Coty L’Origan

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Sometimes, just because I’m immature, I like to pretend that Coty only came out with the good stuff and all the stuff they’ve made that’s been terrible just simply doesn’t exist. When I think of Coty these days, the first thing that pops into my head is Lady Gaga and everybody freaking out about her up and coming “blood and semen” perfume. I won’t mention our favorite friend from Etat Libre d’Orange but I will say that the Coty of the early 1900s could have taken “blood and semen” and turned it into something beautiful. These days, I kind of hope Gaga at least gets something that isn’t a fruity-floral. Oh, Coty.

L'Origan

In Bottle: L’Origan has that classic smell that you just can’t imitate these days. It’s dense and complex with a varying, slightly discordant mixture of big honking spices and florals up top.

Applied: Spicy on arrival with a floral touch coming up. There’s a very old-world style to the way this perfume goes on and starts to age. People have compared L’Origan to L’Heure Bleue–well,  I should say they compare L’Heure Bleue to L’Origan because Guerlain’s hit fragrance was released after this one. It’s similar in that both scents trail the same sort of fragrance with L’Heure Bleue exhibiting a much colder, more melancholy personality. L’Origan, to me, is warm and much more animalic. There’s a hint of animal in the opening there and I experienced hints of animalics throughout the livespan of the scent. It’s blended very well, though, not overpowering the scent but rather giving it a bit of sensuality and added depth. Another thing about L’Origan vs. L’Heure Bleue, it’s spicier with slightly less noticeable florals and it’s ultimately a brighter scent though its uses of the  spices are very familiar. There’s a powderiness to this that tends to show up in vintage fragrances as well as a heavy dose of clove. As L’Origan approaches dry down it maintains that spiciness the whole time the florals are totally gone but what’s waiting at the bottom is this thick, rich warmness that reminds me a bit of slick metals and mosses.

Extra: L’Origan was released in 1905 and still survives today–though in an undoubtedly heavily reformulated state. As always, vintage is leaps and bounds better.

Design: The original L’Origan was bottled in a flat glass bottle of a squarish shape with the Coty seal on it. I had a warm, amber-like color and was a bit reminiscent of Chypre de Coty in appearance. The modern bottle (pictured) is reminiscent of a flower bulb with a spiky crown for a cap. I have to say I prefer the old style better.

Fragrance Family: Spicy

Notes: Bergamot, orange, coriander, pepper, peach, nutmeg, clove, jasmine, violet, rose, ylang-ylang, orange flower, benzoin, cedar, incense, vanilla, sandalwood, musk, coumarin, civet.

Somehow L’Origan comes out as the happy side of L’Heure Bleue. These two could be best friends, though probably not sisters. I have to say, despite my love for L’Heure Bleue–I like L’Origan a bit more.

Reviewed in This Post: L’Origan, ~1950, Eau de Parfum.

Diesel Only the Brave

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I was hesitant to test out this fragrance largely because I couldn’t get over the ridiculous-looking bottle. But hey, the gimmick got to me one day and I said, “Welp, might as well smell that fist perfume”.

Only the Brave

In Bottle: Citrus, something sweet and dirty in the background with a huge cedar note in the foreground. Hooray, more cedar.

Applied: Only the Brave opens up rather sweet to me, smelling a little bit like citrus candy. The candy citrus appeal doesn’t last very long as Only the Brave starts amping up the woods–more specifically–amping up the cedar as it floods the mid-stage, drowning out whatever else may have been in this. I have such terrible luck with cedar and certain wood notes. Only the Brave felt like it was actually punching me in the face with the woods in its composition. I managed to wait it out, getting too-strong wafts of woodsiness as I let the fragrance sink in and age. The dry down is a more agreeable affair with a soft, leathery warm amber fragrance touched with a bit of spice.

Extra: Only the Brave was a collaboration between L’Oreal and Diesel. This fragrance involved three noses for its composition too, Olivier Polge (Balenciaga Paris), Pierre Wargnye (Drakkar Noir), and Alienor Massanet (Tresor Sparkling).

Design: I mentioned the bottle in my opening sentences. Only the Brave comes packaged in a glass fist. I think the bottle design is ugly, clunky, and at times hilarious. Due to its shape, the bottle falls over easily so I imagine most people keep their bottles lying on their sides. Still, the humor in Only the Brave’s fist bottle isn’t lost on me and I can chuckle at it now and then. At the very least, there isn’t a single fairy on it.

