April 6, 2022 by Undina

Scent Semantics #6: VERNAL

Today is the sixth episode of the collaboration of six bloggers: Portia (A Bottled Rose), Elena (The Plum Girl), Sheila (Alembicated Genie), Daisy (eau là là !), Old Herbaceous (Serenity Now Scents and Sensibilities) and Undina (Undina’s Looking Glass). Because of all the events happening in Ukraine, I missed the fifth episode – even though it was my word, and I have a story to tell! Maybe I’ll do it anyway later. And this month I’m a little late, but I decided to do it. Hopefully, by now you’ve read all other participating blogs (I haven’t yet – will do now) and still don’t mind to check out one more take on the topic.

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This month’s word is: VERNAL

This month’s word surprised me: after more than two decades in the US, I didn’t have it not only in my active vocabulary but even in the passive one. Considering its quite mundane (though poetic) meaning, I’m amazed I haven’t come across it until now. A small consolation: Google search returns 4.6B of results for “spring” and just 15.9M for “vernal.”

As I was thinking about what that word means to me (after checking its meaning), I started thinking of Spring and remembering how it was back when I was experiencing it. I realized that living in an almost unvarying climate, while I do not miss Winter or cold weather, I miss that longing for the end of Winter and happiness from watching the Spring awakening of nature from the frozen sleep.

In my childhood and adolescent years, winter clothes that most of us got to wear were ugly. Those for adults usually weren’t much better, but at least theoretically better choices existed. But for the ages until late teenage years, those clothes weren’t something one would look forward to wearing. So, at first glimpses of Spring sun, we were eager to start taking off at least hats and scarves or maybe even putting on something less bulky and shapeless. And since by that time our immune systems were suffering from the lack of sun (read vitamin D3) and almost complete absence of fruits and vegetables (we won’t count potato, onions and beets, will we?), oftentimes that combination was enough to bring us down with a cold or flu.

Getting outside after a week spent in bed was magical: you could see and feel how Spring had sprung while you weren’t watching. And then, with every next day, Spring was claiming more and more territory with warmer days, longer days, young foliage and of course blossoms and flowers.

And if the early Spring days (those pre-flu ones) mean tender snowdrops, shy mimosa and timid daffodils, real, “full-fledged” Spring came with lavish lilac bushes.

One other drawback of not having cold weather in our area is that lilac grows here very reluctantly. In decades of living here, I saw a couple of sparse bushes in gardens and bought three or four bouquets of lilacs – far more expensive and smaller than what I used to see in my childhood.

Last weekend, while still playing with the word of the month in my head, for the first time while living in the US, I saw a white lilac bouquet. That was my vernal moment! And I immediately thought of a very fitting perfume for it.

After My Own Heart by Ineke is the first perfume in their Alphabet line. Notes: bergamot, raspberry, green leaves, lilac, sandalwood, heliotrope and musk. When I tested it the first time… 11 years ago, I thought it was nice, but I didn’t love it: the lilac seems too simple and soapy. My first discovery set went off at some point, so I had just my memory of how that perfume smelled. But recently I got a fresh sample set (with the purchase of Field Notes From Paris for my father), so I was able to revisit After My Own Heart.

After My Own Heart is a beautiful lilac, still slightly soapy in the opening, but this time it didn’t bother me much. It is a lush, warm, slightly green and quite a realistic lilac. It smells stronger than my small white lilac bouquet in my bedroom. And seeing that bouquet while wearing After My Own Heart conjures that feeling of happiness from the Spring that has finally arrived to stay.

Image: my own

January 20, 2022 by Undina

Brand Appreciation: INEKE

Many years ago, I planned to run a series of posts to feature brands that I wanted to spotlight – not because they’ve released the newest popular perfume or got some award but just because. It didn’t materialize, and I published just one post. Now I decided to come back to that idea*. And today’s choice is a local to me (San Francisco-based) niche brand named after its owner and perfumer: INEKE.

I’m not sure why this brand doesn’t get more love. I’m talking not as much of “hardcore perfumistas” with hundreds of uber-expensive uber-niche perfumes in their collection (not that I wouldn’t expect Ineke perfumes to be found there) but rather about perfume enthusiasts who clear out TJ Max perfume shelves or shop “bargain basement” of online discounters. In my opinion, INEKE has all the markers of a great brand for both “civilians” and people who report in the NST’s quarterly polls more than 15 bottles purchases.

