Fashion

Vanille Absolument (was Havana Vanille) by L’Artisan Parfumeur 2009

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 12 Comments

Hiya all you lovely Perfumistas,

I ordered my Vanille Absolument from the French sale online recently but it was once known as Havana Vanille too. Different name, same juice apparently. I have a long standing love of vanilla in food and fragrance so add this to rum, leather and musk; it was a no brainer.

Photo Stolen L’Artiisan Parfumeur

Fragrantica gives these notes/accords
Top: Clove, Mexican vanilla pod, leather and crystallized dried fruit
Heart: Narcissus, rum, everlasting flower, tonka bean, tobacco leaves and honey
Base: Balms, vanilla absolute, smoked woods and musks

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

OMG! The opening of slightly bitter vanilla is mesmerising, and to have put the leather in right up top to cut through the sweet, spicy candied fruit and give you a blast of dark cakery is genius. I get a milky/ice-creamy blush through the beginning too. Dark rum and honeyed tonka come in to give the whole a cocktail-ish almost Brandy Alexander feel that is both boozy, alcoholic, spicy and cozy warm. I am trying to parse the narcissus and everlasting daisies but they are completely subjugated by the other notes; but every now and then I almost smell them. Although this is a vanilla fragrance there is so much more to it, twists and turns within turns. The dry down is a warm and sweet vanilla that is held back from being foodie by the musk and woods, though I don’t get smoke in the traditional sense.

This is a classy, elegant fragrance that still remains friendly and approachable with good longevity (at about 5 hours before I lose 3 spritz completely) and the sillage & scent bubble are good too. Where would I wear it? This is so divine that I’m finding it hard to think of somewhere I couldn’t wear Vanille Absolument. It may be a little too much for a workplace where there are anti-perfume rules or very close quarters, otherwise from jeans to Haute Couture, Bar B Q to meet the Queen. Excellent as a date night fragrance because it’s sensual rather than sexual.

NowSmellThis and TheNonBlonde do great reviews with much more knowledge than I posess, go check them out too.

LuckyScent have 100ml for $165
Parfum1 has 100ml for $165 (still as Havana Vanille and I’m wondering if it’s pre-reformulation there?)
ThePoshPeasant has decants starting at only $5

How do you all feel about Vanilla? Does it spark your attention and is there one I should definitely try?

See you all tomorrow, thanks for dropping in.
Portia xx

Louis Vuitton fall/winter 2012/13

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 9 Comments

Hello Everyone,

It’s Sunday and I know you’re all dying to see the making of the Louis Vuitton 2012/13 fall/winter ads, which I thought were gorgeous!

The whole train trip as an event you got spruced up for, rather than a necessity is wonderfully evocative to me. Here are the print ads and making of video. I wish Vuitton would bring out a fragrance, even though I understand that they don’t want their stuff in the discounters and they want to maintain absolute control over the image, but wouldn’t it be amazing?

Photos Stolen millionlooks
.

Sorry there’s no QUICKSNIFFS today, it’s been CRAZY around here, hopefully they’ll be back next week.
Love to you all, I hope your Sunday is glorious like ours is. Sunny, cool and a little breezy here, the wind-chimes are tinkling and bonging in the background as I type.
See you tomorrow for Madeleine’s post,
Much love and hope for your good health,
Portia xx

Sweet Darling by Thierry Wasser for Kylie Minogue 2007

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Hiya Fellow Fumies,

This is not a fragrance I would ever have seen myself owning or reviewing and I’ve not read a review of any of Kylie’s fragrances but instinctively felt they’d be shite. Even the name Sweet Darling has my “WTF why another super sweet boring clone-ish confection by one more celeb with NO FECKING CLUE about perfume,” face on.

I love Kylie, have performed to her music, had it blaring from my car/house/radio, loved her videos, fashion, concerts. I’ve been in the same room as her even, though we’ve never spoken. A girlfriend of mine (Heya Annie!) has a few of her fragrances but this one didn’t work for her so she wondered if I would like it. Um, sure….

Photo Stolen girl

So brought said bottle home and looked it up, Thierry Wasser (of Guerlain fame) made both Darling and this sweet flanker Sweet Darling. Maybe it won’t be so bad starts to click over in my head. What if it was fabulous and we’d all been ignoring it because we thought it was a celebutards celebuscent? Could it be so?

