Chanel Coco

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Chanel Coco is resting near the top of my favorite Chanel perfumes list. This fragrance couldn’t be any further from its younger incarnation, the pink and bubbly Coco Mademoiselle.

Chanel Coco

In Bottle: Add in spice for warm, a wispy thread of flowers, and a delicately peeled citrus note. Coco smells warm right off the bat with a bit of citrus to clean it up.

Applied: Coco wastes no time just digging into this. It comes off spicy right away, throwing cinnamon and clove at you to warm itself up as the citrus and wispy flowers quickly give way to the midstage where we’re greeted with a delightfully clean, spicy, warm jasmine and rose complex. A lot of perfumes rely on jasmine and rose together but that never seems to make the combination any less beautiful–particularly when it’s used in such a fine tuned balanced such as in Coco. There is the smallest drop of civet in this during the later half of the midstage. The civet in Coco is so well done and well balanced. I don’t normally like it in perfumes but this civet blends really well with the overarching spicy cleanness that the note adds a depth and sensual feel to the fragrance without making it smell too harsh and alienating. The dry down is an equally spicy amber with a hint of sandalwood and a smooth layer of tonka.

Extra: Chanel Coco was released in 1984 and was composed by Chanel’s in house perfumer, Jacques Polge. It is a little sad to see that when you do a search for “Chanel Coco”, most of the results come back for Coco Mademoiselle.

Design: Like most of Chanel’s other widely popular fragrances, Coco comes in various packaging. If you go for the full service parfum concentration deal you get a glass rectangular bottle so often associated with No. 5. Coco’s bottle has a black seal band running around the neck and a black label.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Oriental

Notes: Angelica, mimosa, frangipani, mandarin, cascarilla, orange flower, Bulgarian rose, jasmine, labdanum, ambrette seed, opopanax, benzoin, tonka, vanilla.

Like with most Chanel fragrances, Coco lasts a very long, very impressive time. She’s a sophisticated lady and entirely wearable considering the era it came out in.

Reviewed in This Post: Coco, 2009, Eau de  Parfum.

Guerlain Jicky

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So Jicky, what do you want me to say about you? Well, I ask because everyone the world over has already said what they wanted. It just seems I’d only add yet another opinion to the already loaded mix of what makes Jicky tick. Ah well, let’s give it a stab anyway. I started off this blog reviewing Mitsouko of all things! Jicky

In Bottle: Spicy lavender, warmed up and dotted with a slight citrus topper in the opening. Jicky is immediately alarming and comforting at the same time.

Applied: Initial flare up of citrus, a big yellow splash in the opening to get you ready for the lavender that rolls in soon after. The lavender really shines with Jicky for me. It’s normally a comforting scent, this lavender, but the Jicky lavender gets a bit indolic at times thanks to what I can only assume is the civet used in this. It’s very heady and frankly speaking, she doesn’t smell “right” but that doesn’t stop her from smelling awesome. For those of you not in the know, “indolic” is a polite term for “smells like poo”. Breathe past that minute note of “off-ness” and you’ll be rewarded with a spicy leathery quality to it. There’s definitely animalic swayings in this fragrance. It’s not soft and tender lavender for sure and if you were to drop this into a soap people would be wondering what’s wrong with you while at the same time wondering how they could get in on it too. This is dirty stuff but it’s classy stuff, and it amuses me a great deal. She doesn’t try to fruit it up or pass it off as some sort of therapy and just for that alone, Jicky should be given a crown. It’s simply you and lavender, leather, spice, and hilarious indole. And you had better take it. Jicky uses that full lavender with an air of sophistication and a sense of daring all the way into the closer where the lavender fades a warmed dusty tonka greets you at the bottom with that ever present indole. Something about Jicky smells familiar but at the same time incredibly lush and hard to grasp. If Jicky could talk, I imagine she’d say, “What? You don’t like it? Then it’s obvious you don’t get it and I’ll thank you for getting out of my way”. Yeah, that’s Jicky. She doesn’t care if you don’t like her. She knows she’s good.

