Gardenia Soliflore by Dame Perfumery 2015

December 14, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 26 Comments

Post by Robert Herrmann

NEWSFLASH: Jeffrey Dame has opened shipping for the Dame Perfumery Oils to Australia. FREE SHIPPING!

Hello Fragrant Friends!

This is Robert H. again, writing from my small island home in Washington state, exactly halfway between Seattle and Vancouver B.C. I am an inveterate fragrance lover, occasional writer, full-time business owner, world traveller, ex-Broadway singer, and happily married to an ever-suffering spouse who descends into allergic hell, at the faintest whiff of perfume. Just my luck.

So what’s my SOTD?

Gardenia Soliflore by Dame Perfumery 2015

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives only the note gardenia.

-“What’s the matter? You don’t like Gardenias?”
-“They’re o.k”
-“So?”
-“So you don’t put them on just to…..go to someone’s apartment….for a late-night supper…”
-“So that’s how it is?”
-“That’s how it is.”
Lady Sings The Blues- Warner Brothers 1972

…..and after that first meeting, Billie Holiday wore gardenias for almost every performance for the rest of her life. It became her personal symbol, a flower that like her life blooms for a short while intoxicating everyone who catches the scent, and then once picked droops and dies.

Photo Stolen Wikipedia

True gardenia is a scent that has been difficult for perfumers to capture, and I have any number of various bottles to prove that point….but THIS Gardenia by perfumer Jeffrey Dame is honestly the most photo-realistic gardenia it has ever been my pleasure to wear!

This is not your hot house gardenia, nor the one from the florist’s cooler, ubiquitous accoutrement for so many Prom corsages.

This is a flower blooming in a garden, in it’s natural environment, opening cool and green, medicinal, slightly indolic, but quickly settling down to……REAL Gardenia.

Even my spouse an avowed perfume allergen magnet turned to me yesterday and asked “Hey..did someone give us a potted Gardenia? Again? To kill?” (We don’t have the best of luck with gardenia plants…!”)

I stuck my wrist in front of his nose, he inhaled and smiled and just said “Wow!”

Wow indeed!

Photo Stolen WikiMedia

Dame Perfumery has $35/10ml oil
Now available to Australia with FREE SHIPPING!

Have you tried the Dame Gardenia or any others from Dame Perfumery? What was your favorite?

Amarige by Dominic Ropion for Givenchy 1991

December 13, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 15 Comments

Post by Anne-Marie

For some time I have wanted to tackle a review of Givenchy’s 1991 powerhouse fragrance Amarige but in thinking about Amarige, one of the most divisive fragrances on the counter today, I began browsing not just the online reviews, but some perfume books in my collection. I don’t have an extensive library on perfume but I have a few works, and very interesting they can be, especially the older ones.

So today I thought I would bring you a taste of these diverse published opinions on a fragrance upon which no-one seems to be neutral. Everyone has an opinion on Amarige!

Amarige by Dominic Ropion for Givenchy 1991

A review of reviews

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Parfumo gives these featured accords:
Top: Mandarin, Neroli, Peach, Plum, Rosewood, Violet Heart
Heart: Gardenia, Carnation, Jasmine, Cassia, Mimosa, Orchid, Black locust, Rose, Red berries, Black currant, Tuberose, Ylang-ylang
Base: Amber, Woody notes, Musk, Sandalwood, Tonka bean, Vanilla, Cedar

Released in 1991, Amarige is a colossal white floral which somehow missed the memo that the 90s would be the era of clean, simple fragrances.

Jan Moran:
Amarige is a romantic floral creation, youthful and fresh, lightened by sparkling notes of mandarin and neroli, followed by rich white flowers embedded in a sensual musk, wood and vanilla base. A delicately feminine fragrance.
Jan Moran, Fabulous Fragrances: how to select your perfume wardrobe (Crescent House Publishing, 1994)
Fresh? Delicate? Ye Gods and Little Fishes Jan! I know your book came out in 1994 and that the 1980sa were not far behind you, but really! Even then you must have known that Amarige is about as delicate as the water tumbling over the Hoover Dam. Sheesh!