Fragrantica gives the accords as:
Top: Passionfruit, freesia
Heart: Boronia, cotton candy
Base: Australian sandalwood, patchouli and vanilla

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

How does it smell on? If you like Miss Dior Cherie or whatever they call it these days then this is for you. It’s a super bargain slightly different version of that. GAK!!!

Fizzy and uber sweet opening, honestly it’s just sweet, I can’t pick passionfruit or freesia out of this, maybe some pineapple? I can’t THINK!! Like that little bit of vomit in the back of your mouth sometimes, sweet, acidic, wrong, swallow, burning sensation. It stays sweet and ripe, but not so searing after about 20 minutes, and the cotton candy is definitely doing a kissy kissy twirl thang but the boronia has passed me by, there’s a slightly spicy note that may be boronia? I can’t tell. At about the 40 minute mark I am getting a vanilla/patchouli swirl through the sweet stuff. It stops being quite so sweet by the one hour mark and starts to be a very conventional, and quite nice, vanilla/wood/chouli base. I don’t know how long it lasts because I am going for a bath.

CheapSmells has 50ml for $20.27, and the rest of the range

I hope all is your world is SWEET, Darling. Have you tried it? Any of Kylie’s fragrances?
See you tomorrow for another instalment.
Portia xx
Even though I didn’t love Sweet Darling, I do LOVE Kylie’s current single, TIMEBOMB. Yes, I’ve shown it before but it ROCKS!!

L’Eau Du Navigateur by L’Artisan Parfumeur 1982

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Hey Hey All You Stink Junkies,

Don’t miss my VIDEO guest spot on the PERFUME POSSE today<<<JUMP

They were having a sale at L’Artisan Parfumeur, one of my favourite fragrance houses but I live in Australia. Then my girl friend Alice went to England. So I shopped like KER-AY-ZEEE!!

The first cab off the rank will be L’Ea Du Navigateur. Why? Because it’s fricken AWESOME! This is a slick, classy and elegant creation.


Photos Stolen boatbuildingindonesia

The Phinisi Spirit (Boat Pictured Above)
The highly valued spices, and the fabled spice route itself, actually originated on the islands of the Malay Archipelago, later known as the “East Indies” or spice islands. Spices from these small islands were transported along a well developed network of sea routes by even more impressive sailing vessels, ancestors to the modern Phinisi. (Plagiarised from boatbuildingindonesia)

Fragrantica gives these notes and accords all in one mine: coffee, spices, woodsy notes, floral notes, rum, resin, incense, tobacco, leather, cedar and myrrh

Photo Stolen L’Artisan Parfumeur

What do I smell? I smell a boozy, spicy, coffee; a warm and cheeky Jamaican Coffee, that you used to get after dinner in restaurants. There is wood, I get a salty tang too, the flowers are very quiet and each time I think I’ve nailed one it disappears on me. The resins after half an hour are boat reminiscent but warm like a salty amber, maybe it’s the leather accord and my nose is misreading it. Tar?

The myrrh has been there all along but it makes a centre stage appearance, quite profound for a note that I often find lurking rather than doing a diva turn on my skin, 2-3 hours in. After that last big note the whole melange goes very quiet, like the background smells of cargo at sea I imagine. Starting to smell myself in the mix too, like L’Ea Du Navigateur has found my scent and decided it works very well in the mix so it might as well use everything at its disposal to create a spellbinding and narcotic miasma.

I get zero of the smoke, tobacco and incense that others rave about, and that’s a shame, but I’ve only worn L’Eau Du Navigateur twice. I think there will be surprises wearing it for different things and in changing temperatures. Next morning, over 8 hours, there is still a trace of a better smelling me.

Back in 2006 PerfumeSmellin’Things review is excellent as is 1000Fragrances.

Get hold of a sample/decant because it’s so lovely. I can’t believe there isn’t more of a song and dance done about it. Maybe because it’s been around for 30 years.