INEKE’s perfumes are pleasant and pleasing; maybe not revolutionary or daring, but at the same time they are head above fruity-floral mass-market concoctions or cookie-cutter creations from the plethora of recent “niche” brands.

INEKE’s packaging is superb: bottles, boxes and samples are all of the good quality and tastefully decorated.

INEKE’s prices are almost perfumista-free – $125 for 75 ml, which is quite reasonable if you like a scent.

INEKE has a flexible sampling program: one can get a set of 7 samples for $30 (which includes a $15 coupon for the future full-size bottle purchase) or buy individual samples for $5.

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I wrote before about two of my favorite perfumes from this brand: four months after I wrote about Hothouse Flower, a bottle of it joined my collection. And five years later, I bought Idyllwild and published a story about it.

But somehow, I’ve never written about the first perfume from this brand that I’ve ever bought: Field Notes From Paris.

This perfume was launched in 2009. Notes include coriander seed, orange flower, bergamot, tobacco flower & leaf, patchouli, cedar, tonka bean, leather, beeswax and vanilla. Perfumer: Ineke Ruhland.

Though Field Notes From Paris is leaning a tad masculine, I enjoy its cologne-y freshness in the opening, but even more, I like the woody development. Reading “orange flower,” “tonka bean” and “vanilla,” one would expect more sweetness from this perfume. It does get sweeter 60 minutes into development, but for my nose, the sweetness comes from a tobacco leaf (not fully dried type) and not from those usual suspects. Field Notes From Paris has good longevity, especially on fabric: once I remember it surviving a washing machine on my blouse. But on my skin, it’s also quite good.

From the sample set that I bought first time (perfume names from A to G), I liked Fields Notes From Paris the most, and soon I found and bought a partial bottle from one of the FB groups. When my father, who usually wore Chanel, Jo Malone and Creed, asked me to recommend him something interesting and unusual, I figured out that he wouldn’t be going to stores to ask for and test perfumes, were I to suggest anything new. So, instead, I did what probably any of you would do: I made him a set of small decants from perfumes I thought he might be interested in and added a couple of Diptyque samples I happened to have. After Rusty approved my choices, I sent the package to my father.

Over time he went through all the decants that I prepared for him, and when I visited, he showed me two that he liked the most. One of them was Field Notes From Paris. So, for his birthday last week, I got him a bottle of this perfume. I hope he’ll enjoy wearing it.

Now I’m looking forward to their next letter – K.

Images: my own

* Disclaimer: it is not a sponsored post. Also, I’ve never received any promotional or free items from the brand (if not to count a hand-made sample I got at the event once, but it wasn’t as a blogger).

December 16, 2021 by Undina

What I Wore Wednesday: Perfume Advent Calendar 2021, Week 2

As the year is coming to the end and with my Christmas vacation time approaching, the level of the work-related insanity got up to eleven. So, the help from my Perfume Advent Calendar in making a daily choice was greatly appreciated:

Day 8: By Kilian Amber Oud
Amber Oud, my perfect By Kilian perfume that I found five years ago, isn’t much about the “oud,” and I love it about that perfume. Amber Oud is a beautiful amber, and I enjoy it every time I put it on. This time wasn’t any different. It’s still available in Europe in a refill form, but I haven’t seen it in the US for a while.

Day 9: Hermès Eau de Mandarine Ambrée
Eau de Mandarine Ambree is one of the winners in my Search For The Perfect Mandarin. It feels right for the holidays season. This time it was surprisingly tenacious and didn’t require re-application.

Perfumes for the following three days do not have their stories told yet on my blog, but I plan to get to them eventually.

Day 10: Masque Milano Madeleine Le Donne di Masque
Madeleine is new to my collection, but with notes of chestnut, whipped cream, milk and vanilla it felt very season-appropriate (this isn’t the full notes list).

Day 11: Xerjoff Pykovaya Dama 2018
This is one of those perfumes that in my personal classification is a special occasion perfume. We don’t get too many of those recently, so I was glad to pull this name on a weekend: at least I wore it to a nice dinner at our friends’ place.

Day 12: Puredistance No. 12
No. 12 is my new perfume love. It was one of several perfumes that were pre-designated for a particular date: I thought it would be very fitting to wear perfume No. 12 on 12/12/21 and planned to do a post. It didn’t happen (unfortunately, I had to work that Sunday instead of writing my post). But I still hope to tell you its story soon.

