Histoires de Parfums 1826

The Histoires de Parfums line has always interested me. I loved the concept behind it and had been meaning to get a sample of one of the fragrances for years. My main hold up was not knowing where to start and what year to order first. I settled on 1826 thanks to a recommendation from a friend.

1826

1826

In Bottle: Strong bergamot and woody presence with a hint of smooth vanilla and spice.

Applied: Starts up with a strong bergamot and tangerine showing that is quick to make way for the floral aspect. I get a lot of lowers, and a bit of spice that creeps up to the midstage making for a complex and pleasant blend that gets slapped with a soft vanilla incense halfway through its progression. 1826 settles into a floral vanilla with a hint of woods. It’s giving off a clean floral vibe. Heck, this thing changes on me like crazy, one minute being a spicy floral and another being a vanilla floral that throws in a clean note out of no where. There’s a dark edge to it with the patchouli too, that settles in the background in the early midstage where it lends 1826 a bit of depth. The dry down is markedly woodsy with a final showing of florals and that elusive, but brilliant vanilla.

Extra: 1826 is dedicated to the last French empress, Eugénie de Montijo, whose birthday is reportedly May 5th, 1826. She lived a very long life given the time period and passed away at the age of 94 in Spain. The Empress, formerly known as María Eugenia Ignacia Augustina de Palafox-Portocarrero de Guzmán y Kirkpatrick, is somewhat understandably more well known as the fashionable wife of Napoleon III, and the last empress of the French court.

Design: Histoires de Parfums keeps a somewhat uniformed look for their bottles. I am a huge fan of uniform looks for series because I can imagine if I were ever wealthy enough to buy an entire series of perfumes, that I could line them up and be a little giddy about how awesome that would look. Histoires de Parfums is one of those bottle designs that would look fabulous lined up in a row and still looks pretty good even if you own just one of the bottles. The box tells you what notes are in the fragrance along with a little blurb about the name of the scent. The bottle itself has a label on the side that gives you the notes you should expect to smell. Simple, functional, and would look awesome lined up in a row.

Fragrance Family:  Floral Oriental

Notes: Bergamot, tangerine, white florals, violet, cinnamon, ginger, patchouli, amber, incense, woods, white musk, vanilla.

I have to admit that I expected a little less punch during the initial spray phase, but the rest of the fragrance smells divine. It’s got a great complexity to it, and it’s quite the shape shifter to boot. It smells great, has a young streak, tends toward a sweet youthful vanilla, though it’s probably not the kind of thing you’d want to recommend for a teenage girl or someone with a teenage girl’s sensibilities. 1826 is definitely a woman’s fragrance and needs a sophisticated nose to appreciate it.

Reviewed in This Post: 1826, 2012, Eau de Parfum.


Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab Paris

Paris was one of the very first Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab scents I ever tried. It was in the form of a sampler vial (what they call ‘imps’) and it was, unfortunately, not my cup of tea.

In Bottle: Tons of lavender loaded up with sweetness and a little bit of spice.

Applied: Yep, lots of lavender with a lot of sweetness. I’ve tried other BPAL lotus scents to me and the lotus components always smelled sweet and a little off. It’s off because it smells like chemical sweetness. Like the chemical sweetness you might associate to something you’re not supposed to be near. That’s the kind of sweetness that I’m getting from Paris and it’s very distracting. Lavender has to be mixed just right for me or it ends up distracting or just smells weird in a fragrance. Unfortunately, Paris’ off-sweet lotus mixing with the strong lavender in this fragrance creates an odd sensation that I’m at the dentist and getting ready to have my teeth worked on. As Paris progresses, the fragrance ages into strong off-sweet lavender with a hit of cinnamon. The spice does help to mature the fragrance and make it more appealing, but it’s too little too late for me.

Extra: Paris is a part of BPAL’s Wanderlust series of fragrances.

Design: Pretty much what you’d expect from a BPAL. Paris sits in an amber apothecary bottle with a standard BPAL label and standard black cap.

Fragrance Family: Sweet Aromatic

Notes: Lavender, lotus, cinnamon.

In addition to Paris, I also had a scent that worked out a lot better in my first order from BPAL. Thankfully, The Unicorn was a big hit for me and kept me going on BPAL’s to slowly sample their massive library scents. In that time, I’ve discovered stuff that didn’t work at all and stuff that I really like. Though it’s way too easy to get lost in all the inventory.

Reviewed in This Post: Paris, 2010, Perfume Oil.