Do you have a favourite L’Artisan Parfumeur fragrance I should try? Please leave me a note so I can,
Till tomorrow,
Portia xx

Anglomania by Vivienne Westwood 2005

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 11 Comments

Hello gang,

The Olympics are on in London and I thought I’d do a bit about Anglomania by Dominique Ropion for Vivienne Westwood to coincide with such an auspicious time. I saw it at a local fragrance shop for an extremely reasonable price and snapped it up even though well aware of Luca Turin’s one star rating. “After an intense gourmand top note with too much going on. Anglomania poops out early and reveals a boring synthetic woody amber dry-down plus PVC raincoat” LT in The Guide, but I have disagreed with his sometimes brutal and scientifically biased carvings before, so I was still interested because I love Vivienne Westwood.

Photo Stolen thecultureconcept

Fragrantica gives the accords as:
Top: Cardamom, coriander and green tea
Heart: Rose, tender violet and nutmeg
Base: Leather, vanilla and amber

What do I smell on my skin?

POP! The opening is fun! The cardamom and coriander seem to already be having a chat with the vanilla as a huge burst of scent envelopes me. When the beginning lets a bit of air in there is a very pretty sweet green tea scent floating through, not like a cup of green tea but like thought of what a cup of sweetened green tea should smell like. Cardamom is the shining star though.

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

I miss the rose and violet all together, clearly my nose is not yet attuned to properly parse the fragrance, but I do get the nutmeg, even went to the kitchen to check that it is what I am smelling, it’s there alright but like in an egg-flip milkshake (milk, vanilla, egg, ice cream, nutmeg then blend).

At about the 30-40 minute mark the vanilla and amber are really making their presence felt. Already I am feeling a soft, buttery leather scent come through too, almost suede-ish but no plastic. I’m expecting the powdery woody violets, or the roses to give that funny plastic that they can give, but no, not today.

Towards the 3 hour mark I have a very soft amber with an expensive leather couch. I think only now am I starting to get a hint of the cool powder of violet like a soft loaded powder puff. Maybe the vinyl that everyone else smells is that faint smell of oil based foundation I’m getting?

Anglomania Vivienne Westwood for womenPhoto Stolen Fragrantica

There’s no debating that this didn’t last for many reasons, it’s a solid, pretty and interesting scent but no masterpiece. It was badly advertised, with an image that says nothing and speaks to no one, not lovely or interesting enough for the women to find it aspirational and not sexy and obvious so the boys would buy it for their ladies. The ad is not even in your face enough so the gays, who adore Vivienne Westwood’s often out of control images and presentation, would see it as a collectors piece. It was seriously off my radar till I saw it so drastically reduced. Having put it in that terrible context though, I will wear it, in fact I’m going to wear it to work this week and gauge reactions.

STOP PRESS!! Wear more for roses. As I thought Anglomania was a little quiet there was a spritzfest before work. Left wrist and elbow then mash, 3 hefty sprays on my decollete and one on my scarf. POW!! Here come the roses, the wonderful rich and spicy roses from top to dry-down. Night 1 wear: 2 random compliments (one lovely person so enchanted and asking who made it and where to buy it).

TheCandyPerfumeBoy does a really excellent review but he smells the fragrance completely differently to what I get. I’m wondering if there’s been a reformulation because I get no rose or vinyl?
I found 30ml for $37 at GalaxyPerfume and the only other online place I could find it was Amazon.

Have you tried any of the Vivienne Westwood range of fragrances? Love her clothes? Hate them? Tell me I am agog.
See you tomorrow,
Portia xx

L’Eau De Tarocco EdC by Diptyque 2009

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 8 Comments

Hiya Sniffers,

I ordered a decant of L’Eau De Tarocco EdC by Olivier Pescheux for Diptyque because the name is SO good. The Water of Tarot. Tarocco is also an Italian blood orange so they are probably talking about this being a citrus water, and yes it is, but there is so much more here.

From the Diptyque site: A fruity Eau de Cologne that is sweet yet vibrant and spicy. It carries the exhilarating scent of the Mediterranean in winter and the freshness of fruit just plucked from the tree, plump and ripe.

Fragrantica gives these accords: Musk, Virginia cedar, saffron, ginger, cinnamon, incense, grapefruit, orange and tincture of rose.