Fragrance Family: Woodsy

Notes: Lemon, mandarin, coriander, violet, cedar, labdanum, amber, styrax, leather, benzoin.

Cedar ruins yet another fragrance for me. At the very least Only the Brave is a generic masculine fragrance that I don’t think is particularly unique or fascinating but probably wearable by everyone but me.

Reviewed in This Post: Only the Brave, 2010, Eau de Toilette.

Liz Claiborne Curve Crush (Men)

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I don’t know how Curve Crush managed to squeeze itself into a position so polarizing. We have people on one side loving this stuff while people on the other side are having Curve Crush bonfires and reconsidering the quality of such an idea. I’m with the bonfires on this one. I’m sorry, but I kind of hate this fragrance.

Curve Crush

In Bottle: A strange melange of herbs and sweetness. It’s not sweet like candy sweet but sweet as in “this shouldn’t be sweet but it is” sweet. All this coated with an aqua or marine note which makes me think of Cool Water gone wrong. There’s quite a huge dollop of white musk and moss in this too which just seem to come right out of left field.

Applied: That opening of sweet herbs and the lingering bizarre white musk and moss. This smells like a mess from the get-go, like it wasn’t blended properly and I can see where people are coming from when they say this is very synthetic. I can forgive a synthetic fragrance if it’s done well, but I don’t think Curve Crush for Men realizes there’s a line that shouldn’t be crossed. There’s so much scrubbed, clean, sharp and sterile synthetic notes in this stuff that it smells more like a weird cleaning detergent than a fragrance. The mid-stage is a bizarre blend of that musk and moss stuff along with some plastic violet and spicy ginger situation layered over a persistent cloying sweetness. It heads into its dry down with a moss note so synthetic I can taste it in the back of my throat.

Extra: Curve Crush for Men is a member of the Curve line by Liz Claiborne. Despite my displeasure with this particular fragrance, the other members of the Curve line are decent scents.

Design: I’m not sold on the bottle here but I k now packaging’s not the highest priority when it comes to fragrances like this. The bottle is made of a mottled glass, with a tint on it. It’s got a good weight, the hold of it is decent, the design itself is uninspired and reminds me of an Old Spice bottle with a Flowerbomb tag sticking out of it.

Fragrance Family: Aromatic

Notes: Bartlett pear, muguet aldehyde, basil, coriander, bergamot, ginger, violet, lavender, sage, cardamom, vetiver, musk, moss.

I know this is a budget fragrance, but if you ask me, it’s a pretty terrible one. You want a budget fragrance that smells good and is well-composed? Old Spice. As cliche as that is, Old Spice beats this hands down. Heck, I’d pick Old Spice over a lot of higher end fragrances too. The point is, this fragrance is overly synthetic, uninspired and smells like it wasn’t blended properly.

Reviewed in This Post: Curve Crush, 2009, Eau de Toilette.

Boadicea the Victorious Complex

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Now, hey, I love Boadicea the Victorious’  Pure. I love the smelly excursions of this niche house. I just wish their stuff wasn’t so dang expensive for what you get. And then there’s Complex, which I think should have been named “Perplexing” instead.

Complex

In Bottle: Whoa, I think we have a contender for weirdest, most off-putting scent now. I know everyone gives Secretions Magnifiques that honor but Complex has the dirty, unpleasant smell thing going on right up front. Commendable, though I’m not so sure about wearable. And I’m talking abut unironic wearability here.

Applied: Bitter and green from get go with a very obvious and very loud civet presence. All this wrapped up in a thick blanket of choking smoke. This stuff isn’t for the weak–and I’m weak. I guess. It’s off-putting, it’s alarming. If I didn’t know they were trying to make this a wearable fragrance, I’d be saying Boadicea is trolling us all like Etat Libre d’Orange did. I’m sticking out with this one though. I refuse to let it call me a wuss. Complex is powerful, it’s a big projector too so while you wear this, wear it with confidence. Or wear it somewhere with lots of ventilation and not on an airplane. As I wait for the dry down, Complex does relatively little with its time as it remains predominantly animalic with a brush of sweet violets wavering in and out during the mid-stage. The violets do little to endear this fragrance to me, as the sweetness mixes with the smoky animalic personality of Complex to create this mess of fragrance that doesn’t go together at all. Dry down is marked with more civet (hey, it’s a strong component) as the fragrance ushers out with a bitter parting of the violets and the green. Meanwhile, you’ll be scrubbing for many a day to get the smoky civet off. This fragrance, to me, smells like baked roadkill. Which, I can’t decide, if this is better or worse than sweaty armpit. I’m going to say better–just barely.

