Guerlain

Tobacco Honey by Guerlain L’Art & La Matière
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Tobacco Honey by Guerlain L’Art & La Matière

Hi there ULGers, The Guerlain L’Art & La Matière line is their mass-tige offering. Priced far above their regular lines but never feeling especially luxe. I love and own a few of them but with the introduction of the new bottles am finding them less and less appealing. Especially at this price point. Yes, I feel like a broken record but the dumbing down of fragrance bottles shits me. Guerlain had such a vibrant, beautiful range of bottles that spoke of their legacy. Sure, not all of them were winners but gah… Having said that, I am excited they went with the Flacon Bouchon Coeur for regular range now. It harks back to 1912 L’Heure Bleue and was Mitsouko‘s original bottle too. Anyway, I’m sitting here with a mini of Tobacco Honey. It came with a recent purchase and I’m retrying it again. First go was a no-go but it may have been my mood, weather, health etc. So I’m coming back at it, join me.

Tobacco Honey by Guerlain L’Art & La Matière 2023

Tobacco Honey Guerlain

Guerlain gives these featured accords:
Top: Honey, Cloves, Anise;
Heart: Tobacco, Vanilla, Tonka, Sesame
Base: Agarwood (Oud), Sandalwood

Delphine Jelk created Tobacco Honey. it’s big, loud, sweet and flamboyant. Spiced honey, dry vanilla, dark woods all combine to give an extraordinary, very immortelle like experience.

You know how cough drops are hyper sweet, cordial-like, very slightly medicinal tasting versions of whatever fruit they are purporting to be? That’s what Tobacco Honey is like for me. A confectioners recreation of these notes in a very gluggy immortelle style, but without the deep or dark of that note. All high intensity confection and a medicinal backtaste.

Wearing Tobacco Honey again tonight for work I enjoyed it immensely. Thick, rich, treacle like ropes of fragrance. There were multiple positive comments and I enjoyed smelling so delicious.

Leans heavily modern femme, has excellent projection and sillage. Careful, it can go full beast mode. Longevity is really good but during the last couple of hours I’m left with an amorphous sticky sweetness. Interestingly, for something so dense, this works of warm sunshiny days and sultry nights as well as it does in the deep cold.

Honestly, my favourite tobaccos are a bit darker and woodsier. This is very gorgeous though and I can imagine it being a wonderful signature for the kind of perfume wearer who does that.

What are your thoughts on Tobacco Honey by Guerlain?
Portia xx

 

Mitsouko EdT by Guerlain
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Mitsouko EdT by Guerlain

Hi there ULGers, You may know that Shalimar is my ride or die perfume. It has been part of my life since childhood, Mum and a few of her girlfriends wore it. It still smells so good on and to me. Thing is, wearing Shalimar is a big deal and it takes a lot of attention. So what’s happened is that Mitsouko has become something much easier for me to wear. A Guerlain for all seasons. It’s less memory scent, less awe inspiring ride and much less distracting. Without making it less beautiful, tapestried or interesting. I can wear Mitsouko and go about my day. The reason you’re getting this post is because I just gave myself a lavish spritzing.

Mitsouko EdT by Guerlain

mitsouko

These are the commonly offered featured accords:
Top: Bergamot, Rose, Jasmine, Citruses
Heart: Peach, Ylang-Ylang, Lilac, Rose, Jasmine
Base: Oakmoss, Spices, Vetiver, Cinnamon, Amber

I’m writing to you from the past. Currently Jin, Anna Maria and her husband Johnny and I are on an adventure together. We are off to Singapore and Busan, South Korea. Yes, I’m hoping there will be updates once we return.

Mitsouko EdT! Jacques Guerlain’s 1919 masterpiece is a mind blowing, blowsy, retro hit of gorgeousness. Did you know it was the first fruity chypre? Its peach note, which I find smells like the lid of a tin of canned peaches, was groundbreaking at the time. While smelling dated AF it still smells brand new and bang up to date as well. Because it’s a style not worn by modern youth, it feels brand new, subversive and oh so elegant.

The fruits of Mitsouko are not lush and juicy but sharp, metallic and very sunshiny. In comparison to Shalimar’s regal overblown elegance Mitsouko is definitely the Princess Margaret of the family. I really don’t smell most of the noted parts, Mitsouko is her own scent. A glamorous melange of that not quite real peach, a bouquet and spices all drizzled over a labdanum rich amber and that lovely furry oakmoss.