Photo Stolen theproducehunter

WOOO, This starts with the green rind and zest swoosh of blood orange/grapefruit, also spicy and woodsy, but not the warm embrace of Sandalwood this woodsy is like setting up camp in the woods, with the incense, ginger and musk. It all seems to be front and centre in the first 3 minutes except the rose, and I haven’t a clue what saffron smells like. As you look for each note it is already there awaiting notice.

There does come a slight warmth after about 15-20 minutes but it’s like the smell of the white outside left after you have zested the whole orange, and it’s merely overlaid on top of the already extant scents. It may be the rose, which can sometimes have a warm fruity plastic smell (I know that doesn’t make sense but if you have smelled that particular rose facet you’ll never forget it).

The whole fragrance softens off considerably at around the 1.5-2 hour mark in the cool weather. There is still a citrus feel but the cinnamon, ceder and musks seem to take over and give a warmer, mulled quality to the whole, like it’s been basking in the sun and ripened to the point where there is only sweetness in the juice. By 3 hours I’m hunting around for a respritz, even though the fragrance hasn’t completely left my skin. Today at time of finishing writing I have been wearing L’Eau De Tarocco for nearly 5 hours and it’s faint but still discernible.

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

Diptyque site has 100ml at $98 & 200ml $135 except they DON’T SHIP TO AUSTRALIA!!! Clearly they don’t want my business.
SurrenderToChance does 1ml/$3 or 5ml/$12.60-ish

This is a lovely cologne, not groundbreaking but done very nicely. I could imagine this being suitable for anything from the office, dinner, after gym, date night or cinema.  L’Eau De Tarocco strikes me as refreshing in the warmer months but still completely wearable in the dead of winter here in Sydney. I wanted to buy a FB so I could have a Cologne Bath like BoisDeJasmine was spruking earlier this week. As you can see I tried to go FB but it will have to wait till I can get to a Diptyque counter.

It’s summer in the Northern Hemisphere, what colognes are you wearing and have you tried a Cologne Bath?

Portia xx

Oud Ispahan by Francois Demachy for DIOR 2012

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 14 Comments

Hiya Scent-ualists,

A few weeks ago I was trolling around Facebook Fragrance Friends, a site mainly dedicated to the chat about what you’re wearing and how it is, who else has it, all sorts of great stuff for the fragrance junkie. It’s also a place where people do splits. I’ve never done one before so it was a totally new experience for me. One of the girls bought a huge bottle of Oud Ispahan (way too much to use in this lifetime) and we were allowed order 10 ml for the very reasonable price of 10 quid including postage!! From the UK! So, of course I was all over that like mould on cheese. It arrived on Friday and I have been spritzing away like crazy.

Oud Ispahan Dior for women and menPhoto Stolen Fragrantica

Fragrantica gives these notes:
Top: Labdanum
Heart: Patchouli
Base: Sandalwood, rose and agarwood (oud)

Photo Stolen indonesianagarwoodoud

How does it wear on me? I find Oud Ispahan to be soft, subtle and skin scent-ish; a barely there whisper of grandeur harking back to the Arabian perfumery through 21st century processes. It is quietly tenacious, lasting well over 8 hours on me, and almost linear to my nose unless I am concentrating continuously. There is a journey but not in a grand adventure way. The bright and warm opening whispers sibilantly like a  secret, in a very human almost bed breath way. I think this the softest and cleanest oud accord I’ve smelled yet; like it’s been washed and dressed for company and it rumbles through the whole fragrance life. Now smelling of breath, leather, flesh but all very indoors, captured, domesticized and polished. While the amber/vanilla/patchouli are playing around at the party, I can’t really separate them because of my lack of knowledge but they are all outshone by the incredible heart of rose that everything else here hangs off. It’s like the rose is holding court and all else are bit players, but keeping with the theatrical theme, this rose is Machiavellian. It slides in and around giving a spicy, peppery, sparkly, lemony, fruity rose it is one rose of a thousand faces and facets. My nose thinks it has her pinned and vamoose, gone! replaced by something akin but subtly different.

Due to the awesome staying power of Oud Ispahan I can’t tell when it finally takes its leave but my head tells me that real dry down is an amber/oud sheer layer of extra lovely translucence that makes me smell subtly more desirable. Well, subtly more desirable to TSO Jin. I’ll be smiling all day.