Extra: I want to believe they did this on purpose–this making of a fragrance that challenges the concept of perfume and of–well, just smelling decent. I suppose if you are into fragrances that are, or should be, unwearable you can add Complex to the list.

Design: I do love the way Boadicea the Victorious bottles their fragrances. Pretty glass entrapped in intricate metal vines. The designs are reminiscent of Nordic and Gaelic art. Quite beautiful and interesting.

Fragrance Family: Dirty

Notes: Violet, labdanum, leather, musk, civet, basil, sage.

I never thought I’d label another fragrance under my imaginary ‘dirty’ fragrance family. But there you go. Complex is a powerful, high sillage smoky animalic with brushes of sweet violets and a really weird personality. Not my thing, can’t see myself wearing this, hope I don’t end up in an enclosed space with someone who does.

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

Floris China Rose

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Floris is one of those crazy-old houses that no body thinks is really that old. But it is. I attribute this misconception to most people not knowing about the House of Floris. But tune your noses to receive because they’ve got some beautiful stuff out there.

China Rose

In Bottle: Sweet, warm roses with a fruity header and a delicate note of some non-rose floral that balances out the opening.

Applied: China Rose, I think, is a very well-balanced fragrance from the top to the bottom. It starts off with a nice fruity rose note and as the fruits fade you get more rose. This isn’t modern, cleaned up, scrubbed rose, but a more sensual rose of times past that isn’t afraid to get her elbows a little dirty. The clove in China Rose gives the fragrance a spicy, sultry, irresistible charm. This is an oriental rose fragrance, a light one that will hold close to your skin and remain a rose fragrance until its dry down where the rose gives way to the stronger, warmer, clove and spices that dominate the remainder of the fragrance.

Extra: Floris was established in 1730–yes, the 1700s. As far as I’m concerned they are among one of the oldest surviving fragrance houses out there and they are still pumping out beautiful fragrances almost three hundred years later. Keep rocking, Floris.

Design: China Rose isn’t bottled in any special way that sets it apart from the usual Floris bottles. It’s a glass bottle, looks a bit old-fashioned and plain, but suits the purpose just fine. The label is a soft, deep pink bearing the name of the fragrance house and the fragrance name. The fragrance house name is also etched into the cap of the bottle.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Floral

Notes: Raspberry, peach, rose, violet, cloves, geranium, patchouli, amber, tonka, vanilla, vetiver.

Floris tends to do these delicate, soft, intimate fragrances that don’t project or shout their presence and for someone who enjoys going light as much as I do, their perfumes are beautifully balanced with just the right amount of sillage and longevity.

Reviewed in This Post: China Rose, 2008, Eau de Toilette.

Balenciaga Paris

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Perhaps you’ve heard of Balenciaga before, no, not their handbags that seem to be gaining in popularity these days. I’m talking about Le Dix, the street, the clothes, and the perfume. Mostly the perfume though. It’s a classic aldehyde, beautiful, but that’s not who we’re talking about today. Let’s jam it up with Balenciaga Paris.

Balenciaga Paris

In Bottle: Paris opens with a sheer, undetected level of sophistication and elegance. It’s violets and sun dew floating in the air.

Applied: Paris is incredibly light, it clings close to the skin and stays close for hours upon hours but what it won’ do is shout. This is a scent that’s meant to stay personal. I smell violets first of all, sweet little powdery violets drenched in dew. The mid-stage sees more violets, the dewy quality evaporating leaving me with a little bit of spice a nice hint of woods and a quiet little whisper of patchouli on the dry down. You shouldn’t expect projection with this fragrance. Paris’ angle is subtle and sleek. Get them while they’re close and keep them there with that violet softness.

Extra: Balenciaga is a fashion house with its headquarters in Paris, France. It was established in 1914. Other popular fragrances by house Balenciaga include Cristobal, Rumba and Le Dix.

Design: I love the bottle. I love its cap, love its shape, love the heft of it. It’s got nice weight, nice aesthetics and even though it’s a bit busier than the usual things I like, the business is well-designed, well-proportioned and very balanced.

Fragrance Family: Modern Chypre

Notes: Bergamot, spices, pepper, violet, carnation, oakmoss, cedar, vetiver, labdanum, patchouli.

Yes, believe it or not, this is a modern chypre. It’s got the right build though.

Reviewed in This Post: Balenciaga Paris, 2010, Eau de Parfum.