Extra: I love Jicky. I don’t love how she smells because I am a self-professed, shame-faced lover of clean and easy to wear. But I love what she stands for and appreciate what she is. She’s an era in perfume long gone but stubbornly and regally embodied in her bold presence that just refuses to go quietly. She’s one of the few Guerlains that I will probably never wear simply because she’s too much for me. But I can appreciate her all the same. Especially for being so “in your face” with all the fresh, clean, fruity stuff being pumped out today. I find it delicious to imagine a group of bottles, a hundred or so in number, of celebrity fragrances could be placed on the floor in a room. And there might be a bottle of Jicky sitting in the middle, waiting for some unsuspecting person to come by, pick her up and get slapped in the face with all that she is. Never change, Jicky. Never change.

Design: Those of you familiar with the Nahema design will recognize the image above. Though it should be noted that Jicky most definitely came first. Beautiful bottle, classical look, wonderful feel. Pictured above is the parfum concentration placed into an fantastic, elegant flacon. It’s Guerlain at its best.

Fragrance Family: Classic Aromatic

Notes: Lemon, mandarin, bergamot, lavender, orris, jasmin, rose, patchouli, vetiver, leather, amber, civet, tonka, incense, benzoin.

You don’t really need me to rehash the romantic story of Jicky and her creation again, do you? Nah, I’ll just leave this post to say that if you were here and reading about Jicky, and were interested, there is a large online database of information readily available with a quick Google search about the conceptualization of Jicky, where you can get Jicky, and what–if anything at all–has happened to her in all these years since 1889 when she was first introduced. Or you can click here.

Reviewed in This Post: Jicky, ~1970, Eau de  Parfum.

Agonist The Infidels

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Agonist has recently come out with a new perfume which spurred the memory of this perfume and it’s crazy abstract bottle. So I dug out my sampler vial and gave her a sniff.

Agonist Infidels

The Infidels by Agonist

In Bottle: Dark, earthy blackcurrant note. The blackcurrant is the most prominent smell I’m getting so far from The Infidels.

Applied: Yep blackcurrant. Not the sweet berries or tea-like blackcurrants, but this earthy, dark jammy blackcurrant note that’s very rich and dense. That currant note is an ever-present entity during the entire fragrance as The Infidels digs into the mid-stage with a slight showing of florals that helps with that earthiness. It’s not particularly interesting in the mid-stage but the end game is a bit better, as The Infidels takes it blackcurrant and plays in a touch of lavender with a woody, green patchouli and warm amber. Very interesting fragrance, though is the juice worth its price? I’m going to have to say that while this stuff smells interesting, it isn’t the best or even anywhere near my top fragrances. So to me, no, it’s not worth the price.

Extra: Priced at $495 for 1.7oz, The Infidels is quite a bit out of reach of most people’s budgets. This is one of those fragrances that have been priced so beyond affordability and practicality that it lands in Clive Christian territory, and that’s a double-edged sword. You can, however, bite the bullet and purchase the glass art bottle for $495 and get the subsequent refills for a–all things considered–reasonable $90 for 50ml.

Design: The design for this bottle is polarizing. There are people who think it’s a beautiful piece of abstract glass art and other people who just can’t figure out what it’s supposed to be. And some people who look at it and simply think it’s hideous. I’m a member of the, “Oooh! Glass art!” crowd. Agonist’s bottle is probably most of the price of the juice as it’s truly a beautiful, misunderstood, piece of artwork. It’s unlike any other perfume bottle I’ve seen out there, it’s strange, it’s compelling, it’s dramatic with the contrast between the redness and black and clear glass. It’s got that crazy application stick too that you don’t see much of. Everything about this bottle speaks of daring, dangerous, and blood. The fragrance isn’t shouting that stuff but the packaging certainly is and I appreciate this thing for the artistic merit of it and the boundaries it pushes in traditional and contemporary bottle design. This bottle is like the high fashion runway. You don’t have to understand it to appreciate it.

Fragrance Family: Fruity Earthy

Notes: Blackcurrant, green cumin, bergamot, magnolia, tonka, lavender, patchouli, amber, labdanum.