The top and heart are lovely but what really makes me swoon is the dry down. Which lasts for hours and hours. That peach/amber/oakmoss meld, with all the bit players, combines to create such a harmonious beauty. It’s dry but fleshy, sparkling ands spicy yet furry, cuddly and scintillating.

Mitsouko EdT by Guerlain

I’m wearing a vintage version but even the modern bottle shown below holds a delectable scent. Not quite as fusty as mine, the modern is a clearer, sheerer, brighter concoction that feels slightly more in line with modern tastes. Though it still has the marvelous shape of the vintage.

I’m seriously glad we are in a new era of the art nouveau inverted heart bottle designed originally by Raymond Guerlain in 1912. It’s such an icon of perfumery and feels good in my hand.

Mitsouko EdT by Guerlain

Are you a Mitsouko fan?
Portia xx

 

 

Patchouli Paris by Guerlain
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Patchouli Paris by Guerlain

Hi there Looking Glassers, I’m clearly a Guerlain fan, it’s been a brand in my life since childhood. Also, I understand that perfume pricing has gone out of control. What was a fun hobby that could be played with spare change, it has now become a major investment. That’s taken quite a lot of the fun out of being a perfumista for me. Now, when I try a stratospherically priced new perfume it has to be unbelievably special. Tick all the boxes, surprise, delight, ring my bell and make me swoon: at the very least. Especially when some of the Indie Perfume Houses are making spectacular, envelope pushing beauties for less than a quarter the price. So, to be fair, I’m coming to Patchouli Paris with a fairly jaded mindset, eyerolling at the price and grumpy at LVMH. I got my decant at Surrender To Chance.

Patchouli Paris by Guerlain 2024

Patchouli Paris by Guerlain

I found these featured accords:
Top: Aldehydes
Heart: Iris
Base: Patchouli, Ambergris

Opening is a lightly sweet, smoky aldehydic zing that smells very CHANEL and it has a real early 200os radiant white floral effect. This could be a new Les Exclusive. Smooth and lovely, the iris feels so clean, a little bit soapy. Dry down is a very soft focus clean patchouli with only the merest whispered hint of briny whale poop.

Everyone that has talked to me about Patchouli Paris has told me it’s a barnstormer but I find it incredibly polite. An under the radar fragrance that feels totally introverted. If that’s your style then Patchouli Paris will be catnip. A perfect low humming pale wash that elevates your own scent without drawing attention, or histrionics.

Obviously, your mileage may vary. I sincerely hope it does and that it’s just on me that Patchouli Paris lays like a limp lettuce leaf: insipid, uninspiring and sadly undelightful.

Patchouli Paris by Guerlain STC

Longevity and sillage are moderate. Nice on everyone, across gender borders.

SOOO NICE that I can see this becoming a go-to patchouli for those that don’t really love patchouli but do love the very glamorous facets of iris, with a touch of leathery goodness. There is none of the bread dough, carrot or woody dankness that can so often accompany the noble iris rhizome.

It’s like Guerlain has become afraid of making a real statement and has decided to mumble.

What did you think?
Portia xx

Iris Pallida Extrait 6 by Guerlain
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Iris Pallida Extrait 6 by Guerlain

Dear Looking Glass-ers, I have a decant from Surrender To Chance. Yes, it cost an arm and a leg BUT I really didn’t want a full bottle. What I wanted after trying the Les Extrait collection in stores was to have enough to really get to know them in my own time, without the miasma of all the other perfumes beating my nose to death. So that’s what I’ve done. My 2ml spray decant has lasted months because I put some on a forearm and spend the next few hours luxuriating in Iris Pallida Extrait 6.

If you can afford these then I envy you (just a bit). US$630 for 50ml of extrait.

ALSO! arrived this week in the mail from the lovely Ingeborg, all the way from Norway to Sydney! Thank you. I seem to have lost you on social media (if we ever were connected) so I thought the best way to get my thanks to you is here on ULG. Jin and I are really touched. HUG. They will have pride of place on the fridge.

Ingeborg Xmas Postcards

Iris Pallida Extrait 6 by Guerlain 2023

Iris Pallida Extrait 6 Guerlain

Guerlain gives these featured accords:
Iris, almond, musk, suede, sandalwood

First breath of Iris Pallida Extrait 6 is almond meal, dry orris and something quite bittersweet like nougat with wood chips and some weird greenery darkness. It’s like fermented grass in an unturned pile during the hottest peak of summer. Sounds vile but actually it adds depth and interest to a fragrance that would otherwise be too simple, pretty and dull. As I head into the heart the suede and sandalwood become more apparent and a streak of cold wet cardboard heads in. Cardboard is one of my favourite facets of iris, combined with the other perfectly blended notes it is interesting rather than repulsive. The super glam Guerlain version of cold wet cardboard.

