Creed

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Saturday Question: What Is The Oldest Perfume In Your Collection?

By the time I click Publish, it’ll be probably Sunday Question even where I live, but I just came back from Hawaii where for the next 3+ hours it’s still Saturday, so I’ll pretend that I’m still there. I plan to share some photos in a separate post next week, but for now, back to our regularly scheduled programming!

 

Saturday Question on Undina's Looking Glass

 

Saturday Question #235:

What Is The Oldest Perfume In Your Collection?

You can interpret the question any way you like. It can be the oldest perfume by the date created. Or the date it was recreated. Or you could go by years in your collection for either the same bottle or a repeated purchase of the same perfume. Do not count samples, but any other formats can participate.

My Answer

One of my most favorite perfumes of all times, Climat by Lancome, would definitely fit the bill if to go by the continuation of one perfume in my collection (and I even still have my very first bottle, sadly empty). But Climat is my answer to so many questions (which isn’t all that surprising), that for today’s question, I decided to go with something different.

Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie by Creed was originally created in 1860s (different sites give slightly different dates, and since it can’t be found on the brand’s site any longer, I can’t confirm the official version), which makes it the oldest perfume in my collection by the date of creation. It also was recreated in 1989, which is still older than probably 90% of all perfumes in my collection.

Creed Jasmin Imperatrice Eugenie

Now, it’s your turn.

 

What Is The Oldest Perfume In Your Collection?

Carmina by Creed 2023 NEW! NEW! NEW!
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Carmina by Creed 2023 NEW! NEW! NEW!

Hi there ULGers, Before going away in November the Libertine crew invited my mate Ainslie and me to the launch of their latest blockbuster. I often hear perfume people say Creed is a blokes brand and that the women aimed perfumes aren’t as good. Honestly, I beg to differ. The only Creed bottle I paid full retail for was Fantasia de Fleurs. It’s a very lightly salted, spicy Bulgarian rose. Sure, the guff about it being Empress Sisi’s personal perfume might be bullshit but the fragrance is glorious. Vanisia, Iris Tuberose, and Angelique Encens have all been decants in my collection, leading to a pre-loved bottle purchase of Iris Tuberose.

Carmina by Creed 2023 Launch

Carmina by Creed 2023 Launch

Carmina by Creed 2023 Launch

Launch night was a big deal. The perfume world of Sydney. Execs, SAs, marketing teams, bloggers, vloggers, TV stars and hoi polloi. I had already spent the day in town and was so completely underdressed it was hilarious. This was a dress to impress event. Oh well. Nobody got seriously hurt by my poor fashion choices.

Carmina by Creed 2023

Carmina by Creed 2023

Creed Australia gives these featured accords:
Top: Black Cherry, Saffron, Pink Pepper
Heart: Rose de Mai, Violet, Cashmere Wood, Peony
Base: Frankincense, Myrrh, Amber, Musk

First let’s look at the bottle. After the massive fail of the Wind Flowers bottle I’m really interested that they have taken this route. The colour is gorgeous, like seriously and ridiculously fabulous. Cherry pink! They have reworked the cap, it’s fine but I don’t really understand why they needed to. Then they’ve used the traditional male bottle shape. It’s definitely sturdier on the foot than the shield bottle. Maybe I’m a grouchy old goat but that shield bottle was one of my favourite in perfume land.

OK, enough about that, how does Carmina smell? The opening moments are CHERRY! Sweet cherry soda pop. Roses make an early appearance and the sweet sizzle of the pink pepper berry makes both the fruit and flower zing. Big, overblown, jammy roses only very slightly tamed by the green, white-floral-adjacent-ness of violet. This is a fun confection. I’m so not sure of this but the whole shimmering opening makes me think there are some aldehydes giving everything some razzle dazzle.

Do you remember Modern Muse Le Rouge Gloss by Estée Lauder? Kendall Jenner was the face? It was a similar vibe but had this weird saccharine backtaste to the fragrance. Carmina is like they’ve taken a similar route but without that chemical waste undertow.

The heart becomes more peony as it goes forward. Not like a real peony though, this is the perfumers peony dream. That rose/peony/cherry accord is so good. It’s probably not exactly what I picture myself smelling of but that damn gorgeous bottle keeps me coming back for more.

Carmina by Creed 2023 bottle

The base remains sweetly cherry soda and rose floating over some woodsy ambers that you’ll definitely recognise. Carmina continues thus quietly pumping itself out for hours and hours. Creed has definitely listened to the masses wanting longevity. While not beast mode for ladies the projection and sillage are both excellent. It’s right up there with Baccarat Rouge and its horde of lookey likeys.

Do I love it? I’m totally ambivalent. I will say that I keep returning to Carmina and giving myself a cheeky spritz on one arm. The bottle calls me as it sits on my desk.

