perfume shopping

Y by Yves Saint Laurent 1964
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Y by Yves Saint Laurent 1964

Hi there Crew, Yves Saint Laurent is one of the big names in fashion that I’ve followed since childhood. When they took his first name from the brand it changed the way the houses name felt in my mouth. Suddenly one of the most forward, modern, beautiful fashion houses of the world sounded like a budget brand trying to be sophisticated. Saint Laurent sounds cheap and desperate to me, Yves Saint Laurent sounds like a couture house. Yes, you can disagree, we will still be friends. No, I will never buy anything with the label Saint Laurent.

Fortunately the beauty side of the business remains YSL and, of course, so do its vintage perfumes. Y has long been a favourite and a few years ago I stockpiled quite a bit of it. More than enough for two lifetimes even if it was the only perfume I wore. Since then I have sold or given as gifts over a litre of the EdT and still have enough to wear without being parsimonious; basically forever.

Y by Yves Saint Laurent 1964

Y by Yves Saint Laurent 1964

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Aldehydes Green Notes Galbanum Honeysuckle Gardenia Peach Mirabelle Plum Heart: Hiacynth Orris Root Ylang-Ylang Jasmine Tuberose Bulgarian Rose
Base: Oakmoss Civet Vetiver Patchouli Sandalwood Benzoin Styrax

The reason I’m writing about Y? Well, on Saturday night I hosted a Studio 54 Hen’s Party. What else do you wear to a Studio 54 party than an aldehydic galbanum bomb floral chypre? So Y got the wear.

It was perfect. It helped me maintain my composure in the face of 50 screaming hens with no microphone. You have NO IDEA how much noise they made, it was bedlam. We all had a ball and my voice next morning was a croak.

Do you remember Y? Maybe you wear or wore it, or someone you know?
Let me know in the comments. I love to read your thoughts.
Portia xx

Miller et Bertaux. Do You?
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Miller et Bertaux. Do You?

Hey ULG Crew, Miller et Bertaux are a couple of art dudes who ventured into fragrance 2006 with a strange set of three scents. #1 (For You) Parfum Trouvé, #2 Spiritus / Land and #3 Green, Green, Green and… Green. Originally intended as a mix and match trio, same base with different top & heart to be worn separately or together. I’m not sure how prevalent layering was at the time because up to that point all my information about perfume was coming from magazines and SAs. The scentbloggosphere and the online life of perfumistas didn’t come till a couple of years after here.

Anyway, at some point I came across the brand and was instantly smitten. My first purchase was around 2012 A Quiet Morning (2008) and it still makes my heart beat faster. Now I think there are 10 or more of their fragrances in my collection but three get more wear than any others. They stay out on my wardrobe perfume grab tray perennially and often get the spritz. Having worn two of them this week I thought maybe we could chat about them.

Hopefully some of you know the brand and can tell me your faves, likes, hates in the comments. Chatting with you all makes me happy.

Miller et Bertaux. Do You?

Miller et Bertaux. Do You?

A Quiet Morning (2008)

Dry and scratchy spiced saffron and woods. It’s supposed to have rice in it too but I can’t smell it at all. This is about as zen as a fragrance can get while still being a rocking great beauty.

Indian Study/ Santal +++ (2017)

A dry sandalwood, bone dry. Yet it still manages to feel creamy. Yeah, I don’t know how they do it either. It also has some of the harshness on open that I attribute to the Australian Sandalwood.

Pimiento +++ (2020)

You’re dreaming. In that dream you are cutting chillies and bell peppers. The juice is all over your fingers. When you lift your hand to your face in your dream, this is the fantasy your mind smells.

 

So, do you have any, or have you smelled some, of the Miller et Bertaux line?