Day 13: Jo Malone Sweet Milk
Sweet Milk is one of those perfumes that has the strongest olfactory connections to my childhood years, and it feels so warming and cozy and calming. I needed its support in the beginning of the week that came after a not exactly restful weekend – and I got it.

Day 14: Ineke Idyllwild
I can’t believe Idyllwild was launched four years ago: it feels like I just got this wonderful evergreen perfume. If you haven’t tried it, please read my original story. It was such a joy to wear it! And, just in case you have tried Idyllwild or just don’t want to go to the old post, I’ll put here the photo of Rusty from that post because I liked it but had a feeling that it was underappreciated (I’m sure that happened because everyone was taken in by my brilliant writing, I’m sure).

If you were considering purchase of any of Ineke’s perfumes, there is a nice promotion on the site now: for the price of the full bottle ($125), you can get their discovery set (currently $30) with a free delivery plus a coupon code for the full bottle with free shipping. This way you can get the discovery set free – either for yourself or to give it as a present to someone. If you’re not familiar with this brand, their discovery set (extremely well presented) comes with a $15 discount code against future full bottle purchase.

Day 15: Serge Lutens Ambre Sultan
By the time I got into the rabbit hole, discovered and bought Ambre Sultan, my first ever Serge Lutens bottle, it was such a well-loved and discussed perfume, that other than mentioning it here and there in amber-related posts or my Entertaining Statistics posts, there wasn’t much new to tell about it. Hence, there are no relevant links to provide. But I wanted to wear it this year, because I noticed my tendency to postpone wearing Ambre Sultan until it’s “cold enough,” which sometimes doesn’t happen with our winters. I still think it was worth the hype, though, of course, in the last decade many brands, both mainstream and niche, came out with really good amber perfumes. But I’m glad I have this classic of the genre for reference.

I first tricked and then bribed Rusty into posing with the Week 2 perfumes under our lit but not decorated yet Christmas Tree. For more pictures of Rusty, see the Advent CaTendar on my Instagram account (@undina_ba) – a count up to Rusty’s 13^th Birthday on Christmas Eve Day.

Images: my own

January 7, 2018 by Undina

Entertaining Statistics: 2017 Year Round-up

Strictly from the personal prospective, 2017 wasn’t a bad year: it had its share of unpleasantness and hardships but nothing to be really unhappy – so I won’t complain or even mention that. Instead, I would rather remember that year by good things that happened – short and long trips, wonderful time spent with my friends, successful projects at work and wonderful perfumes I got to test and wear in 2017.

As I usually do it in the beginning of the new year, I’m looking back to my perfume records and sharing with you my insights.

How I do it

Years ago I created a personal database (using MS Access) to hold information on all the perfumes I own or test. Whenever I get a new sample, I add it to the database – below I give an example of the entry form I use. I do not always get all the information but I add what I can find. Perfume name, launch year and notes are free-text entry; designer (brand), perfumers, notes and some other data points are coming from the pre-defined lists, so there can be no discrepancies.

Whenever I wear or test perfumes, I record it in the Perfume Diary. In the form below, “Purpose” is one of the choices for when/why I wore or tested that perfume, e.g., “office wear” or “weekend day” or “Work from home.” Type of use is either “wore” or “tested”; “Response” is a formalized evaluation of how I reacted to that perfume on that day – e.g., “Enjoyed it a lot” or “Mixed feelings” or “I hated it,” etc. And finally “My notes” contain a short free-form comment, whatever I want to write about that time I wore or tested perfume.

For those readers who haven’t been around when I was doing this series regularly, I want to explain what I mean when I say “tested” or “wore”: for testing I apply perfume to one area on my arms easily available for the repetitive sniffing. I can test two, sometimes even more perfumes at the same time. I do most of my testing in the evenings or while working from home. When I wear perfume, I apply it to at least three-four points, and usually I plan to spend at least 4-8 hours with the same scent so I’m prepared to re-apply if the original application wears off. After wearing a less tenacious perfume in the morning I might wear another one later. I wear perfumes mostly from bottles and decants; I wear perfumes from samples only when I consider buying a bottle or decant.

So, now when I explained how I collect data, let’s take a look at my 2017 in numbers.

178 Perfumes Worn

This year I wore more different perfumes than the year before – 178 (vs. 164 in 2016) from more brands – 72 (vs. 61) but did it less often – on 314 occasions (vs. 333).