John Oakes:
Sultry is probably the word to describe this strong, elaborate and passionate perfume … Its unconventionality and breeding place it well above the usual shriek and clamour of reckless ‘moderns’. A woman will either fall immediately in love with it or avoid its uncompromising demands. It is a lusciously exotic perfume – mesmerising and sophisticated. It is Givenchy’s most daring adventure.
John Oakes, The New Book of Perfumes (Prion Books, 2000)
Considering that Oakes’ declared favourite perfume is Balmain’s Vent Vert (‘green wind’), which is stratospherically different from Amarige, his review is a masterpiece of diplomacy. I wonder what were the ‘reckless “moderns” ‘ he was thinking of in 2000?

Luca Turin:
This is the review that put Amarige on the map for innocents like me who had until encountering his book had never tried it. Many of us probably recite this one by heart, can’t we? Here we go:
We nearly gave it four stars: the soapy-green tobacco tuberose accord Dominique Ropion designed for Amarige is unmissable, unmistakable, and unforgettable. However, it is also truly loathsome, perceptible even at parts-per-billion levels, and at all times incompatible with others’ enjoyment of food, music, sex and travel. If you are reading this because it’s your darling fragrance, please wear it at home exclusively, and tape the windows shut. LT
Luca Turin and Tania Sanchez, Perfumes: the guide (Penguin, 2008)
Equal parts amusing and insulting, like so many Turin-Sanchez reviews. Only one star was actually awarded, meaning I suppose that while he and TS find Amarige technically accomplished, LT personally loathes it. Fair enough.

Barbara Herman:
With a jumble of synthetic-smelling fruit notes that smell as jarring as spandex shorts with headbands and fanny packs now look, Amarige’s predictable progression in a tuberose-sweet floral heart and vanilla/amber woody base makes it hard to separate from its sisters (Cabotine, Giorgio, Animale, etc). … Amarige’s sandalwood and cedar base at least helps redeem it by providing depth and texture to the chemical stew that bubbles at its heart. … It’s hard to imagine this style of sweetness will ever come back into perfume, even ironically.
Barbara Herman, Scent & Subversion: decoding a century of provocative perfume (Lyon Press, 2013)

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

FragranceNet has $28/30ml
My Perfume Samples starts at $2/ml

So, what in 1994 was ‘fresh’ and ‘delicate’ is now a ‘chemical stew’ which should only be worn in privacy among consenting adults. What a difference 20 years makes!

Have you worn Amarige?
Anne-Marie

Imagine The Possibilities: Barbie: 2015

December 13, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 4 Comments

Post by Portia

Hey Crew,

Barbie, and its creators Mattel, have often come under criticism for educating young women that the impossible figure is normal. It’s a serious charge and one that our Mum fought by buying us loads of different dolls including the prettier and less formidably and ferociously sexualised Cindy doll, as well as some cheapies that had very nice but homely faces and much more real bodies. We didn’t care, they were all fun and we found them all equally perfect to inhabit our worlds of make believe. We even had some boy dolls, although they didn’t get nearly as much playtime because their day was done in the games when they drove off to work and the ladies could start living their lives.

Imagine The Possibilities: Barbie: 2015

Photo Stolen Barbie.com

Today I found the new Barbie advertisement and my Mum would have been 100% behind this ad, though I can hear the cynic in her asking if the body had become more realistic and if the barbie had been given Doctor, Lawyer, Scientist, Astronaut, Park Ranger or Engineering outfits in 2015?

This is a small step but a significant one. I hope you enjoy the ad, it makes me want to buy a Barbie for every child I know. Again I hear my Mum saying that the marketing team has done their job well. Yes they have Mum, BRAVO.

Portia xxx

Imagine The Possibilities | Barbie

Apollo Hyacinth by Alberto Morillas for Eric Buterbaugh Florals 2015

December 12, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 15 Comments

Post by Portia

Hi there Fragrant Family,

There are some perfumers whose name will make me prick up my nose in anticipation. A name that I know, though usually cannot pinpoint what it is they did that I love. Alberto Morillas is one such, he has done some of my all time favourite fragrances and a slew of my mates signatures through the years. Let’s talk Byzance by Rochas, M7 by YSL, Mugler Cologne, Kenzo Flower, BVLGARI BLV Pour Homme, BVLGARI Man, Lanvin Oxygene and the original Salvador Dali. These are just my favourites from the plethora of major blockbusters and some very good, well created flops and some absolute shite that I wouldn’t clean my driveway with.