Portia xx

CHANEL Les Eaux De Chanel
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CHANEL Les Eaux De Chanel

Hiya ULG crew, Time got away from me this week. I had even gone and purchased the newest Eaux, Paris – Paris, so we could chat about it. Yesterday got hijacked by Jin though and a whole bunch of stuff didn’t get done. This is not a complaint. Jin did overnight overtime both Saturday and Sunday this weekend. That’s two EXTRA 12 hour shifts for the week. Basically he worked 7 days straight. He got an ADO on Monday, yesterday. So though we had seen glimpses of each other over the weekend it wasn’t real time. Given yesterday we took it and did stuff together. We went to the Dr, had some bloodwork done, checked a problem and fixed it temporarily at the new investment apartment, did some shopping, cut up a slew of veggies and cooked pork and then sat companionably together producing and eating Vietnamese Rolls while watching TV. Then when he hit the hay I wrote my TRIVIA Q&A for the week and after finishing was completely bushed.

Though all this happened yesterday. It meant today I had to do the apartment cleaning and other stuff usually done on a Monday. Fortunately it’s raining so hard laundry is out of the question. Hopefully there will be some sunshine later in the week for that.

Here we are. I’m not going to lie. There’s a window of about 20 minutes before i have to start putting my make up on for work tonight. Instead of writing about Paris – Paris today I offer you this picture.

Are you wearing Les Eaux De Chanel if you are in the Northern Hemisphere? Did you even try them?

My take is that the bottles are gorgeous, the fragrances beautiful (if fleeting) and the whole concept is kept extremely affordable for a luxury/aspirational brand. It’s still not cheap but coming from CHANEL I was pleasantly surprised at the price point.

Have Les Eaux De Chanel made their way into your heart or collection?
Portia xx

Bouquet de Hongrie BDK Parfums
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Bouquet de Hongrie BDK Parfums

Hey ULGers, BDK Parfums are a brand I look out for. They have quite a few lovely perfumes. They’re mostly safe, elegant remixes of things you’ve smelt before but with a little twist. Perfect if you like to be scented but for it to be something quiet and restrained. Their Creme de Cuir is one of my favourite under the radar leathers, there is something totally luxurious about wearing a fragrance that is just for you, and those you allow very close.

Bouquet de Hongrie by BDK Parfums

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Yop: Pear, Strawberry, Cassis
Heart: Turkish Rose, Jasmine Sambac, Lorenox
Base: Musk, Amber, Cedar

From the note list I had expectations. Which you’d think after smelling perfume for decades I’d have grown out of. In my head it was going to smell quite like a sister to SJP Stash Unspoken or Burberry Britt for her. It doesn’t.

What it does smell like to me is peony petals and cherry blossom. Real peony and the perfumers shorthand for cherry blossom. It’s ridiculously pretty and delightful. Imagine one of the L’Occitane shower gels done with refined ingredients and you’re pretty much there. Actually, having worn Bouquet de Hongrie for a week in Bali, and read your comments on Sakura two weeks ago, I now know exactly what it smells like. It smells like a posh version of those Victoria’s Secret body mists you can buy for a couple of $$.

Bouquet de Hongrie BDK Parfums

If you’re after something sophisticated then you’ll be bitterly disappointed.

Thing is, I like it. It’s so femme leaning and feels like I should be wearing a short, ruffled, lacy frock in a strong pastel colour somewhere between peach and strawberry. The incongruity of me, a 53 year old hefty chunk of silver daddy, wearing it makes me smile like I’m being deliberately subversive. Musette wrote a short while ago about this very thing on Perfume Posse and I’ve been embracing it. Sorry I can’t find the piece because her musings ramble about, throwing up oodles of bits and pieces.

Projection and longevity are moderate to low, it softens considerably after about 30 minutes to a quiet jammy peony/cherry wash. It could be your fabric softener if you spent some big $$$$ on it.

What I REALLY like is that BDK makes these strong, beautiful 10ml Travel Sprays. There are 2 three packs and some singles available here in OZ but I bet there’s oodles more choice elsewhere. You can see my Bouquet de Hongrie is already over 2/3 spritzed.