Second year in a row Jo Malone was a brand I wore the most. I think it’s because these are my most “office friendly” perfumes. Neela Vermeire Creations made its way back into the Top 10 chart (last time it was here in 2014); while Le Labo fell completely off. The rest of the group just moved around but stayed on the chart, which isn’t surprising since I do not either update or expand my collection significantly any longer and keep wearing my favorites.

I tend to rotate perfumes I wear daily so I usually do not wear the same perfume even twice the same months – that’s how I go through that many different perfumes in a year. But I still managed to wear 67 perfumes more than once during 2017. Five perfumes I wore the most – Chanel No 19 (EdT, EdP and extrait), Lancôme Climat, Ormonde Jayne Ta’if, Krigler Lieber Gustav 14 and Armani La Femme Bleue.

Testing: Recording 300 and “carrying over” 1,000

This year was remarkable in regards to testing: in addition to the cursory testing of about 1,000 perfumes during my London – Barcelona – Stockholm trip (those didn’t go into my database – unless I scored a sample to bring back with me), I recorded testing at home 300 perfumes (vs. 275 last year) from 103 (vs. 100) brands. 134 of them were completely new to me (the rest I had tested before). I really liked/loved 24 of them, liked 20, thought that 56 were just not interesting and disliked 34.

Out if the 134 new for me perfumes that I tested, only 45 were released in 2017. Two of the 45 I liked enough to buy – Ineke Idyllwild and Sonoma Scent Studio Bee’s Bliss.

Has any of the 2017 releases joined your collection?

Images: my own

October 25, 2017 by Undina

Light and Shadows: Ineke Idyllwild

I’m a city person. I grew up in downtown of a big city, and I still would prefer to live in one of those. Moving to the Northern California suburbia wasn’t a conscious choice: work-related circumstances brought us here. But since we moved, San Francisco Bay Area became our home, and I love it.

There are many great things about this area but one of them that I want to mention in this post is that there are several great parks 30-90 minutes’ drive from where I live.

Idylwild, new perfume from the San Francisco-based brand INEKE, to my nose does not smell of any of the forests I’ve been to around here (and I’ve been to many different ones) but it perfectly evokes the image of California forest on a sunny day: as you follow the trail, you move from brightly sunlit areas through the mélange of light and shadows to dark patches and back to the bright openings.

Notes: rhubarb tea, grapefruit, lavender, Big Sur sagebrush, cypress, fir needle, cardamom, woods, oud and musk.

The moment I sprayed on Idyllwild, an unexpected association popped into my head: Christmas in July. Even if you’re familiar with the term, the association probably needs explaining.

This is one of those concepts, about which you are not aware until you either experience it yourself or come across it in some media. I grew up knowing about Christmas in the country that didn’t celebrate the “regular” one, let alone any other kind. After moving to the U.S., I embraced that holiday but until recently I haven’t heard about Christmas in July.

My knowledge about it came from the episode Murder Under the Mistletoe of the Australian series Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries. Not everybody who celebrates Christmas lives in areas that have winter, snow and everything else that accompanies Christmas celebration in Northern Hemisphere – for example, where I live it never snows – so for our winter-for-winter-holidays fix we usually drive to mountains but otherwise feel content with a single Christmas celebration. But it made some sense that living on the opposite side of the globe and having winter weather but offset 6 months related to Christmas, somebody would come up with the second celebration.

Back to my association. Idyllwild smells like Christmas in July but in the area where I live – meaning, a hot July Christmas. Why? All those evergreens and cardamom in the notes vividly conjure Christmas but unlike other Chistmas-y perfumes, for example, Fille en Aiguilles, Idyllwild starts so bright and light and cheerful that white and cold winter is the last thing that comes to mind. Grapefruit is as juicy as it can be and while it is citrus, I associate it more with summer than with Christmas (unlike oranges and mandarins). As it dries down, it transitions from the sunny territory into the shadowy wood full of fir needles – though you can still “see” glimpses of “light.” I can’t smell agarwood – real or not – but it is a plus for me. Idyllwild is not the most tenacious perfume I wear but it’s not the least either.

Woody Aromatic perfumes aren’t “my thing”: until now I had just a travel bottle and a small decant in this genre. But somehow Idyllwild captured me from the first time I put it on. So soon after that a bottle has joined my collection.