Bath and Body Works Carried Away

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Carried away, released recently by Bath and Body Works is a fragrance meant to invoke springtime. And considering the snow dumps and the cold air that’s been blowing about here lately, I welcome spring’s arrival any moment now.

Carried Away

In Bottle: Bright, green citrus with a soft floral undernote. Not entirely interesting but doesn’t smell bad. This is fairly on bar with other Bath and Body Works fragrances. It’s not unique, it’s not daring, but it’s definitely functional.

Applied: I get a sharp hit of citrus right away with the lemon and mandarin mixing together up front. There’s a slight tartness from the raspberry note that carries the sweet little pear note a little further and when you start digging into the mid-stage, the sweet and light florals waft in to distract you while the citrus note sin the opening bow out. There’s nothing to phone home about in the mid-stage as it’s a mild floral, easy to wear, easy to like, not the least bit offensive. Though I will give Carried Away points for taking its springtime theme and running with it. This smells fresh, clean, femininely floral. The dry down is uninspired, the vanilla is sweet, comes up during the mid-stage and accompanies sandalwood on the way out.

Extra: Carried Away, like almost every other Bath and Body Works scent comes in a line of bath and body products such as body mists, lotion, body butter, and shower gel.

Design: Same shape and general design premise as the other eau de toilettes from Bath and Body Works. Glass rectangle with designs on it. Plastic cap. The designs for Carried Away are colorful turquoise and pink ribbons wrapping around the glass. Pretty, generic, but works very well.

Fragrance Family: Fresh Floral

Notes: Bergamot, meyer lemon, mandarin, pear, raspberry, freesia, tuberose, jasmine, violet, sandalwood, vanilla, musk.

I’m not jumping on this fragrance mostly because I’ve smelled similar stuff that I like better from Bath and Body Works. For freshness, I go with White Citrus. For florals, I prefer the roses in P.S. I Love You. And if I want clean, I’ve got Cotton Blossom.

Reviewed in This Post: Carried Away, 2011, Eau de Toilette.

Ed Hardy Hearts and Daggers

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So what do you do when you get a hankering for a fruity perfume? Book it over to Hearts and Daggers and experience the fragrance the least smells like hearts and daggers! This perfume is well-loved amongst the mass market and I can see why, it’s fun, it’s fruity. It’s so painfully easy though.

Ed Hardy Hearts and Daggers

In Bottle: Fruit punch. Yeah. Even in the bottle Hearts and Daggers smells extremely sweet, like you’re taking a whiff of someone’s fruit punch containing as many fruits as they can cram in.

Applied: There’s an initial flare of sweet grape and what I swear smells like canned pineapple and mandarins. Then as the fragrance continues to age it throws more fruits into the mix. Berries, apples, mangos, what have you got? We’ll add it in. What’s that? A passionfruit? Why not? Basically Hearts and Daggers crams a bunch of fruit notes into itself so that the progression is so hard to define simply because all the fruit notes end up floating up to the top of the notes pyramid. As a result, this scent suffers hugely from longevity issues. Almost every note it uses is a delicate top note so they’ll fly away rather quickly. When Hearts and Daggers settles down into its dry down phase, you realize there’s something else mixed in with the fruits that you hadn’t realized was there until now. Some sort of sweet floral that I can’t quite put my finger on. I’m going out on a limb here and saying it’s probably the sugar-dipped jasmine missing all its indolic bite to usher out this scent.

Extra: Ed Hardy Hearts and Daggers is actually by Christian Audigier which refers to Ed Hardy as the line of perfumes. Well, if there had to be a defining perfume for teenage girls these days, Hearts and Daggers is probably it. It’s fun, it’s easy to wear, it’s way too sweet for me but probably perfect for anyone who enjoys these sweet scents. Just keep in mind that you will smell like fruit punch.

Design: Not a fan of the bottle design. Hearts and Daggers is a hot pink glass bottle with those signature Ed Hardy designed tatoo-esque elements. The bottle has a cap that you put over about 80% of the bottle–sort of like an all body hat for the bottle.

Fragrance Family: Fruity

Notes: Blood orange, violet, apple, mango, apple blossom, jasmine, musk, amber, benzoin, blond wood.

As stated above, despite this fragrance being an Eau de Parfum its longevity is severely lacking due to how most of the notes it’s composed of being delicate fruity top notes.

Reviewed in This Post: Hearts and Daggers, 2010, Eau de Parfum.

