 products.
...I saw this commercial ad for the cologne Lacoste pour Homme featuring model Ian Lawless. There is such a discrepancy between the conservative and even arguably dull packaging for the scent and the ad which is meant to reach out to the closeted sensualist the cologne is obviously targeting (???) It took me by surprise, I have to say. The tag line is "Style on Skin" (and nothing else),
British designer Alice Temperley confesses to having a weak spot for niche perfume house L'Artisan Parfumeur. She loves in particular to go to their store on rue du Bourg Tibourg (where the Mariage Frères tea room is also located) in the 4th arrondissement of Paris. Her all-time favorite perfume is La Chasse Aux Papillons to which she returns always despite her infidelities, as she likes to change scents according to the season.
Read more in the Daily Mail for more about her fave shopping and staying addresses in Paris...
So you have partied, re-partied, re-re-partied during the Holidays, crossed over to the new year 2009 and tomorrow is Epiphany day, yet another opportunity to feast on a traditional dessert, the galette des rois, a buttery mille-feuilles delight filled with fragrant and tasty almond paste.
What you need now and for the rest of the year is Kusmi Tea Detox, a new blend introduced in the summer of 2007 to celebrate the 140th anniversary of tea houseKusmi Tea Est. 1867 in St Petersburg, short for the name of the founding Kousmichoff family.
As its name Detox makes explicit this tea blend helps drain and purify your organism while - as it turns out - being pleasurable to the nose and tastebuds all at the same time. What I personally appreciate with the Detox tea - a green blend - besides its depurative properties is how smooth a green tea concoction it is. This makes it a great candidate for day-long sipping without feeling dehydrated by a high level of theine/caffeine. In second and equal position as far as I am concerned comes its fragrance...
German fashion brand Joop! continues to develop a dynamic perfume portfolio and will introduce a duo of scents called Thrill for Her and Thrill for Him. The fragrances are licensed to Coty Prestige and were developed with giant perfume company Givaudan...
Belatedly but still interestingly we learn that French niche brand Memo launched two organic companion scents, certified Ecocert, to their latest release Jannat. It looks like what the Mediterranean diet is to vegetarian diet, that is less purist in terms of forsaking animal proteins but still reducing them and trying to reach a good balance...
A new term has been coined to designate those remnants of smoking that are not associated with visible smoke but with the smells it leaves, "third-hand smoking". Those odors, like the cold tobacco odor, ought to signal danger because they remain toxic...
Italian fashion designer Valentino has launched a new perfume which is currently exclusive to Neiman Marcus. Bottled in a strikingly designed diamond-cut flacon, the fragrance is described as a "modern aldehydic floral" with fresh facets...
Serge Lutens has unveiled his latest opus called Nuit de Cellophane (Cellophane Night). The fragrance is scheduled to launch in March of 2009.
While the nocturnal thematic will not be unfamiliar to Serge Lutens followers, in particular by those who follow his perfume creations, the insertion of a modernistic material such as cellophane is more of a departure from the general timeless atmosphere pertaining to the Lutensian fragrance universe. I would argue however, that it draws a bridge with his research on materials and textures found in his photographic work.
There is also the possibility that cellophane here is used with a double entendre, at once the sign of a romantic gift bought at the florist and an allusion to a thicker nocturnal atmosphere as cellophane is a material privileged by fetishists.
Three perfume notes and a more general aesthetic impression are mentioned to offer an initial sketch of the fragrance:
"Un osmanthus de Chine
Un jasmin particulier qui aurait volé l'écorce de mandarine ;
le tout sous cellophane"
&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&
"An osmanthus from China
A special jasmine which would have stolen a mandarin peel
This is a picture of a female torso in ceramic called Odore di Femmina created by Johan Creten while he was artist in residence at the Manufacture Nationale de Sèvres. It was meant to be an illustration of the perfume by the same name created by perfumer Françoise Caron for the 2007 exhibition Essences Insensées...
Chergui, a best-seller of the Serge Lutens non-export range (the bell-jar collection) is now available in the export range. It is priced at 79 € for 50 ml.
We have a ton of beauty stories waiting in the sidelines, but while we are still working on organizing things, here is our first post of 2009. Happy New Year 2009 to our beauty readers by the way! Right now you will see me more often on our perfume site The Scented Salamander but we are getting there. I love to write about beauty as I find it so relaxing and in a way more down to earth and simple than writing about perfume! I think also that beauty is very much about self-care and taking the time to breathe, slowing down the pace of things and regenerating yourself both physically and spiritually while sharing your passion (and tips) with others! Yep, the 9-year-old kid making beauty creams on the kitchen stove out
of an old Harry-Potterish recipe book which contained poison recipes
as well, that was me!
I tend to be more about skin care, hair care, and bath than makeup but I love, love color in general. In fact I am fascinated by manifestations of extreme beauty and dramatic effects. My natural inclination being to be rather, well, natural, I have come to admire more and more steely, willful beauties who do not have it all but who by dint of will achieve great style like for example...Elizabeth the First. They have what I like to call "Witty Beauty" and "Willful Beauty", in fact perhaps I should rename the blog after those concepts as they are central to my interest in beauty, those efforts put out by generations of women and men who affirmed their personalities through these endeavors.
Natural and organic products are also significant on my list of interests as I am intrigued, sometimes awed by plants and as a scent-oriented person I always appreciate the extra bonus of their aromatherapeutic properties.
But what about Chanel?
So this morning I had to post about the new 2009 Bohemian Fantasy Makeup Collection by Chanel when I saw the news landed in my mailbox and especially when I caught a glimpse of the new nail polish called Vendetta...
Jennifer Lopez who single-handedly revived the celebrity fragrance market at the beginning of the 21st century, as it had been left somewhat fallow before her is continuing to expand her franchise. A new scent called Sunkissed Glow will be launched in February 2009 in Europe. It belongs to the unofficial Glow collection which started in 2003 with her debut perfume Glow by J. Lo. This was followed by Miami Glow, Love at First Glow, Glow After Dark. It comes more recently after Deseo and Deseo for Men.
I personally own three of those in full sizes and can only say positive things about them, in particular I think that the drydown of Glow is simply superior, one of the very best on the market in terms of evolution and unobtrusive, pleasurable tenacity. Love at First Glow I had to buy after realizing how exquisite it smelled on a paper strip left abandoned (well not quite) on my night stand, several days after it had been sprayed on...
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