Parisian perfumer Stéphanie de Bruijn has created a new bespoke fragrance business whose core mission is to provide the same kind of service one can get from Guerlain or Cartier but at more democratically priced rates.
After watching the Obama campaign and better realizing the effectiveness of the internet, she decided to be both of Paris and of the World Wide Web (ok, this is just said in jest), opening a window onto the exclusive world of French custom-made fragrances on the internet.
You can now say, my perfumer in Paris created this little nothing for me, to my specifications...
Rich Hippie whose tag line is "Organic, Wildcrafted Perfumes" have launched a new packaging option for their scents consisting in smaller 1/8 oz roll-ons to be slipped in your purse or pocket...
MDCI Paris (Marchal Design & Créations Indépendantes), an exclusive niche perfume house founded by Claude Marchal which debuted in 2006 with a catalogue of five perfumes created by well-known noses Pierre Bourdon, Stéphanie Bakouche and Francis Kurkdjian will add three new compositions from early 2009.
The house is known in particular for its attention to the aesthetics of the perfume flacon and its desire to offer truly luxurious designs. Their bottles are made of crystal and the stoppers represent antique sculptures made out either of biscuit de Limoges or crystal...
French couturier Christian Lacroix is pursuing his partnership with mass-market giant Avon with the launch of a third fragrance in March 2009 called Absynthe following Rouge and Noir.
Inspired by the mythical drink of poets and bohemian artists living in 19th century Paris, it comes in the midst of a renewal of interest for the jade-colored drink as it is now legally available again. In particular, the US is now allowing its commercial distillation since December 2007...
Lancôme has introduced a new fresh twist on Magnifique, originally released as an Eau de Parfum in September of 2008. The flanker arrives to stave off the summer heat of 2009, or to be worn more casually during the day or at work. As is usual, a slight reformulation will ensue and here it seems that the composition was made to feel somewhat simpler and more linear while offering more of a thirst-quenching quality...
As stated earlier this vanilla-composition endeavor can be summed up as being paradoxical from the get-go. It is interesting to consider put both in the context of Ellena's personal diaphanous (yet sensual) aesthetics and his own self-confessed reluctance and difficulty in working the vanilla note. It is also meaningful to view it put in perspective with other recent vanilla perfume compositions. In a sense, just like the rose with its multivariegated nuances is the queen of flowers, the vanilla bean can be seen and is to some extent seen as the queen of spices with its hundreds of natural components in addition to vanillin. It is however more common to encounter vanilla as a supporting element than as the focus of a perfumery study stripped off of other distracting associations...
Chanel No. 5, New China Series, 2007 by Chinese artist Ma Jun -- The Chanel No. 5 bottle is so iconic it appears still recognizable in the glazed Chinese ceramic medium.
(A bottle of No. 5 is said to be sold every 55 seconds around the globe.)
According to a survey conducted by the Superdrug store chain in Great Britain, the top cult fragrance of all time is considered to be Chanel No. 5 - the oldest composition also in this survey - based on perceptions of the women respondents in the UK who were polled in November 2008. The survey included 2000 participants. The next two are CK One (2) and Eternity (3), both by Calvin Klein.
Next, we have Coco by Chanel (4), then Dior Poison (5), Ghost by Ghost (6) a very popular scent in the UK which is less often mentioned in the US and France...
Here is a video from the Research Institute on Fragrance Materials (RIFM) on popular perceptions of fragrances and fragrance safety. Everyman answers questions on the curbs of New York City in June 2008. A few humorous moments such as: who knew perfumers used "yak pee" in their perfumes? Now, that's an idea...Or the guy who wouldn't be happy about lack of fragrance in products... because his wife wouldn't be happy about it "and that's not a pretty thing" verifying on the spot the cliched notion that men's thinking about perfume is primarily mediated by their relationships to the fair sex.
Travel editor and blog writer Catharine Hamm answers a reader's query about how best to counteract olfactory nuisance in closed quarters and planes in particular (you really can't step out to take a breather, can you). A major direction of thought in the article is to oppose the force to such obnoxious effluvia and the force in this case is the right mental attitude: think positive, think zen, think compassionate thoughts, it can help.
"And no doubt about it: The mind does play an important role -- and in ways beyond our primitive reaction to odors.