Speaking of the bottle, this was my only disappointment about this perfume. Starting from the letter “E,” Ineke decorated each of the bottles so beautifully that I was looking forward to the arrival of my new bottle hoping for a nice forest-themed artwork. The bottle is still the same they used before but this time it’s back to “blank” bottle. Coupled with a slightly changed box – a generic box and a dust jacket with the perfume name on it instead of a “designated” printed box, it seems like the brand cheapened the packaging a little. But as long as they do not compromise on their scents quality, I won’t complain much.

Rusty and Ineke Idyllwild

I was almost ready to publish this post yesterday but I couldn’t finish working with pictures in time. Last thing before going to bed I checked my inbox and was surprised by a coincidence: Lucas (Chemist in the Bottle) published his review of the same perfume. He liked it as well. You might want to check it out if you’re curious what the perfumer told him about this perfume in a private conversation.

Images: my own

March 23, 2017 by Undina

Know-How: Brands with Perfumista Size Bottles

For years I keep repeating that more brands should release their perfumes in perfumista size bottles – 10-15 ml. Of course, for somebody who has a signature scent or alternates 2-3 perfumes in their day-to-day life, 50 ml, 100 ml or even 200 ml bottles might make more sense both economically and logically. But for anybody who has been “into perfume” for at least several years, not too many perfumes warrant the vats, in which most perfumes nowadays are sold.

Sure, big bottles are great for splits; and decants are nice for getting to wear something without committing your heart or money to a full bottle. But even the best decant – with well-made labels and a good sprayer – is still not as good as a real bottle. And I suspect that, as a rule, it has a shorter shelf life, even if you use parafilm or electrical tape to prevent evaporation: the act of spraying perfume from the original bottle into a smaller receptacle introduces additional oxidation to the juice, which cannot be healthy (should we add a blueberry or two?).

For all these reasons for anything more than 3-5 ml I would rather pay extra price per ml but get a travel bottle from the brand – if the brand has that option.

Surprisingly, when it comes to niche brands, those that offer smaller sizes are still rather an exception than a rule. So I decided to put together a list of the brands that offer smaller (perfumista size) bottles of their perfumes. I won’t include links since those change but it’s easy to find them through a search engine.

The following brands have single bottles for all or most of their perfumes (bottle size is given in parentheses):

April Aromatics (15 ml)
Frederic Malle (10 ml)
Hiram Green (10 ml)
Histoires de Parfums (15 ml)
Le Labo (15 ml)
Sonoma Scent Studio (4 ml & 17 ml)
Jul et Mad (5 ml & 20 ml)
Cognoscenti (5 ml)
Dame Perfumery (5 ml)
DSH Perfumes (multiple sizes)
EnVoyage Perfumes (15 ml)
4160 Tuesdays (9 ml)
Roja Dove (7.5 ml)
The Different Company (10 ml)
Puredistance (17.5ml)

Several brands have smaller sizes just for some of their perfumes:

Atelier Cologne (12 different perfumes in 7.5 ml at Sephora)
Juliette Has A Gun (4 different perfumes in 7.5 ml at Sephora)
Ineke (15 ml, Floral Curiosities line only)

More brands recently have introduced the “travel” option – probably as a response to the air travel regulations. Unfortunately, those come in sets either of single perfume or of pre-selected (or all) perfumes from the brand. Single perfume sets are easier for friendly splits. Mixed sets defeat the purpose: how often does someone like all the perfumes in the set? I also found two brands that offer customizable mixed travel sets.

Single perfume sets:

Neela Vermeire Creations (2 x 15 ml)
Ormonde Jayne (4 x 10 ml)
Amouage (3 x 10 ml)
By Kilian (4 x 7.5 ml)
Byredo (3 x 12 ml)
Maison Francis Kurkdjian (3 x 10 ml)
Aedes de Venustas (3 x 7.5 ml)

Customizable mixed sets:

Hermès (4 x 15 ml sets for both their regular line and Hermessence)
Tauer Perfumes (3 x 15 ml)

Pre-set mixed perfumes sets:

Viktoria Minya (5 x 15 ml)
Maison Francis Kurkdjian (8 x 10 ml)
Miller Harris (3 x 14 ml and 2 x 7.5 ml)
Aedes de Venustas (3 x 7.5 ml)

If you know any other brands that offer small bottles in one of these categories, please share in comments. And if you agree that more brands should have perfumista size bottles, keep repeating that whenever you publish a review on your blog or comment on perfume reviews and discussions on blogs, forums, FB or Twitter. Somebody might be reading…

