Monday 4/20. What fragrance are you wearing?
I'm in Annick Goutal Mandragore.
Reminder: this Friday, 24 April, wear something from Annick Goutal or perfumer Isabelle Doyen.
And for those of you who like to plan ahead, see Scent of the day ~ Friday community projects 2015, where I'll try to always have the next five or six weeks mapped out in advance.
Note: top center image is Mandrake. Mandragora officinarum [as Mandragora officinalis] Herbier général de l’amateur, vol. 8 (1817-1827) [P. Bessa] by Swallowtail Garden Seeds at flickr; some rights reserved.
Great scent and wonderful choice for Friday. I will have plenty of options. Today is not a Goutal or a Doyen, I’m wearing Fils de Dieu du Riz et des Agrumes.
I *love* Fils de Dieu! One of my favourite ELdOs, soothing but also quirky and interesting. You smell great!
We’re both in great scents 🙂
I have been wanting to try that for so long! I’m fascinated by the idea of a rice fragrance.
SOTD is Noir Extreme (Tom Ford). I wore Mandragore over the weekend! 🙂
Ah, almost twins!
Did you apply the EDT or EDP version? I only have the EDT, haven’t sampled the EDP or the Pourpre versions.
After this weekend’s utter L’Heure Bleue fail, I’m back to Guerlain wearing Vetiver edt. I sprayed about 4 times this morning, and I can still smell it! So hooray! And it is great on a rainy Monday.
Guerlain Vetiver is so invigorating! It’s a great layering scent too.
Funny you should ask that 🙂 Because I just sniffed my wrist and thought “God, this smells so good, but… what is it?” I simply could not remember what I put on in the morning and it took me a short while to figure out it was Rue Cambon. I love that scent, even when I don’t know I’m smelling it.
And I love it when that happens!
That one’s next on my list…
Do try it, it’s a great scent. I’ve also just realized that it has amazing longevity for such a relatively understated scent: I put it on in the morning, it’s been 15 hours and I can still clearly smell it on my wrist.
This is a beautiful fragrance. I have a nice decant of it that I always forget to wear…..
Eau du Fier for me–I was deciding between this and Eau du Sud this morning (I remembered to put a post it about AG week on my mirror). Eau du Fier is a smoky birch tar and orange fragrance with maybe a bit of leather.
One of these days (years) I’ll get my hands on some Eau du Fier. I ordered Eau du Sud last week, should arrive today or tomorrow.
I got some thanks to Austenfan and it’s pretty fierce. Very good, too.
I got a little spray vial from STC. I had a bottle years ago and gave it way since I never wore it and boom several weeks ago I wanted to smell it again. Very nice, but no lemming. I would rather wear CdG Tar or Bulgari Black when I want a blast of smoke.
SOTD is Badgley Mischka.
BM is so rich and warm! I haven’t worn mine in a while, but I always love it when I do.
I’m wearing Marni today.
I do love your choice for today. I remember the first time I smelled Mandragore. It was so different from any perfume I’d ever smelled — love at first sniff
It’s a great scent. Wish I’d liked the Pourpre version better, or that they’d do more flankers for it.
I love the Pourpre version also. I bought a bottle of it last summer. We were vacationing in Italy, and I told my husband I wouldn’t ask for jewelry or artwork, I’d just like to have a perfume to remember our trip. I ended up with 3 perfumes, Mandragore Pourpre was the second one I purchased there.
We ended up buying some artwork also from an artist painting by the Venice canal 🙂
Oh, that’s a good idea – more flankers, preferably with interesting colors, too. 🙂
So bummed that AG cut all the colored bottles 🙁
Me too. I loved seeing the different colored AG bottles when I’d go shopping, and visit the perfume counter. They looked like beautiful Easter eggs.
I especially loved the old Neroli and Nuit Etoilee bottles.
its a rainy rainy day here in NYC-atleast the rain is cleaning off the windows outside our apartment!
I am finishing off some Mariage Freres tea-Christmas Pudding-so delicious.
SOTD-Interlude Woman
We had tons of rain yesterday, and I was a little taken aback to see just how much pollen washed off my vehicle onto the driveway. But the sun is out today, with everything washed clean.
Glad the pollen is off your car- free car wash from Mother Nature!
I am happy to have the day off today- I think I will stay in my pj all day and play with the little one
I needed something a little warmer today b/c of the rain – good rain, which we need! – so I picked Cuir de Lancome. Love that iris! Tomorrow I’ll get into my Goutals.