Tauer Pentachord Auburn

Tauer Perfumes caught my eye while I was shopping for samples and thought of my husband’s birthday. Now his birthday is a few months off at least, but when it comes to me and fragrance shopping I can’t get started soon enough. What attracted me to Auburn was the promise of a cinnamon and tobacco scent.

Pentachord Auburn

Pentachord Auburn

In Bottle: A hint of sweetness mixed with a bit of cinnamon and smokiness. Reminds me a bit of autumn.

Applied: A hit of sweet cinnamon up front. I get no orange flower from this and the sweetness of the fragrance instantly disqualifies it for my husband. But I let it sit and see where it goes. Auburn rather happily introduces a sandalwood and tobacco mix, more heavy on the tobacco than sandalwood though. There’s a pleasant smokiness to this that dominates the fragrance giving it a very rich incense-like quality. What I don’t care too much for is the sweetness that I’m not sure I quite like mixed with tobacco. Auburn is definitely warm and sweet and gives me an idea of what a cinnamon smoke would smell like. But I can’t say I’m a big fan of the mixture. It’s definitely interesting, but I don’t know about wearable when it comes to my taste.

Extra: The Pentachord series is about the molecules in the fragrances where every fragrance features just five notes.

Design: I’ve always liked Tauer’s bottles. Pleasantly geometric, functional with just enough style and none of the fluff. Good spraying, good feel in the hands, looks great on display and if you have more than one, they look fabulous together.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Oriental

Notes: Orange flower, cinnamon, sandalwood, amber, tobacco.

I do find the concept of the Pentachords interesting and while I don’t think Auburn really suits me, I’d definitely like to keep exploring the rest of the series.

Reviewed in This Post: Auburn, 2012, Eau de Parfum.


Yves Saint Laurent Kouros

Every time someone asks for a strong, long-lasting fragrance marketed toward men someone else is bound to suggest Kouros.

Kouros

Kouros

In Bottle: Holy cow, it’s strong. Yeah, I’d say it lives up to its reputation. Bergamot, I think is what I’m smelling with a lot of aldehydes and some drowning florals.

Applied: All right, I understand why a lot of people hate this fragrance. They were kidding when they said it was strong. If you were thinking of getting this because you wanted a strong (with italics and everything) fragrance then Kouros will make you happy. Well, it’ll make you happen if you happen to enjoy powerful animalic fougeres. Kouros starts off with a big hit of bergamot that’s bolstered with a ton of aldehydes and a spicy herbal treatment that adds to the masculinity of the fragrance. You’re going to see a lot of hyperbolic language in this post because this stuff is strong. Period. It’s a bit screechy at first, and if you’re not used to strong fragrances, you will get a headache or your nose will be overwhelmed. Let Kouros rest on your skin for a while and it’ll develop into a deeper more animal fragrance that introduces another round of spices and a bit of incense. This is complex defined with its classical personality paired with an 80s Powerhouse underbelly. The dry down never seems to come with this stuff as it’s just so strong and so dominant that I can only say by the time I had to shower it off, it still smelled finely of smoke, musks, spice, florals and confidence.

Extra: Kouros was released in 1981. Named after a Greecian statue that typically depicts a youth in a standing pose.

Design: Not the most interesting bottle to look at, but I do notice the relative simplicity of men’s fragrance packaging compared to women’s fragrances. Kouros is a fine design though. It’s simple but functional, would not look out of place on a man’s wardrobe or wherever he chooses to use his cologne. It’s nice to hold, easy to use, and has an excellent sprayer.

Fragrance Family: Fougere

Notes: Aldehydes, artemisia, coriander, clary sage, bergamot, carnation, patchouli, cinnamon, orris root, jasmine, vetiver, geranium, honey, leather, tonka bean, amber, musk, civet, oakmoss, vanilla.

Despite being so strong Kouros hits a nice and reasonable ground with me so that I don’t find it repulsive and strong. It’s a good fragrance, it’s very strong, and it’s considered close to the classics. If you can handle it’s strength then you’ll be very happy with it.

Reviewed in This Post: Kouros,  ~2000, Eau de Parfum.


Knize Ten

Picked up this classic out of the pile today. I had heard of Knize Ten on various fragrance boards and saw it had a lot of love and praise so I was very excited to see how I’d react to it.

Knize Ten

Knize Ten

In Bottle: Strong leather up top with a mixture of notes that reminds me of motor oil or rubber. I know my fiance, whose love of things that smell like car garages would love this.

