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Val the Cookie Queen
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Hey APJs
As you all may know if you have been following my Strange Tales from the Cookie Kitchen on A Bottled Rose, I have an Altered States past. These days perfume is my addiction of choice and once in a while something interesting lands in my hands. Continue reading
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Kate Apted
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Years ago I saw a quirky film called ‘Being John Malkovich’. It involved a portal to enable people to enter the mind of John Malkovich, the esteemed actor. Not being in the least arty myself, I am intrigued at how artists think, and such a literal portal would allow me to enter an artist’s mind. Kind of creepy an idea, I know, but it would be the closest I could get to producing art and the thought processes that occur in its production.
Of all the perfumers whose work I admire, it comes as no surprise to me that many are multi media artists. Teone Reinthal paints and works with video production, Andy Tauer draws and is involved in his entire image, and John Biebel works in IT and paints in a variety of styles.
John is the visionary of a brand called January Scent Project. He has produced 5 eau de parfums and 2 oils to date.
You may know of John from his Fragrantica articles and editorial contributions. I think it was through Ida Meister’s 2016 Fragrantica interview of John I first learned of John’s perfumes (link here). Smitten with Ida’s operatic writing style, I promptly ordered a sample set of John’s first three scents.
Ida Meister and John Biebel. Photo credit: Fragrantica.
The names of these scents give away the style of perfumery John has employed. Eiderantker, Smolderose and Selperniku are not of French provenance, in name and smell. They are decidedly modern, almost avant garde and come from John’s soul. Only someone like John could imagine such blends of notes and make them work. John has pushed the limits of what contemporary perfumery is capable of and I look forward to every scent he creates.
Photo credit: Fragrantica
I must admit I felt incredibly challenged by both Eiderantler and Selperniku. I spent a good week with each of them and studied every nuance like I do any building by Tadao Ando. Complexity abounds in each sniff, though I am reaching for a unified, simplified understanding I can grasp in one smell. John’s scents are not like that. From afar, one can determine they are JSP scents, but up close, each one brings a near sensory overload. A most welcome feature indeed, for JSP scents are not mundane in any way.
I find Selperniku a textural and sensory delight. In fact, all John’s scents are, but Selperniku is more so. It contains seemingly competitive notes, such as salt, tangy apricot, creamy butter and a host of things that should bump against each other in ways to repel, but they do not. I seek out the taste of the salt, I want to feel the sun kissed fuzzy skin of the apricots and I think of that rich butter melting between my fingers. Together, Selperniku has me come back for more; wanting to discover what else lies beneath.
Then there is the decadent, sensual, smoky Smolderose. Funnily, I love the scent more after I have worn it to bed and it lingers on my pillow case in the morning. My skin must amplify the smoke and the rose to make an alluring scent that is intensely boudoir. Not a high top note in sight, yet its bassy heft is complete.
John’s more recent release, Vaporocindro, is a light hearted play on crisp green notes, waxy lilac that reads violet, and florals. It flits around in a non linear way and catches notes in the same way the sun is reflected off shiny surfaces on a warm summer morning. This an aspect of John that took me by surprise; especially as his next release was a quiet, masculine, reflective scent.
Mr Biebel has me intrigued as to what lies inside his mind. If these cacophonous, contemplative, Jackson Pollckesque scents came from within, what more exists in that magnificent mind of his? It has to suffice that the closest I will get to experiencing what it is to be John Biebel is to smother myself in one of his perfumes and allow my own mind to wander where it will. Maybe that is the point to JSP? To have me want to discover what lies within me and concern myself less with others?
Have you tried any of John’s January Scent Project perfumes? If so, what do you take from them? And what of the film, Being John Malkovich?
Til next time, droogies,
Kate xx
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Val the Cookie Queen
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Hey APJ
It is eight in the morning and I am sat here wearing the Strangelove NYC deadofnight. It is an oud; I was given it in London. More of that in another post, after I have sold my children. And whilst talking perfume, I got some vintage Chanel N°5 from Portia, via Tara. I nearly killed myself on that, overspraying. And despite what Portia says, not recommended. It reignited a thousand memories, and is utterly divine. Take a look at Tara’s write up of our time together, she has lots of great photos and actually remembered everything that we did. Which saved me having to.
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Kate Apted
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Years ago, I saw Beige sitting on the counter at the Chadstone Chanel boutique. You are kidding me that Chanel would call an exclusive … Beige?! Such a boring, nondescript name would have to have a boring scent inside. To top it off, the sales assistant told me it is her favourite from the line. I walked past it and never, ever tried it. I felt I was missing nothing.
For some bizarre reason, I bought a used bottle of the EDT from an Ebay seller I have implicit trust in just two months ago. A huge 200 ml bottle with about 50 ml left. And it was cheap!