I’m pleased with the week’s theme too. I don’t have many Goutal bottles, but I have a few decants and several samples.
I mostly wear Goutal during warm weather months, so we’ll see how the weather shapes up for tomorrow. If you ever want a decant of something, just let me know! 😉
After a busy weekend moving in the house I’m actually glad to be at work, which is forcing me to sit still and not run all over the place. Never thought I’d say that, but there it is…
Exhausted, but happy to be moved. I just need three more weekends from this past weekend to recover.
Wearing Cuir de Russie on this rainy day.
Always an excellent choice.
Moving is the worst….dreading my (well into the) future move. Congrats on the accomplishment.
Scent of the day is Slumberhouse Kiste. I’m not a peach fan (I don’t even like eating them), but I’m hugely enamored with this scent. I’m thinking this is decant-worthy, at a minimum. Only problem is that it didn’t last all that long when I wore it yesterday; maybe today will be better.
It’s a rainy day and I have a sick child home today. After smelling nearly every bottle I own, opted for vintage Vent Vert from a mini. Such a great scent – green and fresh it reminds me that all this rain just means spring is here!
Hope the little one gets better fast
Sounds like a good day for snuggling! I hope your kiddo is feeling better soon!
I am at home this morning with my daughter too – spring head cold. Boo. Actually, all of us have it. I hope your’s feels better soon.
Mucho caliente here today, so I’m doing it right with a healthy spritz of EL Bronze Goddess! I am pasty white and the total opposite end of the spectrum from goddess, but I smell great! Happy Monday to all 🙂
Do you have a preference between BG and Terracotta on super hot day? I know you have such a love for BG, so I’m wondering if your BG has competition from Terracotta.
Oh, I think Terracotta may be in danger…I like it but after 1-2 hours, it becomes homicidal and tries to strangle me. It’s like being in a bad relationship- you *want* it to work and have a hard time coming to grips with the reality it doesn’t *really* jive. I’m on the fence about it (still!). Sigh…
Oh no…I’m sorry it wasn’t instant love!! I first tried Terracotta last year and then promptly gave away my sample. I can’t even say what compelled me to give it another try. With it’s LE status I have no doubt you could find a buyer if it turns out not to be your thing.
Hope you’re keeping cool!
Oh my…I just re-read my post. I hope I didn’t come across sounding presumptous and suggesting you get rid of your Terracotta! Please forgive me it that came out wrong! :-O
I truly hope it works out for you!
oh no worries! Lol! You may be right because life is too short to hang onto fragrances (and relationships!) that just don’t work.
Do you need a back-up bottle?! 😉
Back to work after a week off with the family. We had a great stay-cation which makes it feel just fine to return to work.
SOTD Terracotta – for the third day in a row (so unlike me)! This fragrance is much sweeter than I usually wear which makes me wonder if I should seek out some gourmands to sample.
I love Terracotta because it’s got that bitter edge to the sweetness! It’s just so perfectly done. I enjoy some gourmands as comfort scents but Terracotta elevates things for me. I would be happy to find more scents that can balance on the line like that 🙂
Completely agree!
I can’t wait to try Terracotta. I will visiting the Guerlain boutique in Disney EPCOT, and I hope they have it there.
Are you speaking of the Epcot in Florida?
yes.
Was curious about any Annick Goutal’s I might own. Total: Zero. I’ve owned a small bottle of Grand Amor that I liked, and small bottles of Quel Amor and Gardenia Passion that were total scrubbers for me… and I once owned a dry oil spray of Heure Exquise that was nice… I guess I am not a huge fan of AG. Who knew?
Last night sampled Tea for Two from a decant I purchased from STC. I LOVE it. Oddly, my usually enthusiastic husband did not. It just didn’t smell “pretty” (high praise, medium praise, and the only praise from those quarters) to him. Looking forward to wearing it today.
My husband is a fan of the “pretty” too.
That HE dry oil was so nice! Too bad it’s d/c… it was mostly rose and sandalwood, really pleasant. The Goutals, at least the feminines, do tend toward the floral, so that’s right up my alley most of the time.
Oakland,
A very generous NSTer gave me a full bottle of Matin d’Orage. I’m trying to share the wealth and give out free samples of this to anyone who’d like one. I’d be delighted to send you some if you want. Contact me at my username at yahoo.
