Although it took me a while to appreciate some of the classic Christian Diors, as I've become more experienced with perfume I've come to love them more and more. For instance, the first time I tried Miss Dior and Diorella, I wasn't sure about them. They were intriguing, but I wasn't ready for them yet. Dioressence, on the other hand, I loved at first sniff. What I didn't know was that my first sniff was of the vintage Dioressence.
Dior's website describes Dioressence as a “spicy oriental” and lists its top notes as aldehydes, greens and fruit; its heart as jasmine, geranium, cinnamon, carnation, orris, ylang ylang and tuberose; and its base as patchouli, oakmoss, vetiver, vanilla and musk…
Underlying Notes is a new romance novel with a perfume twist:
Perfume blog newbies often comment that some of the regulars have a language of their own, and indeed we even have our own dirty words, the f- and s-bombs: “fruit” and “sweet”. I must admit to being among the contingent that usually gives a snobbish shiver of repulsion when I read a note list that includes grape, litchi or coconut. Unfortunately, sales assistants flogging candy cocktails are attracted to my chubby cheeks, decade-old sweatshirts and general lack of bearing. I notice this most often in big city, higher-end department stores: salespeople ignored by the older, impeccably groomed customers going by zero in on me as being the only person in the area who could conceivably be within the age range for their fragrance. Since I was a child, I've had a particular fear of situations in which somebody is giving an embarrassing or futile speech and I am obliged to stand there, smiling politely. I feel this fear as a pain in my chest, as heartburn, while I stand there with my frozen grin, waving around a testing strip or ribbon sprayed with something that is attracting flying insects.