Victorian Ladies All in White

Posted on May 18, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

The Victorian ladies described here are actually  shrubs called Philadelphus.  Their common name is Mock Orange, and they can be found leaning, and lounging and flouncing their long green skirts starred with white floral embroidery all during May and June in these latitudes. They’re a bit self conscious, a bit apt to pose for the tableau vivants of a June garden.

But then, if you were that good looking, so would you.

Mock oranges have always frustrated me just a little bit.  Every time that I see one in  a garden bed or a shrub border I hurry over, ready to huff in that distinctive blend of honeysuckle/orange blossom/jasmine that is the hallmark of the shrub, but I am frequently foiled.  There are, you see, lots of kinds of Philadelphus and some of them have no smell at all.  Those, in my opinion, are duds. Continue reading →

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The Lost Liner

Posted on May 15, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

You were thinking that I meant the Titanic, perhaps?  Actually, I was thinking of the Normandie.  You may also be wondering what exactly this has to do with perfume? Well, the ocean liner was launched in 1935 and the first class passengers on the maiden voyage received bottles of Normandie the perfume in silver holders. Continue reading →

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A Broad Appeal

Posted on May 13, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

Most of the bottles of scent I own do nothing for my husband.  I don’t think he minds my perfume – except for some of the chypres and white florals – but then again, he doesn’t really think too much of them either.  So it’s a rare event when I come home from NYC or Saks waving about samples of something he actually likes.

It happened the other day though, and what was I wearing you may ask?  Well, it wasn’t a Chanel (although he’s alright with Chanels in general, finds Bois des Isles a bit overstated, but they’re “okay”) nor was it Guerlain (Guerlain’s never really appealed to him either, except for Attrape Coeur) and it wasn’t a Caron (although he’s made peace with the fact that I will always have Carons in the house no matter what, and hey, Poivre is not bad in his book).  It was… Kate Walsh’s Boyfriend.

Continue reading →

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The Perfume House That Does Not Catch On

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

It can happen.  For preference, you need a hit to avoid that catastrophe.  It doesn’t have to be a mainstream hit.  You don’t have to come up with the next J’Adore, but you do have to come up with something that makes the perfume world buzz just a little- like a disturbed hive.

Certain perfumers have a knack for this.  Andy Tauer certainly does. His L’Air du Desert Marrocain still comes up on lists of things that the perfume-obsessed wear, and write about, and rhapsodize over.  Pierre Guillaume is good at it too, he only has to stare hypnotically at a camera to sell perfume bottles, although the heck of it is, his stuff is surprisingly good, and if he resembled a cross eyed nanny goat I’d still think so.

Continue reading →

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Twist and Shout

Posted on May 8, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

In 1964, the year that Jean Patou’s Caline came out, I had a baby sitter.  She was very pretty and had the kind of hair that everyone wanted back then, i.e. hugely puffy.  It was shoulder length and had to be put up in curlers and then carefully back combed and sprayed to get the effect that younger people only recognize now from films such as The Blob, or old sitcoms like Bewitched.  I was in awe of Linda. She  listened to the Beatles! Wow, how fab was that?

Ratted hair, a portable record player, pale blue chenille bedspreads, and a bottle of Caline are what I remember of Linda’s bedroom.  Caline was new that year and Linda was an only child, therefore spoiled by her Daddy who was probably the source of the Caline – if it wasn’t her boyfriend,  who was about equally under her spell.

Continue reading →

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Down a Lazy River Before the Blitzkrieg

Posted on May 6, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

Of all the old Patou perfumes, the one that many people seem to love the best is Vacances.  Some smellers even claim it as their ideal scent, the one they’d pick if the perfume world suddenly turned small and ungenerous, and they had only one measly choice.

Vacances is a sunny perfume, and meant for daytime.  There’s nothing remotely vampish or glamorous or hard in the bottle. Released in 1936, the year paid vacations were inaugurated in France, it coincided with the bicycle craze of the thirties.  Everyone who was anyone, on that first nationally mandated vacation, climbed on a bike:  “At Patou,  culottes worn with a little blouse are designed to meet its requirements.  Plus fours are only seen in the little season and shorts with short stockings and a little bag attached to the waist come in.”*

It’s a far cry from spandex cycle shorts. Continue reading →

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The Scent of Chocolate, Bread, and Vanilla

Posted on May 5, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

A scent not to be found inside a bottle created by Guerlain, even though you might well think that, and no, it wasn’t something from Parfumerie Generale either, it was a clematis in flower, in a yard, one town over from mine.

I should explain that I am a walker.  Scarcely a week passes that I don’t go for a two mile walk, three or more times, and one of the best aspects of all that walking, is that I can see and smell whatever is in bloom that week in my neighborhood.  This last week one of the things in bloom was Clematis Montana (or C. Montana rubens if I introduce the plant formally here).  Montana’s the small anemone flowered clematis that blooms in the spring, and lots of people grow it for its carpeting effect of pale pink flowers up to thirty feet, but what that vine should be famous for is the scent. Continue reading →

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Joy in the Morning, M. Kerleo in the Afternoon

Posted on May 1, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

M. Kerleo’s career was spent behind a curtain, choreographing some of the finest prestidigitation of French perfumery.  He was the man in the booth at Jean Patou for some thirty two years and in that time he not only kept Joy at its ebullient best, but also created the enigmatic 1000, the satiny Sublime, and what many consider among the best masculines ever created, Patou Pour Homme.

These are only the best known of his works.  He also orchestrated a revival of the most famous Patou scents for the Ma Collection series in the 1980′s including the green floral Caline, and the much praised gourmand/chypre Que Sais Je.  He did Ma Liberte in 1987, and Eau de Patou, Voyageur, also Patou Forever.  He composed a number of scents for Lacoste, including Land, and the first perfume for Yohji Yamamoto, simply called Yohji. He won the Prix des Parfumeurs in 1965, and the Prix Francois Coty in 2001. He is still the honorary president of the Society of French Perfumers, and the founder of the museum of historically significant perfumes, the Osmotheque in Versailles. It’s quite some record, you must admit. Continue reading →

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Why So Few New Classics?

Posted on April 29, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

Why are so many new perfumes failing to become staples in the public’s wardrobe?  It’s a good question.  We still wear perfumes that are quite old by the estimation of the Industry. D&G’s Light Blue came out in 2001, Dior’s J’Adore in 1999, Lolita Lempicka in 1997 – you see what I mean.

And it’s not as though things are vastly more au courant on the other side of the pond.  Frenchwomen still wear Thierry Mugler’s Angel 1992, or Victor and Rolf’s Flowerbomb 2005.  In fact there weren’t many I could find on bestseller lists younger than three years.  Will things like Wonderstruck or Someday survive till next year or 2014?  Sensuous in the US, a 2008 Estee Lauder release, and in France  Idylle from Guerlain in 2009, might manage  a few more seasons in the sun.  Does it  take that long for us to make up our minds that we really really like something?  Or is it that we are now inundated with product and have a hard time filtering the perfume deluge? Are we so busy bailing out our little dinghies on the ocean of scent that we can hardly tell what we’re smelling before we heave it overboard? Continue reading →

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Missing Emeralds

Posted on April 27, 2012 by Blacknall Allen

“Aunt Alicia slid the great square emerald onto her slender finger and was silent for a moment. “Do you see…that nearly blue fire which burns at the heart of the green light…only the most beautiful emeralds contain that miracle of illusive blue.”

Gigi, Colette

I used to prefer green perfumes in daylight.  It seemed like the logical time for them, and for decades the perfume industry had pushed the notion of the green fragrance as a daytime scent, something to wear casually or to the office. Continue reading →

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