Updates from comments:

Maria Candida Gentile (7 ml and 15 ml single bottles)
Zoologist (11 ml single bottles)
Parfums MDCI (5 x 10 ml customizable set)
Memo (3 x 10 ml same perfume set)
Imaginary Authors (14 ml single bottles)
Maison Anonyme (10 ml single bottles)
Olympic Orchids (5 ml and 15 ml single bottles)
Soivohle (10 ml single bottles)
Ormonde Jayne (10 ml single bottles if you call)
Profvmvm Roma (18 ml single bottles for some of their scents)

Images: my own

March 2, 2017 by Undina

A Month of Roses: Conclusion, Statistics and the Draw Winner

It was a great month filled with great perfumes. I’m so glad Lucas came up with this idea. While I’m not sure I’m ready to do another month of any particular note, I’m thinking about a couple of note-themed weeks (and even doing one already – but that’s the topic for the next post).

Rose Perfumes for Week 4

February 22: Le Jardin Retrouvé Rose Trocadéro

A beautiful and extremely realistic in the opening rose. And it has my favorite black currant. I like it and actually plan to wear my sample, which I don’t do too often. But I’m not sure if I want more: it’s a rose soliflore, and it comes only in a HUGE 125 ml bottle. But it’s very nice, and I recommend testing this perfume if you get a chance.

February 23: Keiko Mecheri Mogador

I was supposed to wear another perfume but I couldn’t find the sample in the morning, so I decided to wear Mogador again. Loved it.

February 24: Atelier Cologne Rose Anonyme

I had a large sample of Rose Anonyme, which I was testing periodically when I wanted to compare it to something else. When I scheduled it for wearing, I didn’t realize how little I had left in my sample. When I applied it first, very sparingly, I thought that I didn’t like it at all and was surprised since I remembered liking it more. But in the evening when I didn’t try to save it and put on the remains of my sample, it smelled much better – the way I remembered it from before. But I don’t think I need more Rose Anonyme in my life.

February 25: Ineke Briar Rose

This is the only perfume from Ineke’s Floral Curiosities Collection, for which I do not have a travel bottle-book. It wasn’t by choice: they didn’t have it on sale at the time when I bought the other four, mostly just to have those “books.” But I had a sample in the set (the one, with which Rusty is playing on the picture above). I didn’t remember what I thought about Briar Rose but I remembered that Blacknall (aperfumeblog by Blacknall Allen) liked this perfume enough to go through the full bottle at some point. So I decided to give it a go. It’s not bad but I won’t want to wear it.

February 26: April Aromatics Rosenlust

One more change of plans: I got this sample with my purchase and wanted to re-test it. It’s a lemony rose – very natural and beautiful. But it’s just a rose. With many other rose-centric perfumes in my collection Rosenlust does not cross that line from “nice to have” to “need to have.”

February 27: Lancome Mille et Une Roses

This is one of my favorite perfumes; I enjoy wearing it every time. And I love its color. A couple of years ago I paired it with the second equation in my post A Simple Equation Or In the Search for the Perfect Rose.

February 28: Hermès Rose Ikebana

I left Rose Ikebana for the last day of the month because I thought it would be warm by then. I was wrong. We are having an unusually cold for our area winter (not that I’m complaining: it’s nice for a change; and it comes with long-expected rain), so Rose Ikebana was a little too light for the weather. But it still wore nicely.

February Statistics

Rose perfumes I wore: 27 (but two of them I wore twice)

Rose perfumes I tested: 5 (yes, it wasn’t enough that I wore a rose-centric perfume each day, I managed to test 5 more rose perfumes during that month)

Samples finished: 4

New bottles of rose perfumes: 1 (bought); 3 (being considered)

23 people left 75 comments for the Month of Roses posts. 34 of those comments had mentioning of the rose perfumes worn in the spirit of the Month of Roses – and, as I promised, they all were included into the draw for two bars of local artisan chocolates.

And the Winner is…

According to random.org, the winner is the most diligent commenter – hajusuuri! Congratulations! Now it’s your time to choose whether you want two bars of dark chocolate, milk chocolate, or one of each.

Shall we do it again next year?

