There are those wanting to know more in a hysterical way. Honestly, we live in a world of nerds.
— Hear, hear. Frederic Malle, on perfumista culture, in Perfumer Frederic Malle delights 'fumeheads at Barneys New York at Dallas Morning News. Many thanks to Angela and March for the link!
HMMMPHRRR, ‘Mr. Malle’ seems as dismissive as the Elle magazine woman from a few days ago.
@ least this wonderful site got a mention. Congrats, Robin! 🙂
But he’s so right: we do live in a world of geeks & nerds, and I like it that way! And the hysteria, if there is hysteria and I suspect that at these personal appearances there is, must be annoying/perplexing.
I am a nerd, and I’m proud of it!
I prefer to go by geek 😉
http://laughingsquid.com/nerd-venn-diagram-geek-dork-or-dweeb/
Ha! I’ve never seen that diagram before. That’s great! I still think I fall into “nerd” category, though “social ineptitude” in my case is more of a choice. I can blend socially quite well, I just don’t like to because it’s exhausting!
Wow; my husband always calls me “nerd,” but now there’s scientific evidence backing him up! LOL.
🙂
I love the diagram! I think I’m a Gnerd.
Let’s see–intelligent, socially inept, obsessive–yep, I’m a nerd all right.
I am a perfume fanatic and that is my therapy!
He can call me a nerd if he likes, I can easily live with that, but is it really wise for him to be so dismissive of the people who buy his stuff? It is not the regular customers who go for Editions de Parfums, but the hysterical nerds!
I thought his overall attitude seemed more perplexed than dismissive — but I liked his honesty. I am perplexed too, sometimes, by the way people have translated their admiration for perfume as a product into admiration (on a personal level) for the people who make those perfumes.
For me, the admiration is a kind of awe, because constructing a scent that captures my attention and actually makes me want a FB is akin to alchemy for me. Now that I think about it, I seem to correlate the creating a perfume as a kind of sub-genre of alchemy. And these fantastic creators are like descendants of old wizards and mages, with skills that have to be inherited through bloodlines because they seem all too ephemeral to be capable of being learned. But that’s the dreamy teenager talking, the one who refuses to shut up or grow up (thankfully). 🙂 She’s the one who keeps the mystery alive.
That said – Frederic Malle is also French, so isn’t it a matter of national pride to be spikey and disdainful? *ducking from flying Gallic rotten fruits*
LOL…yes, I suppose.
*throwing rotten fruit – and veg – at you*
😛 Go right ahead, Bela, I’m used to it. 😀
R –
There’s a great (food) saying:
“loving a dish and then meeting the chef is like loving pate and then meeting the goose” (relating, obviously, to chef-worship). It must be perplexing though, if it weren’t so, he would be SOL – because it’s us ‘nerds’ who promote and buy his pricey perfumes/candles (as so many on here have noted)
xo
Oh, I love that saying and had never heard it, thanks! I often think I’m missing the gene for true “fandom” — I consider myself a fan of a number of perfumers, but all I mean by that is I want their perfumes, and I have the same attitude towards writers or actors or anybody.
I love being a nerd, a geek, a ‘fumehead, a perfumista, a nut, an eccentric, a weirdo…whatever! As Kevin Kline said in “A Fish Called Wanda” -“don’t call me stupid!” 😛
Reading the whole article, Frederic Malle’s statemens seems a little snobbish and prejudiced. Maybe he was just silly to have not noticed yet that he call of fragrance nerds are the clients that end spending huge amounts of money in their passion for fragrances. I don’t know, it seems a little silly from his part to say something like this from what may be a good part of his clientelle.
I was just going to say that it likely the nerds that are helping to keep the cash flowing in his business. So call me a “nerd” – I love perfume!
Mr. Malle is supposed to be coming to my Barney’s at some point. It will be interesting so see how he is (if I can go). I’m sure he is a bit perplexed, if he is thinking that it is just wealthy glamour-pusses who are buying his perfumes, only to find that his audience is akin to a perfume version of a Trekkie.
“akin to a perfume version of a Trekkie.” *snort* That’s just too funny!!!
Well, Mr. Malle’s concept has certainly contributed to the increase in the number of perfume geeks/nerds, whether he approves of us or not! 🙂
I definitely though the comment was critical as well as perplexed. At first I thought maybe he was talking about a faddish kind of over-excitement in some of his admirers. Then I thought maybe he is still into the nonchalant is cool, and excitement not idea. And then i thought maybe he thinks people who are not experts ought not to think too much but just listen to the ‘properly trained professional’. Then I realised it just wasnt worth working out!
Bingo! We do what we do. He does what he does. Good thing he makes wonderful sniffies!
Regardless of Malle’s intentions (and the silly suggestion that customers once bought couture without any knowledge of quality or their own taste), I find it sad that these days anyone who seeks or has any in-depth knowledge in any field is called a “nerd”. Once upon a time, such people were called connoisseurs, or enthusiasts, or experts or hobbyists or devotees.
I may have extremely limited interest in the history of postage stamps, the electoral structure of European Parliment, zoological classifications, or zone defense (basketball? football?) but I admire people who study what they love in depth and may even share some bit of that knowledge with me.
I think the reporter’s attitude comes across as dismissive, so maybe he led Malle by phrasing his questions in terms of geeks and nerds? Just wondrin.
BTW, it may be that Malle feels like a painter would if people were showing up at an opening and asking him or her about pigments and brush sizes and cross-referencing specific paintings that were not at the show by name and so on. To someone who may wish for their work’s public reception to be couched in terms of the art itself (not that there ever is such a thing as pure art, right) and not the intertext or conditions of production that surround it, this may be a little frustrating.
Or maybe he just wants rich ladies to say, OOOOH, that smells divine! and pony up.
The Malle rep in Dallas called me to invite me to this and, though I wish I’d gone, making the 8-hour drive (round-trip from Houston) alone didn’t make it seem worth it. Maybe next go-round. 🙁
I love the topic. Bear in mind, Frederic Malle SELLS perfumes. And to be honest, all this hords of geeks rather go for samples and buy a perfume after a thought or two. The ladies he has in mind as his top customers are the one to buy his entire line and exchange excitement about Frederic Malle Edition de Parfums over a coffee with a good friend who will then go to buy the entire line, too.
In this sense he is not better than mass market seller, only that he has another target group. Mind you, at the same time with the ladies who bought couture there were also hords of poor typewritetrs who always bought Shalimar or Chanel 5, saving money for months. They afforded only one perfume and had to make a big decision between Sahlimar and Chanel 5, so may be they were geeks, too. But there were many of them.
So the story is a bit silly altogether 🙂