Towards the end of the heart my ride gives old fashioned make up vibes. Powdery, lipstick-ish and a little of hairspray. Very movie star and every housewife trying to live up to their impossible standards of beauty.  This stays and gets more woody, yet still that distinctive iris/orris till fade.

Iris Pallida Extrait 6 by Guerlain decant

Iris Pallida Extrait 6 is gorgeous. I’m unsure why we got these as a group instead of dropping one each year and why on earth did they come in extrait? I would quite like to have enjoyed it with more effervescence in an EdT and a swipe of the extrait to give it some extra depth (Did LVMH not think these perfumes worthy of pillar status?) This though is what we got and if I could spend that money right now I would without hesitation.

What did you think?
Portia x

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Shalimar Reflections

Hi Crew. We are in the summer heat here in Sydney. It’s gorgeous but there are days when I’d like to shirk my skin and lie around just bones under the fan. The heat itself is fine but the humidly tends to have me wilt just a little. So how does Shalimar fit into the heat? Well, I have a bottle of the extrait on my desk. It was a gift from one of my dearest friends. Whenever the world gets overwhelming I give myself a swipe on my forearm and suddenly everything seems less spectacularly oppressive. This year has had some significant bumps, mainly business related. Though I’ve run businesses for years I’m not actually very good at it. Fortunately my ideas have been good enough to push through my basic inability to function. Of course with every changing of the guard there are growing and dying pains. Study has also been a big part of the year and I’m poor at focus and time management, HA! That’s being generous. Seriously. Add to that the many plates spinning at any given time. Trivia, apartments, blogging perfume, cleaning house and laundry PLUS now studying and doing book reviews. One wheel gets shaky and my whole train collapses in a heap. I know, definitely the problems of the wealthy. I’m super grateful for everything we have. Also, fully acknowledged how fortunate we are in terms of home, work, love and friends. Jin recently moved up and across at his work and if I can get my bloody Celebrant Course done then there will be an extra cash stream to pick up the rising interest cost of the mortgage.

Sorry, I got sidetracked.

Shalimar Reflections

Shalimar and Reflections

There are dozens of note list but here’s a pretty good summation:
Bergamot, lemon, iris, jasmine, rose, patchouli, vetiver, opopanax, tonka bean, frankincense, sandalwood, musk, civet, ambergris, leather, vanilla

This evening the world got overwhelming. Just too much input and it left me breathless.

SWIPE

Seriously, the relief to just let myself revel in the inimitable beauty of Shalimar extrait. Suddenly my shoulders unclench, my back straightens and I can quietly go have a lie down under the fan for 15 minutes and get lost in the fragrance.

Shalimar is also chock full of happy memories of Mum and some of her girlfriends that wore it as daywear. Big fragrant hugs and them all laughing, planning, chattering, sniping over lunch or afternoon tea. Not always happy, there were meetings of solidarity for all of life’s aches and pains, home troubles, illness or financial woes. Still, though there were tears, the love held them all together.

It has since become one of my go-to event fragrances. The event might be a big gig, party, dinner or it may be to make a mundane event like groceries and cleaning into something wonderful.

So with Shalimar I get not only to drift off with the scent but also a plethora of memories.

Do you have a fragrance that gives you surcease but also is full of magical memories?
Portia xx

 

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Saturday Question: What Are Your Top 5 Seasonal Perfumes?

While it’s still relatively warm in the Northern California where I live, it is an unmistakably Autumn, the beginning of my favorite time of the year, perfume-wise and not only. So, for most of my readers, the question is about their Fall favorites. But for my wonderful co-writer Portia and periodic readers from Down Under it’s Spring – hence a more generic form of this week’s SQ.

 

Saturday Question on Undina's Looking Glass

 

Saturday Question #237:

What Are Your Top 5 Seasonal Perfumes?

I’m not asking for the best-of-the-best-of-the-best (sir) perfumes for the season or even your all-time loves. But just for this year, this autumn (or spring) – what top 5 perfumes do you look forward to wearing?