Photo Stolen Ispahan.com

1000Fragrances does his usual excellent job of reviewing and PerfumeShrine does a super pre-release geography, accord and history lesson. Both are well worth looking up for interesting data.

I hope you are lucky enough to get to try DIOR’s Oud Ispahan. I like it a lot; it’s classy, beautiful, long lasting, sexy and interestingly it has good sillage. I can smell it in a room that I’ve vacated and come back to 15 minutes later.
SurrenderToChance starts at $3/ml but 5ml is only $12 and that is a great size to really get to know it. Of my 10ml I gave 3ml to a mate and have about 3ml left.  This will definitely become a full bottle when I get to a counter.

Have you tried Oud Ispahan? Any of the Couturier Collection? How do you rate them?

Thanks for dropping by, and/or leaving a message. I am so happy and grateful that you do. Have a lovely day, till tomorrow,
Portia xx
PS The video below has nothing to do with Oud Ispahan, it’s just a lovely DIOR mini movie for Miss Dior Winter 2012

Clayton Ilolahia, Blogger, Writer, Fragrance Junkie. Interview

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 18 Comments

 Hey All,

Today I have for you Clayton Ilolahia, a man with a very successful blog (whatmenshouldsmelllike.com), who writes for the The Perfume Magazine and has been giving talks about perfume around the traps. He is also an Australiasian, YAY! and general good guy.  I have cajoled Clayton into answering some questions for us. He has been crazy busy so took the time to do it while flying to Bangkok! So read on and find out about this fascinating man who knows What Men Should Smell Like….

Tell us about young Clayton please, where you came from, family, siblings, poignant or helped create who you are moments?
I was raised in New Zealand and was bought up on a farm. I have a large extended family, somewhat expected if you have a Maori/Polynesian background, but my immediate family is quite small with just my sister and I. My upbringing was pretty standard for rural New Zealand. One of my first scented memories is the jonquils and jasmine that grew wild on the farm.

 How did you become interested in fragrance?
I want to say I have always been interested in fragrance, but then haven’t we all? It’s true, I only became conscious of this interest in the past 10 years, but I think if we all look back, we have memories of scent that trigger emotion. For me, the picture became clearer after I left New Zealand and moved to Melbourne, Australia in 2004. I had retail management experience and was offered a job managing a small perfumery opened by the Polakis brothers of Harrolds, luxury designer mens stores in Sydney and Melbourne, who’d noticed niche perfumeries opening in France and Italy so they wanted to replicate the idea in Melbourne. At that stage I had no interest in working in the perfume industry. In my spare time I was always mixing fragrant oils and reading about perfume, which lead to blogging.

Who were and are your mentors and inspirations?
I have always had a soft spot for perfumer, Jean-Claude Ellena, I really admire his work. I also think Jean-Paul Guerlain is one of the most extraordinary perfumers of his age. I would love to interview him.
In terms of writing about fragrance, I love the sharp wit of Luca Turin and Chandler Burr is also one of the best fragrance writers, a wonderful storyteller and his statements are always backed up by fact.

Do you still wear mass-market fragrances, if yes which and why?
Absolutely! I love the mass market. Sometimes the most luxurious brand that promises creativity and quality can disappoint me. And a small budget, mass-market perfume, made by a perfumer working with a cost-considered palette of materials is able to express the most memorable idea. Some of my recent under $100 buys are Narciso Rodriguez Essence Eau de Musc, Chanel Bleu and Marc Jacobs Bang.

Who is your favourite independant perfumer and why?
Serge Lutens (or Christpher Sheldrake if you are talking about the ‘Nose’). It is a range that stands on its own. If anything, Lutens references himself instead of others.

Synthetic, natural or mixture, why?
All my favourite perfumes combine both. Naturals are so complex and filled with personality; I love the tension they add to a composition. Synthetics are much more singular in their message and they can alter or colour a perfume story in ways naturals cannot. Synthetics and naturals work beautifully hand in hand.