Let’s not kid ourselves, the major reason to own this perfume is for the bottle. The juice inside is pleasant enough but it’s second fiddle to the packaging.

Reviewed in This Post: The Infidels, 2010, Eau de  Parfum.

Marc Jacobs Lola

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Marc Jacobs Lola was supposed to be a more grown-up Daisy. And I had seen this fragrance touted so much that I had to go and find some just to see if all the hype was true. I left underwhelmed with the scent but pleased with it all the same. Lola

In Bottle: Bright grapefruit, clean spice, and fruity pear. This smells juicy and clean right off the bat. It’s almost like a Herbal Essences shampoo.

Applied: Fruity off the bat with a pile of flowers rolling in like a scrubbed clean tide of–uh–fresh flowers. I’m tired. Cut me some slack. That shampoo smell lingers for a bit in Lola as the opening stage gives way to the mid-stage where the flowers rise up a bit more and the fruity, juicy opening dies down to hold Lola at “Smells like shampoo”. This is a really nice, clean and feminine scent and I can definitely see where people would say this is a grown up Daisy. It doesn’t smell like Daisy but it does smell a little more mature. Not mature in the sense of a classic sophisticated perfume but if we were to assume Daisy is meant for the teen crowd, then Lola would be good for the college kids. She lacks the bright, grassy freshness and youth of Daisy but she makes up for it by being a clean pretty floral with a hovering sweet rose. Sweet rose being a good alternative to classic rose that tends to infuse a bit of youth into perfume’s most popular and, strangely enough, polarizing note. The dry down is a typical affair of sandalwood and vanilla with lingering traces of nice shampoo. Lola reminds me a bit of Gucci Flora with a less sweet mid-stage.

Extra: Lola’s spawned a number of offshoot products. One of the ones I see most often is the solid perfume ring adorned with its iconic vinyl flower.

Design: A big bright, red, purple, blue and green vinyl flower adorns the cap of Lola. The glass bottle itself is a purple color while the circumference of the cap is a textured gold-colored metal. There’s two bottle designs for Lola. The smaller (50ml) is a tall bottle. The 100ml is a squat, wide bottle. The design for Lola took a few pages from Daisy’s bottle design and it’s cute as a button. I didn’t think I would like the bottle design as much as I did but heck, it’s adorable. Not sophisticated at all, a little silly but not the least bit pretentious.

Fragrance Family: Floral

Notes: Pink pepper, pear, red grapefruit, peony, rose, geranium, vanilla, creamy musk, tonka.

If nothing else, Lola is an eye catcher for its bottle design. Subtle is not this lady’s business. The 100ml bottle in particular is huge and comes packaged in an equally huge box due to the giant vinyl flower cap.

Reviewed in This Post: Lola, 2010, Eau de Parfum.

Frederic Malle Musc Ravageur

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A lot of good things have been said about Musc Ravageur. The one that caught my eye the most was the comment that this stuff smells like cinnamon buns and leather. Always on the look out for a cinnamon bun-like fragrance, I got my hands on Musc Ravageur. Musc Ravageur

In Bottle: Spicy citrus, I get the cinnamon but mostly I get citrus, a little bit of dark musk and strong lavender.

Applied: That lavender mixed with citrus makes an interesting scent that many people might say smells medicinal or even powdery. But no, that’s just lavender doing its thing. Wear Musc Ravageur for a little more and it will evolve into a sweeter confection with a blend of smooth vanilla and cinnamon with clove dashed in there for extra spice. This stuff is powerful, projects like crazy, and it clung to me all day, staying in that delicious mid-stage where, I have to admit, it does smell a little bit like cinnamon buns but there’s an undercurrent at work here making it far more exciting. I catch whiffs of leather, incense, and musk.  Musc Ravageur has a dark  base that wafts in and out here and there taking this a little farther away than just as a gourmand. It’s a spicy, dense, sweet, delicious but very grown up. When Musc Ravageur finally chills out, the sweetness leads way into a spicy woodsy scent with a dark vanilla note, aided a bit by fading leather, and a lingering animalic muskiness.

