Indie brand Artemisia Natural Perfume has launched Ozymandias, a new fragrance inspired by the Shelley poem of the same name.
Half buried in the Egyptian desert lies the colossal statue of Ramses II. Percy Bysshe Shelly's poem Ozymandias (aka Ramses II) is a meditation on the inevitable decay of power by the forces of time.
The fragrance Ozymandias is about that journey of time, from it's lively beginning to its earthly finale.
The journey commences with the fresh fragrance of the wood and leaves of the mandarin tree, and on to the rich ancient notes of arnica, tobacco, cedarwood, and elevating sacred frankincense. The final note is mitti attar, a distillation of sandalwood and clay from the earth.
Artemisia Natural Perfume Ozymandias is available in 7 gr Solid Perfume ($28) and 17 ml Eau de Parfum ($68). Samples are also available.
(via artemisiaperfume)
So a rotting memorial statue found in the desert inspired this scent?….
Not sure that’s the ultimate point of the poem…
True, but I’ll still take it as inspiration over tween YouTube stars any day of the week….
Where is the bloody Cistus/labdanum? We know the Pharoah’s symbolic beard, tied on for ceremony, was sleek with sticky Cistus resin, which is beautifully fragrant. More labdanum please….
You guys are a tough crowd today!
I love that poem, so I might have to grab a sample of this one for concept alone.
I like the concept too…but also sounds lovely, I do like clay/earth notes.
I love this poem, had a talk about it with Andrew Eldritch years ago AND I love the Breaking Bad “Ozymandias” episode centered around it. If you go to YouTube, you can see a short, beautiful clip from AMC of Bryan Cranston reading the poem. Here’s the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3dpghfRBHE
As far as natural perfume companies go, Artemisia seems to be flying under the radar, but their scent line up is very strong. I have several of their perfumes, and in case of Eros, I am on my second bottle of it. As far as I am concerned, this is the highest compliment I can pay to a perfume house, by regularly wearing their creations.
The list of notes for Ozymandias is great, I love incense scents and mitti attar, so I might as well go and get it right away…
How about a gourmand based on Kubla Khan by Coleridge? Forests, gardens with incense-bearing trees, honey-dew (I don’t think that he was referring to the melon), and the milk of Paradise. Yum. I am not asking for a re-creation of what Kubla(i) himself might have smelled like.