SCENTS

Fragrance du jour, recent sniffs, random notes.

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8e Jour

Amber frosted mini bottle with cobalt stopper on ecru upholstery.

“Eighth Day” seems rather dated at first–big myrrh out of the bottle with apple cider spices, and some sandalwood and rose–like she’s stuck in a1990’s soundtrack.
But as it settles to the skin, the mix-tape gets sweet with honey, and there are some good tunes in there, ylang-ylang with some long lasting vanilla that is too good to go out of style.

Nice for autumn, and an easy one to find, if you’re into retro vintages and cinnamon.
My mini seems to have aged well–no “off” notes and the juice juice is still clear–possibly because the stopper is ridiculously tight. The cap went flying when I finally got it out, and I splashed quite a bit on my couch.
So I can confirm that this does, in fact, linger for eight days.

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8e Jour came out in 1993, along with this classic.

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Thé Bleu

Pale blue frosted purse spray balanced on rim of teacup filled with Lipton and 3 springs of lavender.

Freshwater mer-folk bath salts.

The first whiff is a slippery murky green note that reminds me of okra. Thankfully, that soon slides away, washed off by fancy French laundry powder–the lavender and violets dried out by iris.

Then comes a round of decongestants in the form of minted tea, an odd sinus clearing smoke under the florals, giving everything a cool blue vibe that I sort of like, for about three hours in intimate space.

Weirdly swampy yet clean.

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Another cool blue.

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Epic Woman

Gray marbled Amouage card with sample spray. The actual bottle is bright India green with gold accents.

Big sweet spice and roses, soured up nicely with lemony geranium tea. There’s some creamy orris powder underneath, with frankincense and vanilla to turn it luxe, but the woods on the bottom keep it grounded, so it doesn’t turn into a cinnamon roll.

Elegant and gorgeous, but also weighty–Epic kind of makes me nervous, like I’d be expected to dance the tango at a moment’s notice, or that dressing in anything but silk brocade would be a disappointment, while wearing this.
(Maybe I’d prefer the cinnamon roll?)

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An easy take on Neil Young’s epic song–

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Eve

Paper test strip cutout of a square St. Claire bottle, and test vial of Eve.

Eve was finalist in the 2020 Art and Olfaction Awards in the artisan/independent category, and it’s aptly named, with enormous seductive apple trees growing out of a single drop.

Comes on strong and skanky at first, dirty jasmine that cleans up with roses as it settles down and turns to orchard blossoms. Then the whole tree fills the room, woody trunks, green leaves, and fruit.
After a few hours, powder coats everything in personal space, for the whole day, with smudges of sweet char on the cuffs until laundry day.

The 35% concentration is way too indolic for me–I feel naked wearing it (which might be the point.)
An eau de toilette would be less overwhelming.

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Another take on Eve and the garden.

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Honour

Whiskery cat nose sniffing the gold dome of a white mini Amouage bottle, and some magenta button carnations.

Pleasant white flowers at first, not a lot of personality, but sweet–then after a few minutes the tuberose and the carnation pick up the spicy notes and turn more interesting.
There’s a delicate watery feel under the florals–more morning garden dew than rainy lotus pond–that might come from the lily-of-the-valley and rhubarb; green, a little earthy.
Some resinous stuff on the bottom gives texture and holds the gardenia in personal space the whole day long.

I get a maternal vibe, in a young expectant mother way–pretty, but not for me.

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This Honor isn’t watery at all.

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Zanzibar

Clear rectangular bottle with offset red square cap, and cardamom pods and cloves.

Opens with green herbs that get spicy as they warm up, teasing cloves and cardamom in a mild weather linen suit way, with sandalwood and soft sweet musk at the base.
Stays in personal space with breezy trails for an hour, then disappears to elusive spice on the skin.

Subtle, elegant and warm. (The guy finds the opening a bit too masculine on me, but likes the drydown.)

Van Cleef & Arpels discontinued Zanzibar, perhaps due to the fleeting performance. Vintages can be found pretty easily, with mini bottles pretty cheap, and full sizes in the hundreds.

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An Australian band that’s been around for forty years, and still touring. This is an early one.

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Italian Leather

Memo black, white and gold promo card with sample spray, held in a white leather glove.

The ad says a lot of pretty things involving fancy car interiors and the Roman countryside, but I get old diner next to a truck stop–chocolate ice cream sundaes, chrome and red leather bar stools, cigarette smoke and Trident gum–in the best way.

Brash and loud at the start, then melting into sweetness, the leather is almost edible, but for the marvelous hit of car-exhaust labdanum.
I can find the tomato leaf after I know to look for it, a twang of green with a metallic discord, but it fades after the first hour, drowning in the syrupy resins at the bottom of the dish. I wish it lasted longer–the sharpness is interesting, and cuts through the vanilla.

The benzoin and myrrh stay half the day on skin, and whisper the next morning on cotton.
Lots of fun.

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Chuck Berry’s “You Can Never Tell” is a diner jukebox staple–

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1000

Vintage Jean Patou cut crystal bottle with gold details and aged sealing thread (and a red capped black Joy bottle in the background.)

Jean Patou’s 1000 (said “Mille” because French, oui?) was launched in 1972, a powdery rose chypre with a glimpse of cat in the leaves.
Retro and odd, with a loud fruity green opening to a big Joy bouquet, yet somehow demure–the enormous flowers are dusted with iris and violet, and a moss so soft it disguises a rather lot of civet–that after eons settles to the skin with sudsy woody aldehydes.

Extremely long lasting, and in this era, unisex, easily worn by the guy who marches in solidarity with his mother, who wore it almost 50 years ago, carrying signs that say the same damn thing.

Sadly, Jean Patou’s production was halted last year, so grab a bottle of this (and Joy, too, if you haven’t one) now, while it can still be found.

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The Partisan is an anti-fascist song written by Anna Marley in 1943, who was an inspiration to the French Resistance. The song resurfaced in 1969 with Leonard Cohen’s cover, and it quickly became an anthem for protesters in the early ’70s, including Joan Baez.

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Excess

Matte black rectangular bottle with white octopus illustration.

TokyoMilk #28 lists amber resin, oak bark, blood orange, and patchouli–and they’re easily identifiable and rather nice.

The orange is sharp–not juicy, but pleasantly pithy–bolstered by the oak, which carries a bit of root-beer sweetness. The patchouli deepens the blend without taking over, listing more toward sailor than mermaid.

Excess is pleasant and polite, lingering in intimate space for half the day, and a lot less Lovecraftian than the black bottle, name and octopus illustration advertise. (I was hoping to get to use the words squamous, eldritch, and abnormal in this write-up, but sadly, no.)

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Here’s a cool cover of the creepy tune from Pirates of the Caribbean 3.

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Savage Belle

TokyoMilk bottle and cylindrical canister, featuring a yellow striped black kingsnake, and nightshade, foxglove and amaryllis (all poisonous flowers.)

TokyoMilk No. 68 lists Warm Ginger, Bergamot, Charcoal Accord and Wisteria on this new one, but I don’t get much of that.

There’s a splash of sugar-free Canada Dry at the beginning, and a hint of guttering candle in the middle–but it’s gone in thirty minutes. A wisp of purplish citrus clings to cuffs for another hour.

The packaging is gorgeous, though.

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This song is a bit more savage.