Perfume Lovers London an Evening of Incense with Chris Bartlett of Pell Wall Perfumes

This past Thursday, 29th January, I attended Perfume Lovers London Evening of Incense with Chris Bartlett of Pell Wall Perfumes.  It marked a very special evening for Perfume Lovers London as it was also the group’s third birthday.

Seeing Stars

Today I made a trek down to the Royal Observatory in Greenwich to check out the brilliant Astronomy Photographer of the Year exhibition for 2014…

 

Thinking About A Streetcar Named Desire

Last Sunday I spent the afternoon watching A Streetcar Named Desire, and I have thought about it almost every day since.  I had seen it a few years ago, but I hadn’t been as immersed in the world of scent at the time, and new aspects of the film struck me during this recent viewing.

Best of Barbier

Two of my favorite illustrations by Georges Barbier…

Andy’s Taxi

“Taxi was from Charleston, South Caroline – a confused, beautiful debutante who’d split with her family and come to New York.  She had a poignantly vacant, vulnerable quality that made her a reflection of everybody’s private fantasies.  Taxi could be anything you wanted her to be – a little girl, a woman, intelligent, dumb, rich, poor – anything.  She was a wonderful, beautiful blank.  The mystique to end all mystiques.” – Excerpt from Andy Warhol’s The Philosophy of Andy Warhol

Madame de Staël

“The more I see of men the more I like dogs.” Madame de Staël

Nasomatto Nuda Perfume Review

“Is Jasmine then the mystical Morn – the centre, the Delphi, the Omphalos of the floral world?  Is it the point of departure, the one unapproachable and indivisible unit of fragrance?  Is Jasmine the Isis of flowers, with veiled face and covered feet, to be loved of all yet discovered by none?  Beautiful Jasmine!  If it be so, the Rose ought to be dethroned and the Inimitable enthroned in her stead; suppose we create a civil war among the gardens and crown the Jasmine empress and queen of all,” Charles Dickens, Household Words as quoted in Mandy Aftel’s Fragrant.

Illustration by Alastair

There are other Jasmine-centric fragrances that strive to capture the essence of Jasmine freshly bloomed, in its first flush of life.  Nasomatto’s stirring soliflore, Nuda, captures Jasmine after she’s been out all night in the deepest twilight hours.

Procrastinating

I’ve been watching this for like two hours!

Remembering Anita Ekberg 1931 – 2015

No one has ever done more for the Trevi Fountain.

“It was I who made Fellini famous, not the other way around,” Anita Ekberg.

Au Pays de la Fleurs d’Oranger Tubéreuse Rosée Perfume Review

 

“The tuberose, with her silvery light, That in the gardens of Malay Is call’d the Mistress of the Night, So like a bride, scented and bright; She comes out when the sun’s away.” from Lalla Rookh by Thomas Moore.

Where possible Tuberose is a starting point for me when exploring a new line of perfumes.  It is the note I am most familiar with and that I have the most appreciation for.  I am always interested in finding new and interesting interpretations of Tuberose fragrances that highlight a different facet to this beguiling floral note.

When I first encountered Au Pays de la Fleurs d’Oranger’s Tubéreuse Rosée I wasn’t sure what to expect.  The name alone sounds like it has all the makings of a heavyweight boxing match between two of the biggest divas of the olfactory stratosphere.