I also own zero bottles of Annick Goutal – have tried numerous samples, but most of them just do not work well on my skin. I do like Mandragore and that will likely be my scent for the Friday theme, but I feel there must be a Goutal that I can truly love so I’m looking forward to reading everyone’s comments this week about their favorites.
It’s a cool sunshiny day so I’m in 4711 Acqua Colonia Lemon & Ginger, which is exactly what it sounds like (no surprises from the entire line) and is incredibly bright and fresh.
SOTD for Keep-It-Simple Monday is Guerlain Meteorites. Almost a soliliflore, a touch of green, a bit of iris, and a powdery heliotrope drydown give substance to the somewhat wistful and melancholy violet that is the star of this fragrance, perfect for a rainy, chilly day. One of my spring favorites!
Meteorites is the scent I wear when I need something ultra light and fresh, without any of those nasty “fresh” notes. Violet always seems a bit melancholy but I like this one better than most because it is not powdery.
Have you tried the Annick Goutal and L’Artisan violets?
I have La Violette and enjoy it, it’s a much greener violet than Meteorites, never tried L’Artisan’s.
Miserable rainy day today. SOTD is JM Wood Sage & Sea Salt.
I should take the opportunity of this Friday’s theme to test a bunch of Goutal’s this week! I’ll start tomorrow. (I just ordered quite a few samples yesterday, and I feel like I need to really start putting some from my growing stash in the “no” pile before I get overflown! It’s so difficult for me for some reason… What if I would have fallen in love with it on a subsequent wear? Any tips on “letting samples go”?)
Just do it! I held on to a lot of samples b/c I just kept telling myself they were important, or I may want them for research. It took me about one year of weeding: I’d go through and separate them into NO and Maybe and YES, special piles. I made myself revisit the maybe pile first and kept moving more of them into the NO pile. I still have quite a lot of YES, specials that I know I either want to keep or can’t afford more, etc. But what I did then was take all those NOs – two completely full sandwich sized ziplocks, and put them out of sight for many months. Out of site, out of mind. Then one day I was ready to really let go, and used them for mega leverage for one of the swap meets. It must have been hundreds of sampels, good, bad, high, low, indie, not, etc. And I am so happy that they are gone forever. Now, a year or so later, I’m started to accrue more samples and decants again, and again, I’ll start going through them. I think it’s an ongoing process.
I am currently doing my best to learn that a ‘like’ is not a ‘love’ and with all the perfume I have to use up, there is only time for loves 🙂 I haven’t gone to any swap meets or anything, so if something is a no or just a plain ‘like,’ I will drain the sample over a day. If I paid for it, I still feel like I used it and fully tried it out.
If anything is interesting but not an instantaneous *love*, it can go back in the sample box in a designated section so I can try it again later.
But for me, most things ARE just ‘nice’ and things I like but wouldn’t spend the money on a full bottle, so I don’t feel bad using up the sample and tossing the vial. If I can dab on a full vial over the course of a day, I feel like I know what I’m getting. There are classics and other interesting things I would keep on hand for reference, but a year and a half into perfume mania, I am getting more comfortable saying ‘that isn’t for me.’ Good luck – it feels better clearing out the space and having more things you LOVE on hand 🙂
Great tips, AnnS!
Really, the separating into No, Maybe, Yes is the fun part. Then, testing down the Maybe pile to see if there is something you missed the first round to qualify it for the Yes pile.
If not, into the No section for bargaining leverage later, or to share with friends.
If you cling too tightly to the Nos, you won’t get enough quality time with the Yes’s. And the more time you spend with Yes’ s, the faster you are able to identify the Yes/Maybe/No split 🙂
Whatever you do, make sure you are having fun and learning – that’s the best part!
And apple bite – great tips, too!
It felt so good to swap all those meh samples for a used bottle of something I really wanted. It is hard to keep up with all the smelling b/c I really only get to test on the weekends…. You are right about making time for the ones you love, ha, ha. Greeting card fragrance themes!
I’m all about getting rid of stuff I won’t use. There are SO many perfumes out there, even my ‘like/love’ sample piles represent more bottles of fumes than I can ever justify buying. And the ‘no/maybe’ pile? fuggedaboudit. Sure maybe there’s something in there that I would have changed my mind about… someday… but eh, so be it. Wasn’t it George Carlin who said, you can’t have everything, where would you put it? 🙂 I feel good about passing my unloved samples on to someone else, perhaps they’ll find someone who appreciates them more.
“Where would you put it?” – LOL! Could have been George Carlin, but actually sounds more like Stephen Wright to me. In either case, so true!