Does Bouquet de Hongrie sound like a scent you’d wear?
Portia xx

Sakura by DIOR
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Sakura by DIOR

Hi there crew. we are having a moment of remarkably spring-like weather. When I say remarkable I mean EVERYONE is saying it feels like spring. In almost every conversation. As banal and boring as that sounds, it does. We have had such a weird, wet, cool summer that finding ourselves in autumn and having these glorious sunshiny days, not too hot, is blissful.

On top of that my courtesy aunt, Aunty Tracey, is in town for a week and we are out day & night on adventures. We’ve been shopping, visiting, visiting the graves of our dead, lunching and generally hanging out in the daytimes. Every trivia she has come and Jin has accompanied. It’s been wonderful. Writing this on Thursday and I’m BUSHED! We only have a few more days but both Jin & I are definitely going to need a rest.

Sakura by DIOR

Sakura by DIOR

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Green Notes
Heart: Japanese Cherry Blossom, Rose, Jasmine, Hedione
Base: Mimosa, Violet, White Musk

Sakura is astringently sweet and green on open, like cherry, alcohol, and citrus pith. Soon it gets a soft fluffy feeling like to cool, softness of rubbing cherry blossom petals against your cheek. It smells like that feeling. As if it was in the cool late winter morning sunshine.

The heart is mimosa, cherry(isa) and something I can not put a name to. Like what I think the fur of a bee might smell like. Animal, honey, floral and something else.

As we head to dry down clean musks lead the charge to fade.

Sakura is lovely and I really like to wear it. It doesn’t smell like an expensive perfume though. It smells like a cheapy. Maybe I’m missing something here. If you’re a big fan could you explain please?

Low key, pretty, smells nice, lasts OK. Perfect for the young, people who want a fragrance but need it to be under the radar. Also good for those that like functional fragrance but don’t like perfume perfume. A perfectly poised sweet nothing that whispers spring.

Are you doing soft fruity florals like Sakura this Spring?
Porttia xx

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Fan di Fendi pour Homme

Hi there Looking Glass Crew, Fendi was one of my favourite brands way back in the heady days of my fashion course and short stint in the industry. They were doing extraordinary things with fur and leather. It was also the days of the beginning of the anti fur brigade. It took me a long time to realise exactly what they were against and join their legion. I did have a vintage black rabbit coat (not Fendi) in the 1990s that was given to me as I left for the UK, a hand me down from my friend Chelsea’s Mum. It got worn till it fell apart in my hands as I was putting it on. That was a very sad night, and I FROZE without it. So while I was browsing FragranceNet a while back and I saw a 7ml spritz Fan di Fendi pour Homme I pounced. Fendi no longer makes perfumes, the SA in our Sydney flagship store told me! So it might be my last chance to smell it.

I was also really happy with the tie in to Undina’s recent Travel Size Scent Semantics post.

Fan di Fendi pour Homme 2012

Fan di Fendi pour Homme

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Leather, Woody Notes, Cardamom, Pink Pepper, Citruses, Basil

Traditional male fragrance. Opens green herbal and woody with a pleasant lick of sweetness. Fan di Fendi pour Homme smells like something from the 1980s. It’s brawny masculinity is comfortable and a little sexy.

This is pretty much what the train suits used to smell of when I was at school. It was a lovely, cozy scent to greet me each morning. Over the top of the regular train smells and the few women in the carriage this woodsy, pine-is herbaceousness sailed over all.

Hardly any movement in the scent. It’s fairly linear after the first five minutes.

Fan di Fendi pour Homme

This is a happy, very masculine leaning fragrance but I really think women would smell better wearing it today. On a guy it would be nice, on a woman it would be surprising.

It’s quite large on open but not obnoxious. Longevity is extremely good. I can still smell wispy woodsy remnants over 24 hours later. The bottle looks like it would have been bloody gorgeous! I do love an inbuilt spritzer within the lid or body.

Do I wish I had a bottle? No. This mini will do me. It would be fun to wear it for a whole holiday and make that scent my memory of somewhere.