Apollo Hyacinth by Eric Buterbaugh Florals 2015

Apollo Hyacinth by Alberto Morillas

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Neroli, pear, galbanum
Heart: Hyacinth, lily of the valley, angelica
Base: Haitian vetiver, oakmoss, cedar

Apollo Hyacinth opens with unruffled calm. Natural fresh cut fruit sweet and the pear smells cool, ripe and juicy: there’s even a hint of the dry and tarter skin. Galbanum smooths the opening giving green resinous porcelain, breath steals in and suddenly the sweetness becomes a litle candied.

Our heart has arrived and it’s a bouquet, fresh, green and stark. An angular, other worldly bouquet that says broken twig, lichen, moss and the gel like sap of aloe vera. There is peace and calm in Apollo Hyacinth, a breath of fresh air and a humid hothouse in the cool of evening. The energy of healthy soil and growing plants. The angelica adds a wild waywardness that the other flowers never possess, it’s enchanting, riveting. Like hyacinth is all grown and ready to rock.

Lasting power is unbelievable, though after 4 hours you have to be close to notice. Next day, 20+ hours later I can still smell the tiniest trace of sweet oily green that is only smellable with my nose against my arm. If it was a sexual tryst though whoever my lucky partner was would be getting a waft from me that is freaking gorgeous, I’m me and I want to root me.

Apollo Hyacinth is 100% unisex, a beautiful, billowing cloud of fresh green and white flowers. I cannot think of a place where you would feel mismatched were you lucky enough to own this glamour frag. SERIOUSLY WANT!!

Further reading: Perfume Posse and Scented Hound
Eric Buterbaugh Florals has EdP $300/100ml
Surrender To Chance has samples from $5/.5ml

Aren’t the bottles stellar? How lavish. Do you want one yet?
Portia xx

Shalimar by Guerlain: Back To My Favourite

December 11, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 33 Comments

Post by Portia

Hiya Frag Fiends,

Shalimar has been my enduring fragrant love. Since it was the fragrance of my Mum for years and some of her friends continued to wear it right through our childhood. Then working a couple of summers at the fragrance counter in a suburban mall, Carlingford Grace Bros. and getting to know a slew of fragrances it still held sway as the most beautiful of them all. Even now after being down the fragrant worm hole for years I still come back to Shalimar regularly and every time I do I quietly ask myself why I ever needed to stray from its billowing extravagance.

Shalimar by Guerlain 1925: Back To My Favourite

Shalimar by Jacques Guerlain

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Citruses, mandarin orange, cedar, lemon, bergamot
Heart: Iris, rose, vetiver, jasmine, patchouli
Base: Civet, musk, tonka bean, opoponax, leather, incense, vanilla, sandalwood

All I knew of Shalimar through my childhood was that it smelled incredible: its sweet, lemon ice-creamy vanilla over a hefty dollop of animal warmth, woodsy incense and plush leathers was so alluring and engulfing.

Named for the Shalimar gardens of Lahore (and Kapurthala’s homage) but the back story is of the love of Shah Jahan for a princess from the Persian nobility who he fell in love with, married and made her his favourite queen, after she died giving birth to their 14th child he nearly bankrupted his kingdom building the Taj Mahal as her crypt. The second time I was at the Taj Mahal the whole experience was so overwhelming that I needed to sit on the steps leading into the park and have a little moment. Yes, I was wearing Shalimar.

Above is a picture of my Shalimar collection. Only the bottles of open boxes are shown, quite a few remain unopened because they are doubles, I have decants or they are discontinued and having/holding/looking at them is as good as smelling them. One of my parfums is not parfum at all (maybe EdC?) and another smells like it has been stretched with perfumers alcohol. The rosebud bottle is still sealed as are the 16oz watchface bottle and the little parfum on the navy box. The batwing bottle that is 1/3 full is my 4th bottle of EdT over the years, I really want to buy one of the newest but feel naughty as I have 2 backups bought at extremely reasonable prices when buying this one. What is interesting is that though the Shalimars are all different, they are so similar that if you’re wearing them for pleasure rather than parsing and blogging they are all pretty much one. No matter what era though the lemon ice-creamy fizz with the vanilla and an animal growl fits me like a glove. My number one.

Further reading: Erica Golding at APJ and Portia on EdC at APJ
FragranceNet has EdT $49/90ml before Coupon
Surrender To Chance has EdP samples from $3/ml

What is your number one?
Portia xx

RandomRec GIVEAWAY WINNERS!