How has your whatmenshouldsmelllike.com developed?
Great. Originally it was just a sounding board for me to write about my perfume collection. I wanted to dedicate more of my time to learning about perfume. Blogging became my way of keeping myself on track, so I was regularly thinking about perfume. I am fortunate to travel regularly for work. When I can, I like to write about my experiences in other cities whether it is a shopping guide or some personal experiences.

What qualifications do you have to write about perfume?
Lol- absolutely none. I think that is the clear distinction between bloggers and journalists- we are not professionals and I am very aware not to cross that line. As much as possible I ensure what I write is accurate as there is a lot of misinformation online. I try to read and research as much as possible before I commit to a post. In terms of working with raw materials I had my breakthrough moment when I did a course with Perfumers World, a training organisation in Bangkok, Thailand. Their programs are great for perfume enthusiasts that want an introduction to basic professional knowledge. In September I am doing a short course in Grasse.

Tell us about how you came to be working for The Perfume Magazine, and a bit about them for our readers who may not have come across it yet?
The Perfume Magazine was a serendipitous occurrence. Their Editor in Chief contacted me after she stumbled across my blog and asked if I would be interested in contributing. I submitted something for their summer edition and they asked me to join them permanently as their mens contributor. They are a lovely team to work with.

 What are the 5 most important things you have learned so far that could help budding perfumistas/bloggers?
1: Create an environment others want to be part of. Write about the things you love, forget the things you dislike and have no control over.
2: If you are expecting to be paid for your blog, don’t quit your day job.
3: Spend some time with a fragrance before writing about it. Get to know the fragrance intimately- the quality of your writing will be much better. Readers want to know your opinion and not just information that can be found on a press release. Make each post personal.
4: I never throw out a perfume brochure, I tear out magazine articles and I pdf any online perfume articles that interest me. They are a valuable resource for information, which often disappear over time.
5: Don’t be shy and approach others to get stories. Most people I have spoken with are really encouraging of bloggers, at the worst; you will only get a ‘no’.

WOW!! I hope you found that as interesting as I did. Thank you Clayton for taking the time out of your busy schedule to let us get inside your head, just a little bit.

Portia xx

Etro: SUNDAY QUICKSNIFF REVIEWS #12

/ australianperfumejunkiescom / 4 Comments

Heya APJ Family,

Click here for more graphics and gifs!

This week I’m doing something slightly different again. I recently received from SurrenderToChance a set of 3 Etro fragrances and I’ve been wanting to get them on the blog and thought that I can try all 3 in Quicksniffs and then do a full review on my favourite at a later date. So that’s what I’ma gonna do for you and give you the usual 3 sentences and a star rating. Follow the jump to find our Rating System Page (<<jump).

ETRO is a crazy fabulous Italian fashion house, check their site here <<JUMP

Photo Stolen Fragrantica

MESSE DE MINUT 1994. COR!!! Citrus explosion, almost like a spicy citrus souffle, sort of cake-ish but with a crackle of pettigrain that keeps the balance from getting too foody, though it is delicious enough to eat my arm. I’m not really a citrus fan, in my mind though my collection calls me a liar, but I really love this and think the Etro crew have done a warm citrus perfect for a sunny autumn, winter or spring day, like today was in Sydney, this felt perfect as it dried down to woods, fresh hewn. S=**** L=**** D=****

SHAAL NUR 1997. After the citrus has burned off I get herbal, spicy and wood. It is great but the flowers don’t appear on my skin in a starring role and Shaal Nur goes straight to an amber, patchouli and woodsy vetiver skin scent that plays so softly it’s almost miss-able that it’s more than me, but I lose the ability to smell it after 5 hours. This definitely has date night potential.  S=*** L=*** D=***

LEMON SORBET 1989. This, as you would expect, is also a burst of citrus, a bitter sweet cloud of cool herbal lemon gelato.  It is a good deal more linear and less cluttered than the other 2 Etros we are looking at today, almost linear but still with an interesting journey. Part of me loves the simplicity here, and it smells really good on me too, but I think it would be a better wear in the warmer months, perfect for you Northern Hemisphere people right now. S=**** L=*** D=***

I bought a pick 3 Etro Gateway Sampler from SurrenderToChance which starts at $7.99

I hope you’re all having a glorious weekend.
Thank you for being part of our APJ family.,
Portia xx