Do you like a traditional masculine?
Portia xx

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Musette made me Jean Nate

Hey Crew, Do you ever read a blog post and suddenly your are pressing PayPal on your favourite online perfume store or discounter? Right, well not long ago over at Perfume Posse Musette waxed lyrical about Jean Nate. It’s always been her go to summer spritz after bathing but it had never been talked about so fulfillingly. Suddenly I had to know. So I bought a cheap 8oz after bath splash mist bottle off FragranceNet, seriously it cost about the price of a McDonalds burger. More recently Tom had a swoon over it too.

Jean Nate (now by Revlon) 1935

Musette made me Jean Nate

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Lemon Bergamot Lavender
Heart: Geranium Spicy Notes Rose Jasmine Lily-of-the-Valley
Base: Musk Sandalwood Tonka Bean Virginia Cedar

So, after all this lead up, what does Jean Nate smell like?

A softly refreshing cologne. The spices and lavender give citrus a frosting of elegance. It’s nothing amazing or extraordinary but it is a pleasant, very short lived scent. I’m lucky to be able to smell it an hour later.

I’m not sure what note or accord it is but I get a definite smell of base humanity as an undercurrent. As if after showering you need to get those lived in, slightly feral aspects back onto your body ASAP.

As the northern hemisphere warms up it might be a good additive if your perfume wardrobe is without a bright, sparkling cologne. Much less zingy than 4711. Jean Nate is more sophisticated and deeper.

Have you tried Jean Nate or do you have memories of a wearer?
Portia xx

 

 

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Tzora by Anat Fritz

Hi there Crew, You might remember a couple of years ago NarthScent wrote a post about green perfumes called A Magical Greenery Tour. She had confessed to not being a green lover and I sent 11 samples of fabulous greens to change her stance. Mission accomplished. One of the fragrances I sent is a very under the radar perfume called Tzora by Anat Fritz.

Tzora by Anat Fritz

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Cedar, Pepper, Vetiver, Clary Sage, Patchouli, Bergamot, Moss, Black Currant, Osmanthus, Musk, Magnolia, Jasmine

Vetiver, oily, green, fresh, crisp and dark surrounded by a bunch of other stuff and I have always thought this had a big dollop of lavender in it too. I can’t even think what notes have blended to give such a striking scent reference to it but there it is. Even when I know it’s not a major player I still smell it.

If I were going for analogy (and clearly I am) I’d be telling you it smells like leaving a cool, after rain forest and heading into a garden. Herbs on one side, flowers on the other. Tsora starts out quite wild and slowly relaxes into a lightly shaded, comfortable garden seat. You might have even rubbed some leaves with your legs and fingers. The garden smells alive and fecund.

Completely unisex but leaning slightly towards traditional modern menswear. Not manly though. No chest beating neanderthal would want to smell like this. Urbane and clever women and men. They like to stand out for quality, not for weirdness.

Way back in 2013 Azar did such a fun review of Tzora on APJ. Definitely worth a reread.

Did you ever fall for one of the Anat Fritz fragrances?
Portia xx

 

Scotch Lavender by Oriza L. Legrand
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Scotch Lavender by Oriza L. Legrand

Hi there crew, Back in 2019 I got a bunch of samples with a big order from FIF. I gave them all a cursory sniff and wrote about a few in passing but then put the bag away and completely forgot about them. This is a constant theme in my life. part of having too much of just about everything because I’m a spoiled brat. Anyway, I rediscovered this bag of goodies while searching out something else and noted an Oriza L Legrand sticker on a paper envelope. Colour me excited already. These guys make perfume that sings for me.

Scotch Lavender by Oriza L. Legrand

Scotch Lavender Oriza L. Legrand

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Lavender, Thyme, Bergamot
Heart: Lavender, Geranium, Vetiver
Base: Tonka Bean, Benzoin, Amber

LAVENDER, cool, smooth, refreshing and calming, lightly sugared and set among some greenery. It’s simple, herbal and balm for my soul. Not 1000 miles from my all time favourite lavender, Caron Pour Un Homme. Less confectionary after the first minute and much more dark greenery. There is also that fabulous oily, inkiness, lightly salted that is what a lot of vetivers smell like to me. Matched perfectly with the spicy sharp rosiness of geranium.