Extra: Frederic Malle’s line of fragrances includes such beauties as Musc Ravageur and one of my other favorites; Angéliques sous la pluie by the much esteemed Jean-Claude Ellena. You may also find in the Frederic Malle line the rather famous Carnal Flower a–what else–tuberose dominant fragrance. Musc Ravageur, itself, was composed by Maurice Roucel who also composed Insolence by Guerlain, Donna Karan Be Delicious, and many others.

Design: I don’t own a bottle of Musc Ravageur but it looks like its bottled in a rather simple cylinder. Musc Ravageur, I guess, is not about the packaging as it keeps things as simple looking as possible. Classic-looking bottle and I really like it that way.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Gourmand

Notes: Lavender, bergamot, clove, cinnamon, gaiac wood, cedar, sandalwood, vanilla, tonka, musk.

Out of all the gourmands I’ve tried, Musc Ravageur is one of the nicest. It’s a well blended fragrance with a lot of interesting evolution going on when you wear it. It has excellent longevity and projection.

Reviewed in This Post: Musc Ravageur, 2009, Eau de Parfum.

Givenchy L’Interdit 1957

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L’Interdit, the original, was discontinued then reformulated and re-released in 2002. Then slightly reformulated back to the classic version and released again in 2007. What it became in 2002 was a generic scent. Reformulated 2002 L’Interdit smells nothing like the classic, the 2007 version is closer but I still thought it lacked a certain daring feel that the original possessed. I had the chance to smell L’Interdit 1957 and the bar has been raised. L'Interdit

In Bottle: Aldehydes, very strong. Sharp and sparkling, and astringent. It’s approaching that point where it smells like urine as the aldehydes are just so strong in this. I think this may have something to do with the perfume’s age making the aldehydes stronger than they should be.

Applied: More aldehydes! The sharpness and sparkle are fleeting on the skin though as they start to evaporate but never quite leave, lending L’Interdit a constant status of glitz and high perfumery. The fragrance calms down a bit into a soft floral with touches of fruit here and there giving it a sweetness. It’s gentle like a like touch, and easy to wear. It doesn’t smell clean or fresh, just warm and gentle. The mid-stage is dominated with floral notes as sheer and light as the non-aldehyde notes in the opener. L’Interdit is  so easy to love as it approaches the dry down with a splash of incense over a bed of flowers and powder. It ushers out with a final flare of woodsy incense.

Extra: L’Interdit was composed in the 1950s for Audrey Hepburn. They released it for the public on 1957 with Hepburn  endorsing it. L’Interdit was composed by Francis Fabron. The man who created Nina Ricci’s L’Air du Temps. You may find it difficult to find the original L’Interdit in stores today but a recent reissue in 2007 of L’Interdit smells as close as you’re going to get.

Design: Simple glass bottle with a red label and a metal cap to protect the sprayer. L’Interdit knows it doesn’t need to impress you with a flashy bottle and it really doesn’t even try. I can appreciate the bottle for its simplicity though and its high contrast design.

Fragrance Family: Floral

Notes: : Aldehydes, galbanum, peach, bergamot, jasmine, rose, narcissus, lily of the valley, incense, sandalwood, benzoin, tonka, amber, musk, vetiver.

I didn’t get an exact date on how old this bottle of L’Interdit was so we compromised with a reasonable year.

Reviewed in This Post: L’Interdit, circa 1970, Eau de Toilette.

Soivohle Vanillaville

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Soivohle is an independent perfume house  run by Liz Zorn that has a fantastic collection of natural perfumes of which Vanillaville is a part of. I was searching for a replacement to my much beloved, Spiritueuse Double Vanille (SDV). While I don’t think Vanillaville is a replacement for SDV, it is nevertheless, a beautiful fragrance.

In Bottle: Smoky strong pipe tobacco with a blend of leather up front. It’s reminiscent of campfires but has a far more sophisticated edge than that. I don’t smell much of the vanilla but it is in the background lending this a pleasant creamy, mildly sweet, smoothness.