"When we are stressed, we can overreact to smell, fueling our
irritability and getting into a negative loop -- 'How dare this person
do this to me!' " said Debbie Mandel, author of "Addicted to Stress."...
Columnist Ian Belcher imparts the gist of his experience learning to blend essential oils in Languedoc in a 17th century convent. The essences are even distilled on location, in an area full of plant varietals that will be further expanded thanks to a 100 € investment sum and will include reconstituted medieval therapeutic gardens.
"Theory comes first, practice later. It's technical stuff so pay attention at
the back. Well-balanced perfume smacks your nostrils three times: a "light,
fleeting" top note, "subtle, lingering" middle note and "heavy, lasting"
bass note. And unlike modern synthetic concoctions, wild-flower oils talk to
three parts of your brain: the intellectual left, creative right and
instinctive central limbic...
When I initially posted about the 25th Tova Anniversary, I soon had to realize that Tova Signature perfume was somewhat of a pop culture phenomenon thanks to the popularity the scent had gained over the years of being sold on QVC. If the thread at The Scented Salamander is but the emerging tip of an iceberg, you can well imagine how many - reportedly millions of Tova wearers - are thinking similar thoughts. At the same time that affection and love was lavished upon the perfume, or rather upon its former glory, much disgruntlement was voiced too regarding its present formulation. And from time to time, a Tova Signature wearer drops by perfume café Scented Salamander to gripe, mostly (and I am guessing) in the hope that the message will come across to the Tova people...
The house of Guerlain now owned by LVMH corporation is turning its eyes or rather nostrils to the world of fashion with the launch of a new composition evoking an iconic element of the 20th and now 21st century feminine wardrobe, the little black dress. Guerlain will introduce this new perfume called by the evocative name La Petite Robe Noire (The Little Black Dress) in February of 2009.
But precisely, Guerlain was never a fashion house in the midst of a 20th century where the pull of fashion was felt in a major...fashion in the realm of fine fragrances. Chanel No. 5 is the epitome of this by-now-classic association. Therefore it is no coincidence that the little black dress sounds a bit like an idea highjacked from the house of Chanel, that perhaps the latter ought to have come up with themselves, except perhaps that they didn't feel compelled to layer it that thick or obviously. The fact is that Chanel themselves never issued a perfume called after this most Chanel of brainchilds and one can wonder what they will think of this semiotic kidnapping. If on the one hand the little black dress has become public property, rehashed in thousands of guises, on the other hand it still refers to the Chanel universe and they also make perfumes...
Didier Ludot is known both as a vintage fashion expert and a designer. He is also the author of a book on the iconic LBD, entitled after it and available both in French and English. I leafed through it entirely at Urban Outfitters once as it is a slim tome. So infatuated is he with the concept that he created a chain of stores called La Petite Robe Noire which you can find in Europe, the USA and Asia.
In Paris, he has a shop located Galerie de Valois at the Palais Royal in Paris right across the garden from the Salons Shiseido where the exclusive Serge Lutens fragrances are housed in the close vicinity of Les Parfums de Rosine, and a little farther afield, Les Parfums de Nicolaï. A common point that Ludot has with these brands is fragrance as one perfume stands lone in the window display amongst the shoes, belts, accessories and clothing...
Further news and pictures have now become available regarding the upcoming Un Matin d'Orage by Annick Goutal (A Morning After The Thunderstorm) to be launched in February 2009. As we wrote earlier on, the new composition by Isabelle Doyen and Camille Goutal centers on the evocation of the scents of a luxuriant Japanese garden after a shower.
We now learn that Un Matin d'Orage recreates the perception of a gardenia chiaroscuro whose play with light and shadow takes place in a vaporous atmosphere,
"Everything is peaceful.In these intangible veils, the bamboos further refine the lines of their shoots, the cherry trees stretch out their branches.
Near the patches of oakmoss, a penetrating scent lingers on in the air. The gardenia reigns majestically in the play of light with shadows. Delicate drops form on the buds; the white flowers sheltered by the emerald-green foliage catch the light on their rounded milky petals. A breeze carries away with it the scent of gardenia enshrouding the garden with its delicate sensuality (our translation)."...
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