My Answer

I have sooo many more cool/cold weather appropriate perfumes in my collection than an appropriate weather to wear them that I’m thrilled that I can finally wear them, and it was actually hard to choose just 5 for this list (as if the rest will be offended not to be included). But here we go (in no particular order):

  • Ormonde Jayne Tolu
  • Puredistance Rubikona
  • Guerlain Encens Mythique d’Orient
  • Teo Cabanel Alahine
  • Jo Malone Mimosa & Cardamom

 

How about you?

 

What Are Your Top 5 Seasonal Perfumes?

Saturday Question: What Three Would You Bring Back
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Saturday Question: What Three Would You Bring Back

Hello Fellow Fumies,

At ULG we have a Saturday Question. Everyone gets to chime in with an answer, chat with other responders and it’s a fun event each week. Taking sides never means taking offence and everyone keeps it respectful and light, even though we can sometimes trawl the depths.

The idea is you’ll see it on the weekend or chime in through the week. Hopefully you will come back regularly and see if anyone has responded to your comment and you can reply to them. The aim is to generate real conversation and connection even though we are scattered around the globe.

Saturday Question: What Three Would You Bring Back?

So many fragrances have been Discontinued, Changed or Reformulated over time that it’s hard to wrap your head around it. Anyone buying Opium, Magie Noire, Diva or Miss Dior in 2024 will be gobsmacked by how different they smell to the originals. Even some less vintage fragrance lines like CHANEL exclusives, Maison Christian Dior Collection, Serge Lutens or the Malle line have been hacked into and given refreshes. We await changes on other brands bought out by big fragrance. Then there are the slew of fragrances that have gone from the counters forever, impossible to find for less than a small countries annual GDP and then you better hope it’s not a fake or refilled.

So what are the three you REALLY wish you could have 200ml of in pristine condition? Imagine there was a perfume fairy that could grant these wishes. No question of expense or postage, snap and the three bottles appear.

My Answer:

Guerlain Paris-Moscou

This is an old photo of my bottle which only has maybe 3ml left in the bottom. I really don’t know why this overly sweet, sticky, glug of a perfume captured me so completely and utterly. Plum cheesecake? Is there such a thing. Screamingly sweet. Still, whenever I spritz the smile goes from ear to ear and I huff deeply for about 5 hours. Loving every minute. Sadly these travel perfumes were not popular and went the way of the dodo in what felt like minutes.

Niki de Saint Phalle

While I love many of the mossy floral chypres, Niki de saint Phalle is the one that speaks loudest to me. I’m pretty sure that at least some of the reason is Niki’s story, art and sheer brazen ability to make her way in such a mans world. Fortunately I was aware they were coming to the end of the road when the discounters were practically giving bottles away and I bought a drawer full. Even if I wore Niki de Saint Phalle exclusively my stash might last 10 years.

Versace Blonde EdT & extrait

Don’t worry. I also have a stash of this magnificent tuberose/jasmine/ylang sillage monster. What makes me sad is something so fabulous and glamorous, created the year before Versace Dreamer (another favourite), heralded the pinnacle of Versace fragrances. It was the diamond that came before they seemed to give up on making fine fragrance. Yes, they still make fragrance and they are not terrible but they also miss the interest, aspirational creativity and magic of the Versace mid 1990s releases.

 

My Saturday Question to you is:

What Three Would You Bring Back?

Going Back to my Full Bottle Wardrobe
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Going Back to my Full Bottle Wardrobe

Hey there ULGers, Welcome to 2024. Hoping it’s a safe, prosperous, fun, comfortable and fragrant year ahead for us all, maybe with a side order of delightfully preposterous. What are the three things we are meant to wish each other? Health, Wealth and Contentment! I wish them for you, and for us.

Welcome to 2024

Maybe you know, last year I tried to scale back my perfume samples and decants. I’m still to do a final tally but in my mind it sits at around 300 thunks for the year. While that sounds like a lot, and I have emptied a few small boxes of them, it also feels like it hardly made a dent. Compounded by my continued purchasing. Yeah, it’s clearly an illness. Anyway, now I’m free to roam the perfume wardrobe again and it is daunting! I want to wear everything at once, yet curiously I’m also so overwhelmed that going through the cupboards and remembering what I have is too much. So I’m wearing the things I can see. There’s the grab tray, actually in my wardrobe. Also, all around my sewing machine and desk there are a bunch of bottles that are either new or awaiting reincorporation into the cupboards. So that’s where I’ve been spritzing from.

Going Back to my Full Bottle Wardrobe

Going Back to my Full Bottle Wardrobe

There also seems to be a gold theme running through my spritz selection so far in 2024.