Yves Saint Laurent Parisienne

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Parisienne is a weird fragrance. Weird because it’s very famous, sometimes maligned, vinyl accord note is a deal breaker for a lot of people. And can you really blame them? The vinyl has been accused of smelling like, “cat pee”, “vomit”, “rubber”, “plastic”, and the ever popular, “yuck!”

Yves Saint Laurent Parisienne

In Bottle: Bright berry note with a really nice sweet rose up front. This reminds me a bit of Paris, it’s the rose doing most of it though and the shape of the bottle.

Applied: Starts off on a good sweet berry and pink rose note but the rose is gone in an instant. Replacing it is the vinyl accord. They were pretty upfront about this, I guess. Now vinyl accord is–well, I’m not sure what YSL was intending for this fragrance and this vinyl note but it makes the whole thing smell like fruity plastic. This smells like I rubbed a bowl of berries on a tire. The vinyl is a trickster too. It’ll fade out upon midstage where the fruitiness is toned down and you’re left with a faintly plastic smelling rosy floral concoction of confusion and wariness. Then when you think you’ve made it past Parisienne, vinyl comes roaring back in the end stage though it is more behaved there, playing rather nicely with the patchouli and woods waiting there.

Extra: Parisienne echoes the design sensibility of Paris but aside from a fleeting rose note, the two are different monsters. Paris is a light, fun-filled floral on a sunny day. Parisienne is paint fumes and fruit arrangements.

Design: Parisienne’s bottle is similar to that of Paris. It’s an egg-shaped glass that reminds me a bit of the bottle for Flowerbomb–only girlier, with more glam. The bottle’s kind of a miss for me, not because it’s ugly or anything. I just don’t think it looks like anything special.

Fragrance Family: Fruity

Notes: Damascus rose, violet, peony, vinyl accord, lacquer, cranberry, patchouli, vetiver, musk, sandalwood.

I’m not going wild over Parisienne here. There’s moments where going full on synthetic is forgivable and fun. But this perfume just doesn’t smell right to me.

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

Caron Fleurs de Rocaille

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I was wearing Fleurs de Rocaille around today to see how she’d do with a little bit of aging and stood a bit too close to a rather unimpressed young woman who upon catching a whiff of it proclaimed, “Someone’s wearing grandma’s perfume!” Ah, complete strangers making loud comments about my perfume. What a life. Fleurs de Rocaille

In Bottle: To be fair to the aforementioned young lady, Fleurs de Rocaille is old and she smells like she came from a different era for sure. She’s a classic from 1934 when she was composed by Ernest Daltroff.

Applied: Fleurs de Rocaille’s opener is a bit sweet for me thanks to the violet she also has a bit of headiness but she does smooth out.  She opens with a fantastic flair of aldehydes and florals, a very pretty rose note up top that stays throughout the scent. Then she settles down a bit. Not quite to the stage of modern perfumes with their clean, floral mid-stages or inoffensive fruity blasts. She’s a powdery, soapy, floral thanks to those famous aldehydes that everyone with a modern nose seems to equate to either grandmas or cat pee. I hope their grandmothers are cheap with their presents this year. Honestly, people, lay off the old ladies, would you? There’s a lot of florals to be had in this scent with the jasmine, rose, and narcissus playing the loudest among a group of green, softer flowers. Fleurs de Rocaille blends the florals so well with a very classic aldehyde rose build that settles into the base and end stage along with a very woody and warm amber scent.

Extra: Seems like the perfume industry loves to confuse its customers. There are two “Fleurs de Rocaille” scents. The one tested and reviewed in this post was Fleurs de Rocaille. There is another, more modern version, called Fleur de Rocaille. Note the missing plural. The more modern version was released in 1993.

Design: Fleurs de Rocaille’s bottle reminds me a bit of Annick Goutal’s ribbed bottles. The shape is similar and the cap’s ribbed shape is very reminiscent of Annick Goutal. I like it though. It’s a nice feminine shape with a pleasant weightiness and a good, simple, clean design. Nothing fancy about this!

Fragrance Family: Aldeyhyde Floral

Notes: Bergamot, palisander, gardenia, violet, oriss root, jasmine, narcissus, rose, carnation, lily-of-the-valley, ylang-ylang, lilac, mimosa, iris, amber, sandalwood, cedar, musk.

This little tester vial of Fleurs de Rocaille has actually been bouncing around my “to test” pile for a while. For some reason, I had convinced myself that I had Fleur de Rocaille instead of the older version.

Reviewed in This Post: Fleurs de Rocaille, ~1980, Eau de Toilette.