Applied: I don’t get a whole lot of shift and change in this as what it is has pretty much been described. Smoky, sophisticated, a bit of leather to add some more personality and a fantastic sweet and creamy vanilla note lurking near the bottom. As this ages, the smokiness fades just a little bit to let the vanilla scent to come up but for the most part, Vanillaville is a clear and beautiful interpretation of a fantastic vanilla concept.

Extra: Soivohle offers some of the best natural perfumes I’ve found and the packaging is impeccable. My favorite from the natural collection is by far, Pink Praline, a deliciously well crafted gourmand scent.

Design: I have not purchased a full bottle yet, but the sample jars that Soivohle uses are adorable little glass deals with a cute screw on black plastic cap. They were meticulously packed and if the sample were so well treated, I can’t wait to see how beautiful the actual bottles will be.

Fragrance Family: Oriental

Notes: Almond, tonka, tarragon, birch tar, coffee.

No replacement for SDV here, but Vanillaville is a fine concept. A bit smoky for my tastes, but this would make an excellent fragrance for anyone looking into darker vanilla scents.

Reviewed in This Post: Vanillaville, ~2009, Eau de Parfum.

Donna Karan Liquid Nude

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Cashmere Mist is one of the most popular Donna Karan fragrances. It was released in the early 90s (1994, I believe) and has been sold with much popularity since. Liquid Nude is the brand new 2010 flanker to Cashmere Mist. Liquid Nude

In Bottle: Light and floral. Reminds me of clean linen and fresh sheets with a hint of cleaned up sandalwood.

Applied: Floral top notes that lend a very feminine edge to this fragrance. It has quite a nice display of florals set against a seemingly always present perfumed sandalwood. The fragrance evolves into a clear and very floral jasmine mid-stage that lends to a nice airy clean linen-like scent. This smells like good soap and I can sort of see the connection to the original Cashmere Mist as this is set in a nicer, more modern stage than the original. It also smells a little bit younger too. The dry down is a pleasant smooth white floral with a bit of lingering warmed sandalwood mixed with a light vanilla. Pretty much the one thing you can take away from Liquid Nude here is that it’s a very good, very clear and clean floral and creamy woodsy fragrance.

Extra: Donna Karan has other fragrances with her name on them including the very popular DKNY Be Delicious line which is a big hit with younger women.

Design: I don’t know if “elegant” is quite the word I want to use here but the design of this bottle is slick and nicely designed. It reminds me of a variety of things but mostly, it’s a close interpretation of the original Cashmere Mist bottle in a nice shiny pinkish tone with the swan shape toned down and smoothed out.

Fragrance Family: Floral

Notes: Orange flowers, pink cyclamen petals, lily of the valley, sandalwood, ylang ylang, Moroccan jasmine, labdanum, jasmine, white amber, skin musk, suede, tonka, benzoin.

I’m actually not much of a fan of Cashmere Mist or this particular incarnation of it. It reminds me of the perfumes I grew up smelling and I suppose my nose is a bit dulled from it by now.

Reviewed in This Post: Liquid Nude, 2010, Eau de Parfum.

Guerlain Tonka Imperiale

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Guerlain’s L’Art et la Matière line of fragrances celebrating great perfumers and great perfumes. The line has been going for some time now and Tonka Imperiale, as of this writing, is the newest release.Tonka Imperiale

In Bottle: Boozy vanilla with a slight almond edge and sourness. Tonka Imperiale reminds me a lot of Spiritueuse Double Vanille but the major difference is in the sourness. Tonka Imperiale has a sour almond scent to where. Spiritueuse Double Vanille, on the other hand, had smooth smokiness to back it up.

Applied: Vanilla liqueur with that hint of sour again. The sourness is quick to fly away though, leaving me with vanilla, almond and booze. The booze then escapes me leaving me with a lovely rich vanilla and almond scent that signifies the mid-stage of Tonka Imperiale. Lovely spiciness comes in to the join the parade, turning this into full on gourmand as I’m reminded of cookies at Christmas time, very vanilla and decadent rum and spice cookies. The dry down after the Christmas cooking phase is a smoky woodsy fragrance with the beautiful vanilla note hanging on by a thread.

