Chanel No. 5

Now, if I were smart, I probably wouldn't write about Chanel No. 5. So many better noses than mine have offered their opinions over the years. But this is not a review -- more of a personal memoir.

Chanel No. 5 happens to be the first "grown-up perfume" my father ever bought for me. I was probably 16 or 17, and easily impressed. And it smelled so good! I did not know the history of this fragrance, and probably if I did know that it was the first ever synthetic perfume to hit the big time back in the 1920's, it wouldn't have meant much at the time. Who was Coco Chanel?

I still like Chanel No. 5 because it smells grown-up. But now I know why it smells the way it does -- an aldehydic floriental. The mix of neroli and ylang ylang with the aldehydic top note really carry through the blend with middle notes of jasmine and rose and a lovely sandalwood-vetiver-vanilla bottom. And it's very tenacious. A little perfume goes a long way. Probably due to the synthetic civet used as a fixative in the blend.

In any case, I think I have always had at least a small bottle of Chanel No. 5 in my collection. It's one of my favorites.

Tubéreuse by L’Artisan Parfumeur

The term soliflore refers to a single flower or floral note perfume. Tubéreuse by L’Artisan Parfumeur, created by their founder Jean LaPorte in 1978, is a great example of a soliflore.

Tubéreuse is anything but subtle. The minute you spray it out of the bottle, the beautifully full and lush scent of blooming tuberose is upon you. And stays upon you -- so you'd better really like it.

I happen to love the scent of tuberose. But I am not accustomed to a lot of tuberose all at once. L’Artisan’s version is ever-present and mostly true, but perhaps a bit too much. Or maybe it’s just that I use too much, because it is intoxicating and you find yourself wanting it more and more. Most notably, the squarely buttery middle lingers longest and keeps you sniffing your wrist.

But, Tubéreuse is a single note, and not a note in a blend. As long as you understand that going in, you will not be disappointed. It is what it is. Or is it?

The first time I ever sniffed tuberose absolute, it was sampled to me by a friend who brokers precious oils through India. My head spun. It was stunningly floral and buttery, but also a bit spicy and green. There was so much going on through that lusciously buttery floral from that one single plant. The absolute is, of course, derived from the natural plant source. L’Artisan Parfumeur’s Tubéreuse is not. It is rather one note-ish, though a lovely one note. But there is no dimension to it.

The bottom of the box lists these ingredients: Alcohol Denat., Aqua (water), Parfum (Fragrance), amyl cinnamal, benzyl salicylate, hexyl cinnamal, linalool, benzyl benzoate, hydroxycitronellal, farnesol, cinnamyl alcohol, geraniol, limonene, eugenol, benzyl alcohol, benzyl cinnamate, isoeugenol. There’s nothing “natural” in the bottle. Maybe I’m a little disappointed because with a name like L’Artisan Parfumeur, I thought there might be some natural ingredients involved.

The bottle itself does not disappoint. The pretty, etched, 7-sided glass bottle with a hot pink label is surprisingly heavy to pick up. The bottle feels good in your hands.

But what about a lovely tuberose absolute at 5% mixed with Perfumer’s alcohol and water? I think that would make the best tuberose soliflore. I will have to try that. In the meantime, I’ll keep the bottle of Tubéreuse nearby, and probably use it up.

Miel de Bois by Serge Lutens

Got a care package a few days ago from Aedes. Actually, I had to pay for it, but it was worth it. The Tubereuse from L’Artisan Parfumeur came along with several samples of different Serge Lutens fragrances –something for winter -- that I had requested. We’ll get to the Tubereuse a little later. I’m too compelled to discuss one of the Serge Lutens samples: Miel de Bois.

Before I started writing this, I googled Miel de Bois to see what other people might think about this perfume. It is different. By and large, the jury does not seem to be with this one. This doesn’t surprise me, but I am a bit disappointed. Different does not have to mean awful.

I really like Miel de Bois, but it's unusual, oh boy. I mean you either love it or you hate it, from the reviews I have read. It’s kind of like a study in black and white -- set in a Catholic Church. Right out of the bottle, Miel de Bois opens with a fragrant blast of sweet wild honey immediately tempered with the pontifical scent of guaiacwood. What? That’s right. Guaiacwood. For the uninitiated, guaiacwood is a smoky, deep, woody scent, highly reminiscent of the incense that Catholic priests wave through the air on high holidays. I am sure there are lots of other notes in between the honey and the guaiacwood, but I’ll be darned if I can smell them. I sense myrrh and frankincense and perhaps a tip of the hat toward galbanum.

The drydown on Miel de Bois is the best part. The smoky scent of the wood melds into the honey and takes on an ephemeral, powdery dimension. I find the scent to be fleeting in drydown, but when I inhale deeply at a pulse point, I can smell the guaiacwood again and it seems to linger.

Miel de Bois is a puzzler. It works well for both men and women. I am wondering how it might smell as a soap – if the scent will transfer nicely, or if it will morph into something else.

A girl can dream, can't she?