Thanks guys for your words of wisdom! Now I feel motivated to be more decisive about my samples. And you really have some great tips to help!
Annick Goutal’s Isle Au The.
THe new one? So how is it?
Hadrien and Eau de Camille had a daughter and she takes after the mother…..in other words citrus and green. I like it but it is fleeting.
Oooohhh!!!!
Back from my convention, and wearing Un Jardin sur la Toit. This is the only one of the Un Jardin scents that I own, but my favorite discounter finally got in the mini of Sur la Nil, so that is going to be my next purchase in this line.
Sur le nil is my favourite of the jardins I think! It’s so refreshing but also not bland and cologney. Yum!
It’s Neela Vermeire week for me (so SunMi will stop pestering me: “Man, I can’t believe you haven’t tried your NVs YET” 🙂 ) – SOTD is Trayee for some calm amidst the Monday work storm.
Trayee is very calming, I think.
I like Trayee a lot. I actually like the entire original trio very much. Ashoka didn’t work for me, although I was expecting great things based on the notes.
Interesting, I first tried this from a dabber and got loads of incense. Today I’m trying it from a spray and getting waaaaay more saffron. Actually I ended up washing it off a bit, now we’re back to the incense part I like best 🙂
Yes, I’ve had very different experiences with it as well, it’s a bit tricky if you don’t like all the variations.
Bwahaha, it’s been a while since I checked in on the SOTD post but the one day I do… 🙂
I’m wearing Terracotta also. It’s very coconutty on me whereas I was hoping for more monoi. Pretty, though, and good for the warm day we are expecting here.
Kilian’s Beyond Love for me today. Vacationing with family in San Diego where it is currently a bit overcast but hey, I’m on vacation with my brother paying for everything so I don’t care
Nice 🙂
Oh, perfect warm weather vacation scent!
Beautiful!
Also wearing By Kilian, but mine’s Love and Tears. It’s a pretty scent, for sure, but not a keeper.
SOTD Serge Lutens La Religieuse…it’s growing on me.
Which part of it has grown on you? I didn’t have much luck with it, so I’m interested to hear what to be on the lookout for next time I try it.
I smell the jasmine today even though I sprayed less than the first time when I didn’t smell much of anything.
Wearing the lovely Hiris today, still in alternation with AG’s HE. So happy about Friday’s post and looking forward to what everyone is wearing and how they feel about it.
I love Hiris! You smell great 🙂
I love Hiris also…it is my go-to scent when I am in a quandary about what to spary!
I’m trying out Armani’s Si again from a mini bottle. It’s okay, but I think there is a note I don’t get along with…the cassis, perhaps? I don’t know it as an individual note. Wouldn’t buy a bottle.
Is it weird that it’s fun to get pickier the more I sample? My wallet must enjoy the reject pile being bigger than the ‘want’ pile 😉
It is fun!
I’m finding the same thing… now that I’ve sniffed several hundred scents, too many ‘new’ things smell close enough to something I’ve already tried that I feel no urge to buy.
I do have a few head-scratchers though: scents where I love *part* of the experience. Like the first hour of TF Plum Japonais (I know, everyone says it’s a copy of Fille en Aiguilles, but I don’t like any part of FeA so how odd is my nose here??) Or the dry-down for 31 Rue Cambon. I can’t quite figure out what to make of the half-sies.
My goal is to keep clearing out my ‘no’ pile and ‘like but don’t love any part’ pile, and not buying much now so that I will feel less guilty about buying larger-size samples (5-10ml) in a few months of things that were in that boat. Surely, I’ll figure out what’s FB-worthy by the end of that? Or, I’ll have just enough perfume for a little hit now and again, even if it’s not something I would wear that often 🙂
I also prefer the beginning of Plum Japonais. Someone once described the dry down as staid and I would agree with that. I would not have thought of it as similar to FeA, but I suppose the latter does have incense and stewed fruit. PJ is without the pine, and I think it has quite a different mood. One that reminded me of PJ is Montale’s Deep Purple (at least I think that was the name…) It also has plum, but its brighter and more vibrant. It may be a little on the sweet side and made me think of sweet red grapes/wine.
This keeps happening to me too: it’s like all the frags are khaki pants and I can’t remember anything about any of them except they are basically nice. I am sure that is on purpose… the first of a style frag comes out and the rest of them jump on the market tested band wagon.
haha, I am going to have to remember the khaki pants analogy to remind myself that I only need one of certain types of scents!