Fragrantica lists the following notes: frangipani, freesia, honey accords and hawthorn.
Upon first spray, I began to have this dialogue run through my head; “Kate, you let this go, girlfriend?! WHY did you not try this before it was discontinued?? *eyes roll back in rapture* Get another bottle STAT!”
Every single day since that first spray, I have been trawling through all my familiar online haunts to secure myself at least another 50 ml of this honeyed beauty. I have not been this smitten with a scent upon first sniff ever. I am yet to find a bottle, used or new, that is within my budget and able to be posted. It will happen.
The notes really do not appeal, on paper. I adore the freesia in my Antonia’s Flowers, so a mighty high standard for any other freesia to match. I am not a fan of frangipani, as I had overdosed on it living in Bali. Honey is a sweet note I would prefer to eat than simply sniff (OMG, stringybark honey!!). As for hawthorn, huh?? Yet, together, the effect is a smooth elixir of something not tropical, sweet or boring. Polge did an astounding job of making a seamless, rich golden floral.
Beige should not be oversprayed. One torso spritz is all I need, and I am a habitual oversprayer. Beige hums on my skin for a good four hours, with all the notes ever present and in equal amounts. I get a constant aura that tickles my brain in such a delightfully playful way, yet Beige is very much a grown up scent I feel a little fradulent wearing, to be honest. It is in a similar vein to 24 Faubourg by Hermes, but much more approachable.
I understand the story that is learned verbatim by Chanel sales assistants regarding Beige, however, the name brings to mind those horrid neutral toned body hugging dresses a certain American reality star-cum-model-cum-whatever else she is today wears. Beige, as a colour, to me, is devoid of character, mood, interest and texture. I find myself mentally and emotionally disengaged from the word and the colour. The sheer genius is in the perfume itself. But nothing attracted me to want to try it, much to my chagrin. The redeeming fact in all this is my renewed interest in the Les Exclusifs line. I am now wondering if I am missing out on any more strokes of Polge talent.
And I humbly admit to my own prejudices. Excuse me while I go and sniff at the altar of Beige divinity…
Have you disregarded a scent based on the whole package, only to find you got to the party too late?
Ciao bella et bello.
Kate xx
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Val the Cookie Queen
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Afternoon from Europe APJ
I am in the middle of getting ready to go to London for the weekend, taking my daughter along to look after me, you know? Make sure her mother can cope with getting on the Tube. Stuff like that. I am meeting up with a A Bottled Rose and with The Candy Perfume Boy. I am gonna pick up a vintage N°5 Perfume that Portia sent home with Tara. I have noticed recently that it does not always get a lot of love from bloggers, but I adore it. I think the fact that I booked a ticket to England to go pick it up, says how much. BUT before I go, let me briefly introduce you to the new Geisha Botan from aroma M. Continue reading
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Val the Cookie Queen
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Hey Guys
I have not had proper training session at the gym for a couple of weeks, due to a hurt knee and a strained neck. I am actually in a filthy bad mood because of it, but no time to really feel properly sorry for myself as the last week was so busy. This is a fifth Tuesday which is not a normal CQ Tuesday so I will take the liberty of telling you what went down. You will need to excuse the few dodgy photos.
Val the Cookie Queen
Hey there APJ Fumeheads
I have just got back from the shop after baking up a few hundred cookies, semi-panicking because I am about to miss my APJ deadline, happy that the shop didn’t burn down last week. More of that in a minute. Hurray! Autumn, Fall, Herbst, whatever you call it, is finally here. Although to be honest you would not know it. It is the middle of October and still hovering around twenty-five degrees. It is finally time to change over to a different set of perfumes, and I cannot wait.
Hey, hey, hey APJ!! What’s up?!It has been such a long time and I have missed you all and all of the chats here. Needless to say, I am thrilled to see APJ up and running again. Truth be told at first I did not know what to do with my free time. I ambitiously thought that I would continue to write during the break and come back with stories to tell and then … life took over. Haha, so much for my goals. Life has been hectic but wonderful and full of surprises. I am going to tell you today about my love affair with Scotland. As my husband had a business trip to Hawaii during my son’s spring break, I decided to go to Edinburgh and the Highlands with my son. Of course I have travelled alone with him, but this was our first sightseeing adventure without Dad there to entertain or be an adult conversationalist in the evenings. I could not have been more thrilled with the experience. We put away the iPad and iPhone (couldn’t talk to husband anyway because of the 11 hour time difference) and hit Scotland with loads of energy and excitement.As my son so eloquently stated on our first day in Edinburgh, Scotland completely surpassed all of our expectations with its beauty, people, history and sites. My son surprised me with his knowledge of some history and when I enquired where he had read that he told me Donald Duck was not as useless as I always claim. 