I have wanted to go on a really special trip for some time. It's my fantasy. On this journey, I do nothing, and I mean absolutely nothing, other than spend every day pursuing fragrance. What started as a means to scent soap has turned into a real obsession for me. I want to pick lavender in the fields in France, buy incense at the street market in Bombay, travel the world and smell all the wonderful things one can only dream about from one's arid, dusty Tucson backyard.

I recently discovered that an acquaintance and fellow vendor of aromatic products -- someone who buys really rare oils in really small lots directly from distillers in-country -- is hosting a trip to Oman with the possibility of a side trip to Yemen in 2008. Suddenly, I want to go. I am thinking of all the scents I will be able to inhale. I would never have considered a trip to the Middle East before. It's not that I don't travel, it's just that I don't travel as much as I used to before the kids came along.

I'm seeing myself alone on this trip. No Bill. No kids. Just me and those exotic, hypnotic scents of frankincense and myrrh. Imagine inhaling deeply of Gold by Amouage, a true oriental, and arguably the most expensive perfume in the world -- right there, where they make it. (At € 290 or about $400 USD for a 50 ml bottle, it's not cheap. You should see the bottle.)

You get the idea. This would be a once in a lifetime trip for me.

A girl can dream, can't she?

Fleurs d'Oranger by Serge Lutens

Serge Lutens is an icon.

For a long time, I had no idea who Serge Lutens was -- if he was alive or dead, or even a fictional character. Turns out he is alive and real and living in Marrakesh, at last report.

Serge Lutens is a French fashionista. A photog by profession, he worked for Vogue and other high profile fashion mags in the early 1960's, and collaborated with Avedon and other notable photographers. By the end of the 60's, Dior commissioned him to create a "revolutionary" line of cosmetics.

Lutens' star as a photographer rose, and by the mid-1970's he was directing "art films", good enough to be judged at Cannes. By the 1980's, Lutens was working for Shiseido, a Japanese cosmetics firm that wanted to improve their international image. And improve they did, under Lutens careful guidance. He created several winning marketing campaigns for them, and began to create make-up and perfume for them, as well.

Since the 1990's, Lutens' train has been gathering steam. He has received numerous awards and citations for his work in perfume, film and cosmetics, including, in 2006, the prestigious title of “Commandeur" in the Order of Arts and Letters by the French government. Though he conceives perfumes on his own, he collaborates closely with Christopher Sheldrake, the R&D man at Chanel. It's good to have friends in high places, don't you think? You can find all of Serge Lutens wonderful perfumes at Salons-Shiseido.

But, like I said, I had no idea who Serge Lutens was until I visited Aedes de Venustras in the West Village during a summer shopping trip several years back. It was just supposed to be a sniffing expedition. Walking around Greenwich Village, you can inhale a huge assortment of odors. Mostly good, some bad. In any case, my niece Robyn and I had just finished a delicious meal at Ray's Famously Original Pizza (yes, I know....), and we decided to walk it off. We noodled around the Village, and by the time we got to Christopher Street, I was ready for some refreshment.

Just entering Aedes is a treat unto itself. The life size peacock (taxodermied, of course) in the display window in front gives you an idea of the splendor of things to come, but I was taken aback by the ancient grandeur of the place. Lots of velvet and leather. Mahogony display cases filled to the brim with the most unique, rare and inspired perfumes from all over the world. And an ever so attentive staff. We had entered Heaven on Christopher Street.

So much to smell, so little time. My niece and I split up. She took one half of the room, and I took the other. We met somewhere in between and after about two hours of non-stop sniffing and sampling, left with three bottles of perfume: Tann Rokka, Ofresia by Diptyque and Fleurs d'Oranger by Serge Lutens. Oh, what a wonderful day!

Now, I am a floriental gal all the way. It literally takes an Act of Congress to convince me to wear anything other than a variant on Valentino or Pink by Nanadebary. Leaving Aedes, though, I knew I had been enchanted by a buttery-citrusy-floral with a wildly ethereal sillage that lasts for hours. I like the Ofresia, but I love the Fleurs d'Oranger. It is still my most favorite perfume. My niece took the Tann Rokka home with her. I have never worn it.

So, what makes Fleurs d'Oranger so different and attractive to me? The scent, the color, the way it smells as soon as it leaves the bottle and how it smells as soon as it touches your skin. It is sexy and clean, buttery and bright, all at once. Such a bundle of contradiction. The heady rush of sweet oranges is masterfully tempered by the most incredible scent of buttery tuberose ever created. I thought it might be massoia bark, so buttery it smells.

Fleurs is addictive. You just have to keep smelling it. You just want to keep smelling it. The drydown is incredible -- lusciously buttery and sweet. It goes on and on. One caution: though tempting, do NOT overuse this fragrance. It can overcome a room.

I love this scent so much, I had to make soap with it. I recently commissioned a fragrance house to dup the scent and we now have a very close version of Fleurs d'Oranger at Snowdrift Farm. I made a large batch of soap for sale to the public, as well. If you're lucky, you can catch the tail end of that batch right here. Or, try the recipe for yourself: Savon de Fleurs d'Oranger.