Applied: Once again a very heavy leather note up top with a few notes that remind me of rubber or motor oil. Just something really heavy and mechanical. This makes me think ‘masculine’ right away as it has a very strong initial personality. If you keep wearing Knize Ten it mellows out a bit, turning into a soft, plush leather fragrance with a hint of floral to back it up. It’s rich, sophisticated and very complex as all classics tend to be. I love it, but I would probably love it more on a man than myself because I can’t see myself rocking this with the same kind of style due to my penchant for lighter fragrances. Anyway, Knize Ten develops into this fabulous comforting leather. The kind of warm, plus leather you can wrap yourself in. The ‘motor oil’ fades so if you were concerned about that aspect, it did fade for me. Also keep in mind that it is hard to pin point exactly what Knize Ten is aside from a really, really good leather. It’s constantly evolving but remains a very nice comforting, luxurious fragrance. The dry down is marked with a warm amber quality and a hint of balancing patchouli.

Extra: Knize Ten is a classic fragrance from the 1920s and it smells like it too. It’s complex and unlike most modern men’s scents in that it has a fabulous balance of notes. It was composed by François Coty and Vincent Roubert.

Design: Fairly simple design choice for this fragrance but it’s a quality-looking fragrance bottle made of quality materials. Feels nice in the hand, has a good weight to it, isn’t awkward to hold or spray and looks simple and tasteful. Overall, a nicely done design.

Fragrance Family: Classic

Notes: Lemon, bergamot, orange, petitgrain, rosemary, geranium, rose, cedar, orris, carnation, cinnamon, orange blossom, sandalwood, leather, musk, moss, patchouli, ambergris, castoreum, vanilla.

Knize Ten is beautiful. I just can’t see myself wearing it, but I can definitely see a man with this fragrance. It’s warm, comforting, and sophisticated at the same time. Not to mention it’s a classic which almost always wins extra points. I’m just not sure how old my sample is.

Reviewed in This Post: Knize Ten, ~2000, Eau de Toilette.


Tom Ford Jasmin Rouge

Still on the look out for a good Jasmine that exceeds Thierry Mugler’s Alien. I still think that one’s a fabulous jasmine, though it is a bit of a one note fragrance. So in search of a bit more complexity, I looked up Tom Ford’s Jasmin Rouge.

Jasmin Rouge

Jasmin Rouge

In Bottle: Strong jasmine with a bit of buttery leather and a shade of very nice spice and wood.

Applied: Jasmin Rouge is a very strong fragrance. Its initial spray is marked with a powerful but beautiful jasmine note that overtakes the space around you. This is the kind of fragrance that announces its presence so be careful when you go to test it or use it for the first time. As the scent ages, I get a bit more of the spices in this fragrance, the peppery kick being most noticeable to me as the leather amps up with its buttery, soft texture that takes the jasmine and leather dominance all the way to the end where I get a few wafts of woodsiness and spices but it is mostly jasmine and leather I’m getting from this. I almost want to describe Jasmin Rouge as a jasmine and fluffy leather fragrance. It smells like it should be floating in the sky, projecting its glory all over everything within a 100ft radius.

Extra: Jasmin Rouge was released along with two other fragrances to the Tom Ford Signature Collection in 2011. So this baby is still new and if you wanted a hand at a leather jasmine then this might just be your stuff.

Design: The bottle screams Tom Ford design. Some fragrance houses just have a look and feel to their bottle designs that makes their products very recognizable. Chanel has it, Hermes has it, and Tom Ford definitely has it. Jasmin Rouge’s bottle is a pleasing shape and weight in an appropriate red color. It has a very nice sprayer that distributes a great even spray.

Fragrance Family: Oriental Floral

Notes: Bergamot, mandarin, cinnamon, ginger, cardamom, black pepper, white pepper, sambac jasmine, broom, neroli, ylang-ylang, clary sage, vanilla, labdanum, leather, wood, amber.

I’m pretty picky when it comes to how jasmine is treated in a fragrance. I know practically every modern women’s perfume has jasmine present in one form or another which only makes me pickier about its usage in a less mainstream interpretation. Thing is, I like Jasmin Rouge just fine. I just don’t know if I love it enough to replace Alien.

Reviewed in This Post: Jasmin Rouge, 2011, Eau de Parfum.


Jean Paul Gaultier Le Male

Le Male’s something of a classic for men’s fragrance, I guess. Well, maybe classic is putting it a bit too high on the totem pole. What Le Male is, however, is a very successful, very nice oriental fragrance that many men who prefer something outside of Acqua di Gio tend to enjoy.