I’ve been wearing AG Eau De Charlotte, and I’ve realized that there’s nothing like it that I know of. Not only that, it’s been pretty resilient over the years. I don’t think it’s as strong as it used to be, but it’s still pretty great. I know the notes are cocoa, but it’s not like any I’ve ever smelled.
I agree, there’s nothing that smells like it. Sometimes it’s cocoa, sometimes it’s LOTV, and sometimes it’s tart currant. It was my first AG and is still my favorite. I’ve been wearing it a long time and look forward to bringing it out every spring.
The only AG that smells similar to anything else is the Gardenia Passion, which smells like other sweet and light tuberose fragrances. OK – Hadrien is lemony like other EDCs. Heure Exquise smells similar to No 19… but still different enough in the drydown. I think most Goutals are very unique compared to other releases.
Journey d’Hermes Absolu… and after swearing off grapefruit (always excepting Kelly Caleche!) I must eat my words and put grapefruit back on the good list.
I smell great! Pairs wonderfully with a sunshiny, cool aired morning.
Happy Monday, All!
I like Kelly Caleche.
Me too! It has the rind oil of grapefruit somewhere… but not that sulphurous heat I get in AA’s Pamplelune.
Well… I like Pamplelune too. 🙂
I like grapefruit when it’s paired with florals (particularly rose, I think). Not so much when it’s woody-herby stuff.
Oooo, Mals, think you’ve got the nail on the head here, with the floral connection.
SOTD = L’AP Seville a l’Aube
Why not? 🙂
I forgot about Friday’s theme. I have an abundance of AG which I hardly wear (boo hiss on me) and I am going to be too lazy to pull them out of storage but we’ll see.
Scent twins!
I’m in Smuggler’s Soul again! The dropper bottle is a nuisance and I always end up overapplying, but on the other hand everything smells like sandalwood all day…
The one advantage of a dropper bottle is that it would be easy to transfer the perfume to another bottle. 😉
SOTD 1881. It’s grey and cool in Chicagoland and 1881 seems sunny to me – there’s also a touch of iodine in it that I like.
Is this the Cerruti 1881? I like that one.
Yes – the original – but not vintage…
I’m wearing Byredo 1996 for the second day in a row.
Not sure what I’m going to do for Friday.. I’ll have to dig through my stuff but I’m not sure I have anything Goutal anymore (I swapped my bottle of Sables) or by Isabel Doyen.
I’m in Andrea Maack Sharp today. It’s nice all year long and since it’s not all that warm here today, I didn’t feel like putting on a floral or anything with green notes, and I decided this would work.
Encens Mythique – even if I have to work on a Monday I can still smell like a Rich Lady (repetition of both perfume and its matching sentiment).
Must try this…
I probably also repeat how darned expensive a lot of perfumes are nowadays, but this one definitely is in the expensive-but-worth-it category.
SOTD: FM Iris Poudre. It’s so lovely and ladylike and beautiful, but I feel like I have to grow into this one. Maybe it will suit me in 10+ years. Until then samples will do.
That would make a great Dealer’s Choice category: perfumes for when we are grown up…
I finally made a pick from my samples, having decided that this will be a Goutal week: La Violette. So so so pretty. Fleeting, though, and on the whole I think I prefer the greenness in Penhaligon’s Violetta (glad I have a bottle of that).
It was the first violet scent I tried and my first Goutal, too, I think. It’s lovely. Until that point I was convinced I didn’t like violet scents and it has of course turned out to be one of my favourite notes – although I prefer it mixed with something woody or leathery or green.
I don’t particularly like the powdery ones – like I say, I prefer the green ones like Violetta and Jolie Madame – but violets are niiiiice.
SOTD is AG Gardenia Passion, which is a big tuberose bomb on me with very little, if any, gardenia. Fortunately it doesn’t last too long, so I can put something else on now! The plus side: I have it in the dearest little mini topped with a butterfly. 🙂
Gardenia Passion is so pretty though!
Dior Feve Delicieuse for me today – it is so yummy. Upon first sniff I wasn’t so sure, but the drydown is gorgeous.
Nice! I heard this was only coming out in May. I’m very curious…
In the spirit of AG week, I’m testing Ninfeo Mio again from a dauber vial and wishing I could spray it. I like this version of fig, but it’s one of those perfumes that I don’t appreciate as much as I might because the top notes are so much more interesting than the heart.
A cold day here and I’m happily wrapped in Rochas’ Alchimie!