Aqua Allegoria Neroli Vetiver by Guerlain

Yes, this got the gong for New Years Eve and so it was my first fragrance for 2024 too. I love its sweet juicy opening and smooth white floral heart made extra fresh and green by a dry vetiver, all over a lovely laundry musk base. Jin and I had a VERY lazy night. We had duck Korean table BarBQ at home with all the side dishes and some pork chipolatas for extras. While we were eating one of our besties Phil dropped in on his way home from family and that was really nice. Then we lay around the couch with Paris the greyhound watching both the Exotic Marigold Hotel films back to back. After midnight I took Paris out for a walk and then we hit the hay. VERY chill NYE.

Soleil Brulant by Tom Ford

This was a gift from one of my dearest, Ainslie Walker: Scentsmith. It’s a honeyed white floral with resinous amber base but there is also this delightfully strange greenery. It’s leaning bitter and astringent and that creates this alluring contrapuntal effect. Also unusual for a Tom Ford it isn’t a top heavy beauty that crumbles to banality in 30 minutes. It lasts all day and has some interesting sideways movements. I’m not sure why this hasn’t become one of the most talked about fragrances of the 2020s. The first morning of 2024 dawned cool and cloudy so this was a lovely rich choice.

Montana femme by Claude Montana

This bloody bottle doesn’t fit anywhere in the cupboards so is constantly out. the pic doesn’t show it well but they’re over 1/3 gone. A full tilt hark back to the days of perfumey perfumes. An aldehydic floral top and sweet woodsy amber base. Not for the faint of heart and smalls bloody fabulous. It really does smell like shoulder pads and jewel bright peplums with big hair. It’s beautiful in the cold weather but in the humidity and heat of Sydney summer it blooms even more gorgeously. If only it came in a less cool and annoying bottle.

 

So how have you spritzed in the new year?
Portia xx

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Saturday Question: What Is Your Favorite Guerlain L’Art & La Matière?

After questions about the private lines of Chanel and Dior, I think it’s time to see how we fare with everyone’s darling Guerlain.

Saturday Question on Undina's Looking Glass

Saturday Question #170:

What Is Your Favorite Guerlain L’Art & La Matière?

Do you love any of them? Too many or not at all? Do you own them? Do you wear them?

Have you tried any of the new ones that they released last year?

My Answer

My most favorite perfume from the line, Cruel Gardenia, is from pre-reformulation time. I was so scared when I learned about the upcoming repackaging that I bought a backup bottle. Recently, I tried a new version at a store: without comparing it side-by-side with the one that I have, I can’t tell how much it has changed.

I smelled several new perfumes released in 2022, but since I’m not an agarwood fan, I didn’t give them any skin time, so I didn’t form a definitive impression of them. Anyway, I have at least two perfumes in the line that I would buy before any of the new ones.

Guerlain Cruel Gardenia

How about you?

 

What Is Your Favorite Guerlain L’Art & La Matière?

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South Korea March 2023

Hey there ULGers, It’s a little CRAZY around here at the moment. I’m writing from last week because currently Jin, a couple of our girlfriends and I are in South Korea for a short but sweet tour. Temperatures are expected to range from -1 to 20C (30-68f). When are you all going to catch up with modern systems so we can all have the same? It will be a very nice change from Sydney’s current 40C (104f) with a shit tonne of humidity. It’s nicer outside than in the apartment though. Jin has the AC on and my body doesn’t really like it.

This will definitely NOT be a perfume shopping trip. We have other adventures planned this year that could become very fragrant. More on those later.

South Korea March 2023

So, I’m furiously trying to work out what to take with me perfume wise. I’m in the middle of the New Idea 2023 and will need to take some samples and decants to use up. Also, I like to have a few old faves for stability in the whirlwind rush of holiday adventures.

So here are my ideas.

Cacharel Amor Amor: A fun fizzy fruit scent that makes me smile in remembrance of Anna Maria who gave me my first 30ml.
Guerlain Terracotta le parfum: Need a white floral with tropical accents to add a little zip.
Hermès Cuir d’Ange: I’m halfway through my 15ml travel of this softly leather beauty.
Miller Harris La Fumee Ottoman: Newish 8ml travel from FragranceNet. Something smoky and dark will be nice for the cold.
Niki de Saint Phalle: The 12ml travel size are perfect in the wetpack. A chypre will always centre me.

On top of that I’m going to grab a random selection of samples/decants to help with New Idea 2023.

Does this feel like a sensible perfume selection?
What 5 would you take?
Portia xx