Le Male

Le Male

In Bottle: Initial whiff of lavender and spices in Le Male. It’s at once familiar and unique.

Applied: Spicy lavender up top. Le Male’s reminiscent of a fougere fragrance with a major spicy kick. The cardamom, to my nose is particularly strong along with the cinnamon note. It reminds me a bit of this awesome chai tea that I really like that features cinnamon and caraway rather heavily. The lavender helps pull the fragrance together from the get go, as its little whiffs of mint and bergamot that were in the initial spray make way for a warm, dry midstage that sees an introduction of a slight floral sandalwood scent. The dry down is very dry with lavender hints hanging on and its spicy cinnamon making a very good run as the sweet, dry, woods scent of the base takes the rest of the show.

Extra: Le Male is strong and has excellent projection, so watch how much of this you spray on yourself. Especially you guys who wear this almost every day. Your nose may have adapted to the scent from prolonged use and you might be overdoing it a bit. I’ve stood close to a man who overdid the Le Male and it turns this brilliant spicy fougere into a powerful mess. Easy on the trigger and you’ll smell awesome though.

Design: Iconic design from Jean Paul Gaultier of the “torso bottles”. Le Male is packaged in a blue torso bottle resemble a man’s chest and hips. The fragrance itself comes in a tin can. Great for keeping out light and helping the fragrance keep a little cooler, but I can’t say I like having a tin can sitting on a fragrance shelf. Still, the torso bottle is a classic piece of design to some people, but for me, it kind of freaks me out to be honest. Still,as soon as you see these torso designs, you probably instantly think, “Oh, it’s Jean Paul Gaultier doing his thing again”. So if nothing else, it is memorable.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Oriental Fougere

Notes: Artemisia, lavender, mint, bergamot, cardamom, caraway, orange blossom, cinnamon, sandalwood, tonka bean, amber, vanilla, cedar.

On myself, Le Male smells too iconically male. Though it’s a great scent that I really like. It smells like it belongs on a man though and that is probably because of the prevalence of the gender that often wears it. Still, it’s like I always say, if you like this enough then who cares what gender it was made for? Just wear it and rock it.

Reviewed in This Post: Le Male, 2001, Eau de Toilette.


Frederic Malle Portrait of a Lady

Portrait of a Lady was the talk of Niche Town when it was first released. It took me a while to get my sample of this fragrance but I’m glad that I did.

Portrait of a Lady

Portrait of a Lady

In Bottle: Sour to my nose thanks to the currants with a spicy kick from the cinnamon and clove.

Applied: Sour currants that give way to spicy cinnamon and clove that mixes in with the incense in the midstage. I get mostly smoke from Portrait of a Lady until she keeps aging on my skin and there’s a bit of earthiness that comes up from the patchouli as the scent keeps aging the amber and its warmness rushes up to mingle with the smoke and spice. The rose in this scent doesn’t come up until later in the fragrance where the spicy notes settle down a bit to leave us with a soft, warmed, rose with a hint of spice.

Extra: Portrait of a Lady was created by Dominique Ropion who also created fragrances such as Burberry The Beat, Cacharel Amor Amor, and Armani Code for Women.

Design: Bottled in much the same way as other Frederic Malle scents, in a cylindrical glass bottle. It has a nice weight to it and the simple design makes you focus more on the scent inside the bottle than the flashy exterior. It’s simple and functional for what it is.

Fragrance Family: Oriental

Notes: Raspberry, blackcurrant, clove, cinnamon, rose, sandalwood, patchouli, incense, musk, amber, benzoin.

Portrait of a Lady is a really well done oriental, it smells a bit like an oriental powerhouse but also has elements of a sophisticated modern scent. I especially like the spicy rose present in this fragrance.

Reviewed in This Post: Portrait of a Lady, 2011, Eau de Parfum.


Houbigant Fougere Royale 2010

Usually when a fragrance company says they’ve taken one of their classics and ‘modernized’ it, big red alarms go off in my head. I’ve never had the pleasure of sampling the original Fougere Royale from 1882 and the oldest vintage I’ve even seen was on an eBay auction of questionable quality. So I went into this 2010 reformulation with as little knowledge of the original perfume as possible–being ignorant of the original fragrance, I’m going to have to say Fougere Royale 2010 is pretty darn good.