December 11, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 2 Comments

Post by Portia

Hey Y’All,

Another great giveaway thanks to Azar!! Superstar.

Don’t forget the….

We are offering a special APJ ONLY 20% discount valid through December 31, 2015. To receive the discount and a free packet of randomly chosen perfume samples with your order enter the code – APJ20 – at checkout.

Please hop over to the RandomRec.com site

Happy Holidays!

RandomRec GIVEAWAY WINNERS!

WHAT CAN YOU WIN?

USA: 1 x Lolita Lempicka Elle L’aime 1.4 oz EdP
Elsewhere: Lolita Lempicka Elle L’aime 6.7 oz body milk
P&H Worldwide

HOUSEKEEPING

Entries Close Thursday 10th December 2015 10pm Australian EST and winners will be announced in a separate post.
Winners will be chosen by random.org

Photo Stolen markmontanoblogs

RuthF for Elsewhere

FeralJasmine for the USA

CONGRATULATIONS!! The winners will have till Monday 14th December 2015 to get in touch (portia underscore turbo at yahoo dot com dot au) with their address or the prize will go to someone else.
No responsibility taken for lost or damaged goods in transit.

When Adele was Jenny: Graham Norton Show

December 11, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 6 Comments

Post by Portia

OK APJ,

Things I love include people with everything who are prepared to have a laugh and who happily help to make others lives a little bit more magical. Adele is a superstar, from this piece I get that she is also a funster with a sense of humour. How she changes a bunch of impersonators lives and gives them a little tiny piece of magic that they can have forever is so lovely and endearing. The impersonators are all ….. well, watch this, enjoy it, it made me so happy for the women and for Adele. I hope we have her singing and being herself for a very long time.
Portia xxx

Photo Stolen Wikipedia

Adele at the BBC: When Adele wasn’t Adele… but was Jenny!

Ballets Rouges by Ellen Covey for Olympic Orchids 2012

December 10, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 3 Comments

Post by Portia

Hi there Independent Perfume Lovers,

It’s no secret how much I love Ellen Covey’s work as a perfumer. There are numerous full bottles of her work around here but only 2 have made it to the 30ml Parfum strength spray; they are Olympic Amber and Ballets Rouges. So it’s weird for me to discover that I have only briefly mentioned Ballets Rouges and never done a complete post on it. TBH I thought I had done one.

Ellen Covey wears a lot of hats. She is a perfumer, scientist, runner, loving partner and general great girl who lives in the USAs Pacific North-West, near APJs Azar (they are great friends). I think I’ve missed a few of her astounding talents too, yes overachiever dot com. Her range of fragrances is one of the broadest, from very pretty florals through to the beastly Dev series, and so many of them speak to me. They are 100% original, even something as ubiquitous as amber becomes an intriguing and marvellous new genre once Ellen gets her teeth into it.

Ballets Rouges by Olympic Orchids 2012

Ballets Rouges by Ellen Covey

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these featured accords:
Top: Aldehydes, bergamot, mandarin orange, red thyme
Heart: May rose, rose, ylang ylang
Base: Musk, oakmoss, patchouli, labdanum

Ballets Rouges is the ultimate rose soliflor for me. Yes it has the smell of roses on the bush, it also has the smell of the earth that the roses grew in, the humus, fertilisers, mulch, add to that the smell of the cut stem and the torn leaf and on top of all that it has the smell of life and living to my nose. There is something of the uneasiness of finding yourself alone in the dusk dark swampy forest and yet it has all the joyful pleasure of a sunny summer meadow. Bright and dark simultaneously, Ballets Rouges is everything I love about Independent Perfumery: it has not followed a formula, never been panel tested, is full of gorgeous ingredients that are probably banned in 27 languages and it has a wonderful big voluptuousness and scent story.

Photo Stolen DeviantArt

There was much talk around the release of Penhaligon’s Iris Prima and how it was lovely and floaty yet completely failed to capture the agony beneath the facade that ballerinas project. It was all about the pastel glamour that 6 year old girls dream of when they want to be dancers. In Ballets Rouges Ellen has captured the stark beauty of a rose, the glittering deep plum sparkle of the dream and also managed to capture the gruelling and monotonous solo hours of perfecting the art, the heartache of watching your feet turn to pain wracked bleeding caricatures of themselves, the relentless drive and dark heart of ballet. Ballets Rouges is a little insight into The Black Swan.