Images: my own

December 13, 2015 by Undina

Scented Gift Ideas 2015

I always wanted to do a post about winter holidays gifts (for my family and close friends it’s more about the New Year gifts than those for Christmas). But usually I was doing my shopping in B&M stores, so whichever interesting items I would find there I usually couldn’t recommend to my readers. This year in general and November-December in particular were so hectic for me that most of my holiday shopping was and still is happening online. So I decided to share with you my scented gift ideas.

Disclaimer: This is not a sponsored post in any form and it doesn’t contain affiliate links.

***

While choosing perfume for somebody else is a very tricky task, some brands make it easier for both the giver and the recipient. So I’ll start with the brand that had changed my attitude towards gifting people with perfumes.

Ineke offers two discovery sets – Scent Library and Deluxe Sample Collection – both are beautifully presented and, at the price of $25 including S&H and $15 coupon towards the full bottle purchase, are perfect stocking stuffers. And if you’ve previously bought one of these and are thinking about a bottle, now is great time to go for it to take advantage of the free shipping until December 25th.

Atelier Cologne, the brand that I really appreciate, offers a good variety of stocking stuffers and gifts, starting from $18 (I’m still contemplating trying one of their soaps) plus free US & Hong Kong delivery until December 25th and free personalization for travel sprays. And if you’re serious about giving somebody special a gift of perfume, I think that their latest offering – a gift card (minimum $70) that includes 12 samples – is a great idea.

Concluding the perfume-giving part of this post, I want to mention that Dame Perfumery‘s 5 ml trial size of Black Flower Mexican Vanilla for $10 including S&H is an absolute steal! Other perfumes are also available from that link.

For those who would still rather not venture into gifting perfumes, there are other options:

Perfumed Lace Garden bracelet or Alahine scented ceramic tile from Teo Cabanel. None of them will break the bank. And for those who’s looking for something more indulgent, there’s always By Killian with his scented jewelry collections (these are new ones) and Frederic Malle’s rubber incense.

I’ve recently discovered Beautyspin online store and I want to share it with you. You’ll have to overlook the percentage they promise you’re saving or the referenced “retail price” – those are pure fictional numbers. But their prices are very good (and sometimes you can find an additional discount code).

Check out these perfect stocking stuffers: Myrrhe Ardente, Encens Flamboyant and Musc Nomade shower gels ($3.35–$5.19) by Annick Goutal or Bottega Veneta Pour Homme shower gel ($29).

After Rusty showed to me what I should do with the beautiful Amouage Dia soap, I decided that it would be a great holiday gift and bought Memoir and Epic perfumed soaps from Beautyspin ($24 each). Now I’m trying to persuade myself that those are great holiday gifts for somebody else since I still haven’t opened my Dia soap.

The person for whom you’re shopping for gifts is not into perfume-y scents? How about a fresh cut pine or coffee smell? Try these firestarters ($10 each):

And finally, if you want to steer clear of imposing any scent choice on your giftees, you might consider Blue Q You Smell Delicious socks ($9.99).

Will you be giving any scented gifts this year?

November 5, 2013 by Undina

Entertaining Statistics: October 2013

October was very warm (too warm if you talk to my vSO), with no rain (which isn’t good whoever you talk to) and a lot of work (no comments). I’m hopelessly behind reading blogs and commenting and I suspect my testing is hitting an all-time record low so I’m glad that this month I decided my readers to help again with the data for the October statistics post.

I asked my readers: Have you ever given a perfume as a gift not knowing beforehand that the recipient wanted to get/liked that specific perfume?

I’ve got thirty-one answers (plus my response). Respondents came from 10 different countries (and 2 not disclosed locations). Out of 32 votes, 22 reported more or less successful perfume-giving experience and 10 stated that they’d never given a gift of an “unsolicited” perfume. It would be interesting to conduct a similar study on a control group of people who do not consider themselves perfumistas.

Until today I’ve hidden only draws announcements in the body of my posts. Today I reached new heights: I’m not mentioning the results of the draw in the headline. But – as I promised – here we go: according to random.org the winner of the Scent Library by Ineke is hajusuuri (#10). Please contact me with your mailing address.

For those who didn’t win: consider buying this limited edition set as a collector item before it’s gone. I have absolutely no financial interest in posting this, it’s just a “public service” type of post. I decided that I will buy one set for my collection. Rusty approves.