Fougere Royale 2010

Fougere Royale 2010

In Bottle: The lavender note is rather strong in this, dominating for the moment over the green herbal quality of the fragrance. There’s a spiciness in the background that blends in beautifully with the rest of the fragrance making Fougere Royale smell  sophisticated.

Applied: Opens with a clear greenness to it layered over a lavender note that’s helping a spicy floral note along that might be the carnation. As the fragrance heads into its midstage the lavender sticks around but also blends in with a strong herbal note that I presume is the clary sage. There’s a lot of complexity in this fragrance but I can pick out a few key notes here and there. Most notable is the lavender, then the sage and a spicy note in the midstage where I get the cinnamon notes. The final dry down is marked with a creamier personality as the tonka and amber notes come up to blend with the herbal and spicy notes. The lavender is still faintly recognizable in the dry down as well.

Extra: Fougere Royale has had a tumultuous past, much like the fragrance house that originally released it. After its release in 1882 it has gone under numerous reformulations. Like with all modern fragrances, any oak moss note is likely to be synthetic or a substitute. The original Fougere Royale was composed by Paul Parquet and was considered one of the first modern fragrances thanks to its use of synthetic coumarin. The 2010 version of Fougere Royale was composed by Rodrigo Floures-Roux (Clinique Happy, John Varvatos Artisan and Artisan Black).

Design: Fougere Royale 2010 is designed to appeal to a more masculine audience with a square-ish bottle featuring cut patterns in the glass. The bottle reminds me a bit of classical fragrances but also remains a little bit of modern appeal. It’s a pretty good design that does the fragrance and its history justice, in my opinion.

Fragrance Family: Aromatic

Notes: Bergamot, chamomile, lavender, herbs, carnation, geranium, cinnamon, rose, patchouli, oak moss, amber, tonka bean, clary sage.

I do believe Fougere Royale 2010 did the best that it could with a notes list from the 1800s that would have been expensive and near impossible to replicate now. I don’t doubt that 2010’s version and the fragrance from 1882 would smell drastically different but the 2010 version is a great fragrance nonetheless.

Reviewed in This Post: Fougere Royale, 2010, Eau de Parfum.


Givenchy Organza Indecence

Sometimes reading up on the history of a perfume is about as complicated as finding it. Organza Indecence had an earlier launch sometime in the late 1990s. I presume somewhere in and around that time it was also discontinued. It has been brought back since 2007  with a reportedly weaker sillage and it is the brought back version that I have.

Organza Indecence

Organza Indecence

In Bottle: Spicy with a clear cinnamon note and a nice mildly woody, floral in the background layered over a warm, sensual amber.

Applied: Spicy, a little bit sweet with a soft floral background that takes Indecence toward the feminine a little bit. I get some of the patchouli but it isn’t distracting because I swear there’s some florals here that are taming that dreaded patchouli and making it work with the spicy cinnamon. As the fragrance ages, it acquires a slight sweet and woody quality and that amber amps up giving this a warm sensual feel that takes it a bit closer to its sister, Organza. In Organza, I got a stronger amber note, with Organza Indecence I get a lighter, tamer amber with a spicy kick at the start and a flowery patchouli. The amber gets stronger and warmer as the fragrance wears on until it’s gone and all you’re left is that golden amber echo.

Extra: One of the more exciting parts about researching Organza Indecence is finding out that the collection it belongs to, Les Parfums Mythiques, also has a redistributed version of L’Interdit, one of those perfumes that I’d go gaga for. Funny enough you can find a few bottles kicking around discounters, on eBay, and even Givenchy’s Amazon.com branch has a couple of these fragrances in stock and the prices aren’t too bad either.

Design: Organza Indecence’s design is a delightful change from Organza as the fragrance plays up the feminine figure motif adding a lovely flowing coat to the bottle. Putting these two side-by-side would be awesome but unless you have the original release bottle, the Les Parfums Mythiques version is a decidedly simpler affair with a rectangle-ish thing that doesn’t inspire as much whimsical artistry. Still, both designs are pleasant.

Fragrance Family: Spicy Oriental

Notes: Patchouli, plum, cinnamon, amber, musk.

The two Organzas  are distinct and of these two, I think I prefer Indecence’s spicier interpretation. There’s something to be said about the tamer amber in this and the sweetness mingling with the spicy cinnamon opening. It’s a little more approachable to my nose, though both of these fragrances have very lovely amberous hearts.

My thanks go out to Dovile for reminding me to get a review of Givenchy Organza Indecence out there. 😀

Reviewed in This Post: Organza Indecence, 2009, Eau de Parfum.