Hello all you lovely Fume Heads,

Photo Stolen from inetgiant.com.au

I love to go to the post box and find something there that’s not a bill, don’t we all? Sometimes though the post box turns up unexpected, interesting, heartening or WOW! Forgot I won/bought/snaggled this. So I want to write about some of the ones that really took my breath away lately, for different reasons..

LE PARFUM DE THERESE.

Photo Stolen from mimifroufrou

Today I went to the box and there was a mail bag from the USA. Tatiana had sent me a surprise sample of Frederic Malle’s Le Parfum De Therese, the fragrance Edmond Roudnitska created in the early 1950s for his wife Thérèse, and it was hers exclusively. In March I had confessed never smelling it on Patty from the Perfume Posse’s review, which was a fun read but definitely not a loving one. I am constantly amazed at the generosity shown in the worm hole de scent (why have I never heard of a fragrance called D Scent, that’s funny) by people who are continents away that I’ve never met. AH MAY ZING! From this fragrance I get roses, broken branch, fresh cut ripe melon and humus in the first rush. It doesn’t really change a lot after the first 15 minutes on my skin, it is mainly fruity floral but not sweet like many of today’s perfumes, ripe and fresh with an underlying strength like feminine women who have made a choice to be so while living, working, loving and generally getting on with the joys and heartaches of modern life.. As apposed to what I had read this smells to me of rise above, fly over, be magic. I know, I’m not making sense but I have been transported. Not for long though, 90 minutes gone. Respritz and begin again.

SEPIA.

Photo Stolen from perfumepharmer

From my reading on other blogs I was expecting this to be an aquatic airy whisper, so spare that my nose was going to miss it completely. What a surprise; Aftelier’s newest scent Sepia is a bit of a blockbuster on my skin. It is warm and dusty, floral and powdery, woody, smoky, dry and sere and smells to me like rural Australia. I can close my eyes and smell the unbroken expanses of sun beaten, dessicated red-earth desert where the properties are 1000’s of square kilometers with sheep, wheat and cattle. Many of the smaller towns have been engulfed in the last 50 years and stand silent, crumbling, with only their stone chimneys left like a mouth full of broken teeth. Sepia is the outback. It is also lovely and surprisingly strong. Thank you Mandy Aftel, something I never would have thought to wear or want in my library. Still powering at 3 hours, now smelling like attics and bookstores. I purchased this sample from Aftelier when buying a FB of Parfum de Maroc, should have ordered FB of this too. On my must have list.

AEDES DE VENUSTAS EdP.

Photo Stolen From edgeboston

I won this from Grain de Musc, blog queen turned author Denyse Beaulieu who wrote The Perfume Lover. What a divisive fragrance Aedes de Venustas has turned out to be. People are loving and hating it all over the scentbloggosphere and there seems to be no Meh factor at all. Dividing them is price point (US$225 per 100ml) and rhubarb accord reality. Mum used to grow rhubarb and cook it with apple in a pie that Dad loved, I can’t remember the taste because it would have to be smothered with ice cream for my sister and I to eat it. So no preconceptions here. What I smell is sharp, tomato leaves/broken ivy/squashed ants but offset by an underlying smell of powdery warmth like tame domestic birds have, mixed with apple and something that could be the vetiver or cold incense, after it’s burnt. I find that I’m divided, it is interesting and I would love a bigger sample which I will now invest in. Good longevity even on my skin, 4 hours and still pumping bitter and sweet softly in equal measure.

WATER CALLIGRAPHY.

Photo Stolen from aedes

I received this generous sample set from by Kilian in the best marketing ploy ever, join his facebook page and he will send you a sample of his new scents as and when they come out. Water Calligraphy by Kilian is like writing with water on a hot stone, like buttery tea, chewed grass, human boob milk and baby in the next room. It is nothing and everything. If you are rich and want the best of a slew of watery scents at about eight times the price, or maybe you just love Kilian, the ridiculously gorgeous bottle, the glamour or want to look like you are living the dream; then I say go for it. He has definitely shown everyone else that he can do the same better and it is more complex than any of the others. But we’re talking levels of air here. I get about 2.5 hours of smelling it before it’s lost to me but TSO Jin can smell a difference still.

There are more but I’ll save them for another day. If you have something you’d like me to sniff, consider me your Aussie nostril. Just ask and I’ll send you my address. Nothing makes me happier than going to the mailbox and finding a packet.

Photo Stolen from free-graphics

Should you want something in your mailbox, don’t forget tomorrow is THURSDAY GIVEAWAY COMPETITION. There’s some wonderful stuff in the pack tomorrow, so see you then,

LOVE, Love, LOVE,

Portia xxx