October 26, 2013 by Undina

A Gift of Perfume

At fourteen I swapped my first love, to which I held on for four years, for a new imaginary relationship. I do not mean that the other person didn’t exist: S. was a perfectly real 15-years old boy I met and befriended during the summer break. Our romance started months later, as the result of the frequent letters exchange, real hand-written letters sent over the regular post. Since we lived a 6-hours bus ride apart, in two years that it all lasted we spent together less than three weeks and even that was only because we had smart and understanding parents who would organize carefully supervised his visits to my city or my trips to his. We would write every 3-5 days, talk on the phone once in a while (long distance calls were expensive) and spend together several days during school breaks.

Where I lived back then, being a rare and expensive commodity, perfumes were not just acceptable but rather desirable gifts and not just for romantically involved people or relatives: a bottle of perfume could be gifted by parents to a kindergarten teacher, offered as a “special thank you” to a doctor by a patient or presented to the retiring accountant by colleagues. Personal tastes weren’t taken into the consideration. As today most people wouldn’t think twice before bringing a bottle of wine as a gift, the same way people felt about giving a perfume while knowing nothing about recipients’ preferences.

S. was the first person in my life to whom I gave a perfume as a gift. It was cologne Tête-à-Tête produced by Nouvelle Etoile (Moscow). I remember that I liked the scent but I have almost no recollection about how it smelled. I don’t know if S. liked and wore Tête-à-Tête: it hadn’t come up in our correspondence and six month later he outgrew our love story. I wonder if I would have recognized it today. It’s still in production but I decided not to chase it either in its modern or in the vintage form: since I smelled Tête-à-Tête only from the bottle I have no nostalgic feelings about it.

***

It’s hard to predict whether I would like a perfume – even though I know my tastes, read notes and other people’s impressions. So with other people it’s almost impossible to guess the right perfume for them. And for many years I steered clear of gifting people with perfumes unless I knew which one they liked. The brand that has changed it for me is INEKE.

On my last trip to Ukraine I brought two travel bottles from Ineke’s Floral Curiosities line – Poet’s Jasmine and Sweet William – as gifts to two of the relatives who do not wear perfumes much but I thought would appreciate them: not revolutionary but pleasant perfumes created by a perfumer from the city where I live (well, if you look from Europe) and with the impossibly cute packaging (I couldn’t resist and bought four “books” for my collection). Both recipients liked their gifts.

With upcoming holidays that involve family gatherings and gift exchanges, I want to suggest a perfect, in my opinion, gift for somebody who isn’t into perfumes, is in the beginning of their fragrant journey or uses mainstream perfumes primarily: Scent Library from Ineke. It’s a set of samples of all five perfumes in the Floral Curiosities line presented in an unbelievably attractive package. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a presentation of samples with more attention to the smallest detail. For $22 (including S&H) you’re almost guaranteed to get a smile from your mom or sister who still remembers old library system with the paper pocket in each book and library cards or a conversation with a younger niece about the changes that happen during the lifetime of any generation, hand-written letters and rotary phones. And if they end up liking any of the perfumes in the set they will be able to redeem the full price of the set against any 75 ml bottle purchase from the site.

Scent Library set was sent to me by the brand (without any conditions). I haven’t decided yet if I should get one for my collection: I love it but I have four perfumes from the set already and the packaging of each fragrance “book” that I bought is almost as cute as the one for the Library. Meanwhile I decided to have a draw for the set I’ve got. It’s new but I sprayed one of the samples twice (Briar Rose) and Rusty “helped” me with the pictures. I will send it anywhere in the world but I won’t be responsible for the package if your postal service decides it’s too cute dangerous and destroys it.

Usually I don’t have any special conditions for entering into my draws but this time I have a requirement. To be entered into the draw answer the question below (I’m gathering data for this month’s statistics post) and tell me the country where you live (this way I’ll know that you want to be in the draw). If you do not want to enter, just answer the question for my stats. I’ll close the draw on Thursday, October 31 PDT, and announce the winner in the October Entertaining Statistics post in the beginning of November.

Have you ever given a perfume as a gift not knowing beforehand that the recipient wanted to get/liked that specific perfume?

Images: Tête-à-Tête from some auction site; all others – my own

Undina's Looking Glass

Perfumed Reflections of Life

Ineke

Scent Semantics #6: VERNAL

Brand Appreciation: INEKE

* Disclaimer: it is not a sponsored post. Also, I’ve never received any promotional or free items from the brand (if not to count a hand-made sample I got at the event once, but it wasn’t as a blogger).

What I Wore Wednesday: Perfume Advent Calendar 2021, Week 2