Edinburgh is a city of contrasts with the Old Town and the New Town. The architecture is stunning and the sheer determination of humans to occupy the Castle Rock, where Edinburgh Castle is positioned is unfathomable to my feeble brain. Edinburgh has stolen my heart with its magnificence.
The 19th century Scottish writer Robert Louis Stevenson described Edinburgh so eloquently when he wrote the following in Edinburgh Picturesque Notes. “Into no other city does the sight of the country enter so far, if you do not meet a butterfly, you shall certainly catch a glimpse of far-away trees upon your walk; and the place is full of theatre tricks in the way of scenery. You peep under an arch, you descend stairs that look as if they would land you in a cellar, you turn to the back-window of a grimy tenement in a lane: -and behold! You are face-to-face with distant and bright prospects. You turn a corner, and there is the sun going down into the Highland hills. You look down an alley, and see ships tacking for the Baltic.”
Our tour of the Highlands was a highlight on this trip and has ensured that we will return next year to further discover what the Highlands has to offer. As a child I believed in Nessie the Famed Loch Ness Monster. My son is not quite the believer I was but he had a wonderful conversation with one of the crew on our cruise of the Loch. Maybe one day he will believe. Ben Nevis was clearly visible on a partly cloudy day and the air was so fresh and clean that it reminded us of Austria. But our absolute favorite part of the Highlands was Glencoe, the famous glen surrounded by snow capped mountains, waterfalls, lush greenery and clean air. We could have spent hours leisurely walking around and discovering the wilderness there. We spotted a herd of red deer grazing which elicited squeals of joy from both of us.
Scotland is fantastic and I will go back next spring break with my son. We plan on exploring the Highlands a bit more. Perhaps The Isle of Skye and the surrounding area.
I was monogamous in my perfume choice for the entirety of the trip as well. This past winter I fell in love with Frederic Malle’s Dries van Noten and it was a perfect choice for the trip. Due to the chilly air I needed something cozy and warm. The opening is a tad bit harsh but Dries van Noten quickly dries down to a soft vanilla, tonka bean, sandalwood, woody dream. I am not a light sprayer and the more I spray of Dries the better my experience. It melds beautifully into my skin creating this wonderful aura. I usually stick to one perfume if I am traveling to an unknown destination, I don’t want any challenges to my olfactory senses when I am trying to focus on the new destination. If it is a family vacation I tend to bring samples or decants so that I can vary things up a bit.How about you? Do you travel with perfume? Please tell me what you have all been up to. Any trips? Any new perfumes?KissesSandra xoxo(All photos taken by me.)
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Portia
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Hi there APJ,
I tried Neroli Outrenoir when it was first released while Jin and I were in the Champs Elysees flagship store. I was totally overwhelmed by the venue and underwhelmed by the scent and really haven’t given it another thought. Recently though I bought a 10ml decant in a split. To be honest I don’t remember putting my name down for it. You know that late night cyber crawl after a couple of cuppas and Continue reading
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Val the Cookie Queen
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November Greetings APJ
From L.A. The Boxwalla October Beauty Box
From L.A. to New York, from New York to L.A.
I chatted a lot with the charming Lavanya as she was in the process of setting up www.theboxwalla.com. Talking about it is one thing, and doing it quite another. Two years on Boxwalla continue to offer four different subscription boxes; the Beauty Box, Food Box, Film Box and Book Box. The boxes themselves are superb. Boxwalla have them made by a small company in India, who make the paper from cotton scraps. Tree-free handmade paper. I keep my decants in an empty box. They are very strong and tough.
The October Beauty Box is nothing short of divine. I am most impressed that products are either full sized at least a large travel size. I am not partial to tiny samples that you need to rip open with your teeth, squeezing out the three drops from within. Boxwalla´s Beauty Boxes treat you to amazing green beauty products. We have most certainly moved on from what my daughter and I refer to as “Müsli products” which we wouldn´t touch with a bargepole.
The October Beauty Box showcases www.hforlove.com products. The Rapha Harmonizing Cleanser feels stimulating on the face. I wear a lot of makeup, which I chose to remove in my normal way. I followed it up by massaging the cleanser into my face, soothing my skin and removing with a hot flannel. Skin is noticeably softer each time I use it.
The Propolis Regenerative Mask felt wonderful, I don´t know if anything has regenerated yet as I have only used it once! The Kinu, a decadent body balm is so good, leaving my skin hydrated and amazingly soft for hours. It smells divine, laced with essential oils of grapefruit, cedar wood, bergamot, rosemary, and vanilla.
Shipping within the US is free, and Boxwalla ship their boxes abroad too, with the exception of the food box. Fifty bucks every two months? Worth every cent and more.
Next time: We go to New York: Aroma M Geisha Marron Eau de Parfum
From sea to shining sea.
Roasted marron bussis
CQ
(ED: All Photos supplied by Val. XX)