Photo Stolen Wikipedia

It’s open of green and scintillating herbaceous citrus which quickly morphs into a dark plum and citrus scented rose, still on the bush and planted in a freshly turned and fertilised bed, you have excised some of the dead heads so there is a brittle green of torn leaf and the wet/dry oxymoron of cut stem. I am fully and divinely fragrant, Ballets Rouge is not the scent for close quarters it’s a prima and needs its space to shine. As we progress the dark heart warms through considerably. While we never lose sight of the starring rose the oakmoss, amber and musks come in and form a magnificent corps, dancing around and through till full dry down around a day later.

Orchidscents has parfum travel $18/5ml
Olympic Orchids has samples and EdP $120/100ml

Have you tried Ballets Rouges? What is your rose?
Portia xx

Christmas with Uncle Serge Lutens

December 9, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 12 Comments

Post by Poodle

When people talk Christmas perfumes, Nuit de Noel always seems to come up. While lovely, I don’t think it smells the least bit like Christmas.

Enter Serge Lutens. He’s got your holiday moments bottled.

Christmas with Uncle Serge Lutens

Baby it’s cold outside. Spritz on L’eau Froide. This smells cold like a winter night. A night so chilly that it makes your nose burn so you pull your scarf up over your face and the smell of cold mixes with your warm breath and skin. Cool notes are balanced with pepper and ginger in this one.

Photo Stolen Torange

On my skin Arabie smells like a traditional holiday candle. Or maybe potpourri. It’s warm with dried fruits and what I think of as mulling spices. I don’t really like wearing this but I do like smelling it if that makes sense. It doesn’t work on my skin but I love it on clothing and other people. If I had more than a sample I’d use it as a posh room spray.

Let’s deck the halls and put up the tree with Fille en Aiguilles. Quite possibly my favorite foresty scent. Pine needles, fir, and incense with a tiny touch of sweetness from the stewed fruits that Uncle Serge does so well. Reminiscent of a Christmas tree but the fruit notes and incense prevents it from smelling like an air freshener.

The tree’s up. Time for a cuppa. Five O’Clock au Gingembre is on the menu. Bergamot, ginger, and honey swirl together to warm you from the inside out. I don’t find this to be a true tea scent but rather more like tea time. Evokes the scent of spicy holiday tea blends that I can’t see to get enough of at this time of year.

Photo Stolen FreeStockPhotos

Love holiday baking? Break out the Jeux de Peau. Jam filled cookies, toasted yeasty bread with butter, syrupy fruitcakes… It’s like grandmas kitchen on steroids. Jeux de Peau starts buttery sweet but ends on a spicy note. It’s everything but the calories of the holiday dessert table.

We always went to midnight mass on Christmas and that’s what Amber Sultan makes me think of. It’s not really a churchy fragrance. It’s more about amber and spice notes. This reminds me of the swirl of perfumes that I’d smell in church. All the ladies wearing their very best for the holiday. A mix of fur coats, perfumes, and that undercurrent of incense that permeated the walls in every catholic church.

It’s late. The fire’s all but gone out and it’s getting chilly. Time to rest and dream about what Santa might bring you. How can you sleep with the clatter of reindeer on the roof? How about a little Gris Clair? This perfume has the scent of lavender and smokey notes. Not a light bedtime scent really, but with all the excitement and holiday stress you might need a big lavender.

Photo Stolen Flickr

Surrender To Chance has all the Serge Lutens samples

What perfumes make you think of the holiday season?

A Merry and Fragrant Christmas to you all!
Poodle

Cookie Queen in Vienna: December 2015: Photo Essay

December 8, 2015 / australianperfumejunkiescom / 28 Comments

Post by Val the Cookie Queen

I have just returned from three days in one of my favourite cities. Time spent with my daughter and friends. Sniffing, shopping, eating delicious food.

Cookie Queen in Vienna: Photo Essay

December 2015

Vienna is a beautiful city, now uneasy and troubled. There is no way of ignoring the refugee crisis. Make no mistake, it is very uncomfortable.
Guerlain exchanged my broken bottle of Shalimar Extrait and I gave a man and his dog who found themselves having to beg, a little money. Perplexing.

Start with the Vienna Christmas Lights