The heart begins mildly medicinal. I’ve not smelled lavender treated quite like it. It’s a bit like lavender and an Asian apothecary shop had a baby. Beautiful and nose intriguing. Through the long lasting heart I’m compelled to come back and sniff myself, checking if it’s still so unusual. The base stays true to the heart but warms through with emery resins till fade.

Last week I went to the season launch of one of Australia’s biggest distributors. We sniffed dozens of things. My eyebrows tend to jump at the excitement of smelling something new or impressive. Sadly, though everything was lovely, I was among friends, was really ready to be excited and feeling happy within myself; almost nothing even registered an eyebrow lift. It was just more of the same boring lazy muck. It was a little soul destroying. Sure, I’m jaded, yes I’ve sniffed a LOT of perfume. Still, I’m usually enthused by about a quarter of the new offerings. Yesterday only Penhaligon’s: Constantinople and Maison Crivelli: Hibiscus Mahajád excited me. So, to find this beauty among an old baggie of samples has renewed my faith in modern perfumery.

Lavender seems to have made a renaissance in the last few years. I’m loving the different directions we are smelling come through. Scotch Lavender feels like an old theme reviewed and renewed for the 21st century.

Perfectly unisex and both sillage and longevity are moderate plus. The early hour is quite diffusive and its unusual timbre give it that, “um… what?” value too.

I’m pretty sure Oriza L. Legrand still sends to the world. If you’re shopping try their soaps as well. SO GOOD!

Do you have a lavender?
Portia x

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L’Heure Folle X by Cartier. Full 180 Degree Turn

Hi there Crew, L’Heure Folle X by Cartier was originally a hard no for me. There was something in its make up that used to give me the heebee geebees. It may even have been March’s Perfume Posse review that sent me down the dark path of dislike. Anyway, her canned fruit analogy had me smelling ptomaine poisoning when I tried it too. Let’s skitch forward to the relatively near now. I was in at Cartier buying a bottle of another one of the L’Heure series and the lovely gent serving me said his favourite was X. Not remembering my previous distaste for it I gave myself a couple of decent blasts and walked out the door. Thinking what an absolute doll he’d been and loving this weird assed fragrance, which I now indelibly think of as his scent. So while doing some shopping a few months ago on FragranceNet I saw a tester bottle for under 1/3 of what a full presentation costs me here in Oz I jumped on it SO FAST! I just looked and they still have a few. SHH!

L’Heure Folle X by Cartier 2009

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Blueberry, Grenadine, Ivy, Red Currant, Black Currant, Boxwood, Violet, Pink Pepper

While this will not resonate with our Northern Hemisphere readers it’s currently 37C (98.6F) and incredibly humid here in Sydney. We’ve had a gloriously rainy summer so far and the sunshine is sucking the water out of the ground and it’s like walking through a fish tank.

That has me reaching for the cooling, sweet beauty of L’Heure Folle X. It’s funny, now that I love it my nose can’t even remember how much I hated it.

The opening is a chill fruity gelato. So sweet it’s sharp. Vibrant and fun but so beautifully blended. I can’t really taste the exact fruits but L’Heure Folle X has that crystalline effect of really good gelato. Cleansing and refreshing.

Through the heart the fruits are joined by greenery. It’s a broken twig and leaf scent. Very green. Do you ever trim your hedge with electric clippers? That scent, even with the very faint zing of metal. The fragrance maintains this stasis for the rest of it’s life till fade.

Unisex but leaning traditional modern femme. I think the ivy keeps the whole fragrance smack bang on for both sexes. Average longevity and not very large projection but it is noticeable.

Sound like something you’d wear?
Portia xx