Extra: L’Art et la Matière is Guerlain’s long awaited answer to their lost niche when they were acquied by LVMH. I always felt most of the mainstream Guerlain releases were really pedestrian and lacking that exquisite Guerlainess that defined them so well prior to the acquisition. Though I do like most of their mainstream releases, I am also overjoyed that they’re still putting out stuff like Tonka Imperiale,  Spiritueuse Double Vanille and the other L’Art et la Matière’s scents.  Guerlain’s still got it.

Design: Bottled in a similar shaped presentation as Spiritueuse Double Vanille, Tonka Imperiale has a neater presentation without the big label and the honey bee wax seal. It still comes in that fitted box that you can’t do anything with if you plan on using the fragrance while keeping it in its original box. But, in addition to having a regular sprayer, Tonka Imperial also comes with a pump atomizer.

Fragrance Family: Gourmand

Notes: : Bergamot, rosemary, tonka bean, honey, spices, almond, jasmine, vanilla, cedar, pine, incense, tobacco and amber.

I really wrestled with wanting a bottle of this and wanting to keep money in my pocket. The L’Art et la Matière line is a few price points above Guerlain’s mainstream releases. It’s even a few price points above some niche houses. At $230 for 75ml, I found the price a bit rich for my tastes. I liked this, but not enough to blow that much on it.

Reviewed in This Post: Tonka Imperiale, 2010, Eau de Parfum.

Burberry Brit

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Burberry Brit, for me, is the fragrance a high school graduate who’s just decided she’s too good for a body mist and wants needs a perfume. Something a little more complex, something with a hint of maturity, and something that costs a little bit of green. Brit is a smooth woodsy gourmand with an impressive wear length that’s a couple dimensions beyond a body spray.Burberry Brit

In Bottle: Sharp citrus and vanilla almond. I get the lime right out of the bottle as it’s sitting up top but there’s also the woodsiness sitting there too. The woods are actually trying to trick my nose into labeling this scent as spicy. Despite all this, it is unmistakably a gourmand scent to me as the almond and vanilla will refuse to make me think any other way on that front.

Applied: Striking flair of citrus right on impact, it takes a few minutes but the citrus dissolves into this fruity, juicy pear and almond mix that carries the fragrance until the vanilla comes up. Brit’s vanilla doesn’t pull any punches, it’s sweet, domineering, and unapologetic. It amps up and mixes with the almond and eventually drowns the pear until all I get is vanilla, a touch of almond, and that tricky spicy but-not-really wood note. I’d have to say the wood note is what’s really saving this fragrance from being a vanilla single note. It adds a much needed and much appreciated depth that stands its own for hours with the vanilla. Overall, Brit is a warm, smooth vanilla fragrance with a wood base. A well-done and very young gourmand.

Extra: Over the years since the first iteration of Brit came out, there’s been three flankers; Brit Sheer, Brit Red, Brit Gold. I have only smelled Brit Sheer, which to me is a much sharper, citrus treatment that somehow managed to be even more inoffensive than the original Brit and I have always considered Brit to be quite agreeable already.

Design: I absolutely hate the bottle design for the Brit bottles. Big, heavy rectangles of clear glass covered in Burberry’s signature tartan. It was a tremendous let-down and the design, to me, seemed like an afterthought. It looks tacky to be honest. Holding the bottle feels a bit like holding a tartan striped brick. The cap is a plastic cube, forgivable in many instances, but it hurts the bottle design here even more. I can see they maybe have been going for the simple angle but missed it and landed in plain and utilitarian. This is one fragrance I think would really benefit from a bottle redesign.

Fragrance Family: Gourmand

Notes: Lime, pear, almond, mahogany, vanilla, tonka.

The original Brit is one of the more iconic and recent gourmand fragrances. With an inoffensive and pleasing vanilla note this should satisfy anyone looking for a more up-scale and complex vanilla scent than a body mist.

Reviewed in This Post: Burberry Brit, 2008, Eau de Parfum.