What about you? Sound good?
Portia xx

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Second Sunday Samples: Creed Aventus for Her and Floralie

Not much changed since I told a story of my first Creed perfume – Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie: I haven’t tried any new perfumes from the brand and haven’t got into my collection any more of those few that I’ve tried before. Mostly, for the same reasons that I’d explained in the above-linked post.

What is even stranger, I don’t think I’ve ever tried probably the most famous of their masculine perfumes – Aventus. Mostly, because I felt some type of a resentment towards the crowd of the fans of this perfume.

I wouldn’t have probably tried any of the two perfumes I’m covering in today’s post, but they were a part of the epic GWP, about which I wrote recently. So, here we are. For the explanation about the ratings, see Sea Star Ratings.

 

Three and Half Sea Stars

Aventus for Her was created in 2016 by Olivier Creed. Official notes (from the brand’s site): apple, pink pepper, patchouli, bergamot, rose, sandalwood, styrax, musk, peach, black currant, amber and Ylang Ylang.

Despite its “for her” designation, in my opinion, it is as feminine as a boyfriend shirt on a woman (but less sexy). It develops better on a warmed skin (on sunny afternoon), and that’s when I can clearly smell the promised apple and black currant – both of the “perfume-y” artificial type, not too realistic (reminds me of Parfums de Marley’s creations). On a “cold skin” (in the morning), I can mostly smell patchouli and some spices. It smells like a modern perfume: more artificial than natural, spicy and sweet. I can’t say that it smells cheap, but it doesn’t strike me as extremely luxurious either.

 

Two Sea Stars

Floralie was created in 2018, also by Olivier Creed. Notes (from the brand’s site): marigold, Bulgarian rose, tuberose, lilac, lily of the valley, amber, cedarwood, amber and musk rose.

Unlike Aventus for Her, Floralie smells better when it’s cooler: it opens with a pleasant floral bouquet. And then it goes into bitterly green territory (and when it’s hot, it jumps directly to that phase without any discernible flowers). I do not like Floralie and would not wear it, but at the same time I think that it is a better perfume than Aventus for Her.

Creed Aventus for Her and Floralie Samples

Image: my own

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My First Creed: Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie

 

For a very long time I haven’t approached Creed. There were several reasons for that.

First, when I didn’t know anything about the brand, its line-up in Neiman Marcus looked so unapproachable that I would keep passing the Creed’s counter long after NM itself stopped being intimidating (though it’s still too expensive for me to shop there).

Later, when I already knew about Creed, in my mind it was closely connected to the testosterone overdose coming from the certain forum and some Facebook groups: all those batch numbers and bottles parts’ details were just making me nauseous and didn’t inspire the exploration.

I was bored. There was absolutely nothing new for me to sniff at the local Neiman Marcus. Because of my previous success with gardenia perfumes – Guerlain Cruel Gardenia and Ineke Hothouse Flower – I was mildly curious about the new Creed’s Fleurs de Gardenia. They didn’t have it yet but it was too late: I “left myself open” and a Creed’s SA, who looked like she also was quite bored, decided it was her chance.

For the next fifteen minutes she was enticing me with different scents on paper strips, names and notes. I decided not to fight back and compliantly stood there nodding. I must have fulfilled my part of the SA-potential client dance, so she easily agreed to make a sample of the perfume that I liked the most – Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie.

Creed Jasmin Imperatrice Eugenie

I wonder how Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie smelled 160 (one hundred and sixty!) years ago when, according to the official legend, it was created by Henry Creed II for the wife of Napoleon III, Empress Eugenie? I suspect it had been reformulated multiple times even before its public release in 1989 and definitely more than once since. But I’ve never smelled any of previous Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie reincarnations so no regrets here.

Official list of notes includes bergamot, Bulgarian rose, ambergris, Italian jasmine, vanilla and sandalwood. For a while I didn’t smell jasmine in Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie – until I tried it in parallel with Dior‘s Grand Bal. Now I can clearly detect it. But still for me this perfume isn’t about jasmine. This perfume is jasmine wrapped into and creamy sandalwood with just a hint of vanilla. I can’t detect rose but I’m not too good with that note when it’s not in a leading role. Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie is very smooth and well-blended. It has a good projection so it’s not one of those perfumes in which you can bathe. It stays on my skin for about 8 hours during which it doesn’t change much to my nose (though I’m positive that at least a couple of my readers would be able to parse out more distinct stages). I like this perfume very much.

Rusty and Creed Jasmin Imperatrice Eugenie

My vSO also likes Jasmin Impératrice Eugénie. I know that not because he gave it to me as a New Year gift (I had a hand in it) but because he complimented me on three separate occasions (which doesn’t happen too often) without knowing what I was wearing (which does happen a lot).

Do you have a favorite Creed perfume?

 

Images: my own