It's hump day! What fragrance are you wearing?
I'm wearing Parfums de Nicolaï Balkis Light. I haven't worn it in ages, and forgot how wonderful it is. I'm pretty sure it's discontinued though.
Reminder: this Friday, 21 August, wear a scent by French niche brand Parfums de Nicolaï, if you have one. If you don't, wear a perfume by another brand that you think deserves more attention than it gets.
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 image is Coffee Bean via Jeff Kubina at flickr; some rights reserved.
The Balkis Light sounds fab!
I’m testing Tom Ford Noir Extreme, which is very interesting — it’s a masculine gourmand, smells like almonds and Coke with menthol.
I’d like the regular Balkis better now than I did in 2006-7, wish they still made it.
And that does sound more interesting than I would have expected!
It actually reminds me of the drydown of Agent Provocateur Strip, that very specific mentholated amber thing. It’s not mindblowing/groundbreaking, but I like it!
I like it too, and I think I’v heard it compared to Shalimar?
To me it lacked the citrus I would need to connect it to Shalimar, but I’ve only worn it one time.
Sorry, I must have been thinking of Noir!
http://thecandyperfumeboy.com/2012/11/13/a-handsome-man-tom-ford-noir-perfume-review/
I also found it likeable but don’t remember the menthol. I’ll have to pull out my sample. My impression was vanilla coke with a dash if chocolate.
There’s still a few snuggly traces of Mimosa and Cardamom on my skin from yesterday. Love it full strength. Pity Saks didn’t have samples in yet
Ah, need to try that one!
Yes, I would love to try Mimosa and Cardamom! I live nowhere near a Jo Malone retailer, so I usually smell that line when I’m traveling.
It is excellent but my full bottles are getting close to my upper limit so now I have to really think about what to buy and what needs to go away
Does Jo do travel sizes? That would help you maneuver around you “FB Limit”
Not really. ..but for holidays, they do minis. Their sizes are 50ml and 100ml. The SA’s are usually very generous if you let them know you are interested in their products.
I have a sample and it really is a beautiful fragrance.
I want to try this too! I love mimosa and cardamom. I am sorely tempted to do a blind buy… I need to be strong. I put on some Mimosa Pour Moi this morning to satisfy my mimosa urge.
I’m very interested in this one, too. I plan to try it as soon as I get back to Brussels.
I’ve never tried Balkis Light but own a bottle of Balkis EDP. Such a versatile and wearable scent. I’m wearing Vie de Château, the original Eau Fraîche version which is plenty strong enough for me.
And that one’s been on my buy list forever.
I’m in Ormonde Jayne Tiare, again. Love it!
I think it is gorgeous too!
You smell lovely!
SOTD is Séville à l’Aube. It is pretty chilly today in South Dakota, but this scent seemed to fit the bill.
We have had a couple of chilly, fall-like mornings in Denver this week — I’m enjoying it! (And I’m driving to South Dakota this weekend to finally see Mt Rushmore….)
Hopefully, it will be nice while you are there. I am 350 miles on the other side of the state. If the weather is sunny, you will get a great view of Mt. Rushmore. That is a great part of the country-in my opinion.
Oh, a cool crisp day! Literally green with envy down here in the swamps
Me too! And Oregon isn’t usually swampy … but this summer has been much steamier than usual. It’s supposed to cool off tomorrow – here’s hoping!
You smell great!
In samsara today – I have a “older” bottle of the parfum
Sandlewood bliss
Samsara is gorgeous!
I agree!
Press repeat-again! Still wearing Kalemat. I was conflicted this morning because I had a strong desire to hang out with Dries, but I have a limited supply of him. I think I will save him for the GC trip- 2ml is so perfect for travel.
This Kalemat, though…it’s so ME! It’s like I’m living in my own embryonic scent bubble.
Happy hump day to all
I love it when you find a fragrance that says ” this is me “
I know! It makes you feel as if all is right with the world
Hmmmm. Must look this Kalemat up. I’m feeling that way about Rossy. It just feels like a soul-mate. I could easily blow through my bottle in a month or two.
Do! I highly recommend if you like this category of fragrance
Wow, I’ve never heard of Kalemut but the notes sound amazing! Do the rosemary and honey stand out at all or is it well blended?
Its very well blended, even to my very inexpert nose. I get tobacco (the sweet, golden kind), some berries briefly in the top, smoooooth woody notes, with a beautiful round amber glinting in the base. I don’t get a ton of honey, more like an abstract “golden” vibe, and the rosemary I get a bit of, but only in the extreme dry down. It’s a very easy oriental to wear in the heat, too. It was 90+ degrees today and the air so thick with humidity you could slice it and serve it on a plate. I went to spin class and the hotter I got and more I sweated, the better I smelled. Hope that helped
Vanille Tonka for me. I’ve had a sample for ages but only fell in love with it this summer and now I have a 30 ml bottle on the way.
I am so tempted to blind buy this one. Is it amazing? What made you fall in love with it?
I’m not sure. When my perfume obsession started, I was very much into spicy, woodsy, vanillic scents (still am) and it didn’t seem to stand out when I first tried it.
But now it makes me so happy with the basil, cinnamon and tonka, which is mostly what I smell. Sort of like cola, but without the sugar.
That said, you should never ever blind buy ;)!
I’m sampling Bigelow Lemon No. 1999, expecting this to be a two-scent day at a minimum. The top and heart are striking me as cleaning product lemon plus blinding white musk. I’m wondering if all that musk will make this a one-scent day after all.
They used to make one called Winter Lemon which was really very good, especially in the lotion.
They still do, only now it’s called Lemon Leaf No. 1821, same notes as the older Winter Lemon. I have the Winter Lemon edp and love it.
I will try this instead. Thank you both! Have you tried No. 1999?
Yes, a long time ago and agree with your assessment of it, but haven’t tried it since. I also have their Lemon & Orange Blossom (don’t remember its’ # nor if it’s still in production) but it’s quite nice. The lemon adds a bit more zing at the top to make the orange blossom even more refreshing, I like it on a hot summer day. But the Winter Lemon is my favorite; warmth is added by a velvety fig with some florals including rose adding a bit more depth and complexity than the other two Bigelow lemon scents.
Thank you!
Oh!! Good tip, I had no idea!
I’m wearing Bottega Veneta for the first time, from another mini. Love my minis.
BV is one of my fav go-to scents.
I love minis too (wish they were all sprays, though).
Yes, this. Minis are the best. And BV is great too. You smell lovely.
My SOTD is Caron Aimez Moi. I purchased a small decant, and I’m considering a full bottle.
I’m not sure where to shop for it, though. The only place I’ve ever seen carry Caron is Henri Bendel, and I’ve read where they don’t have a perfume department anymore.
Fragrancex stock it…
I’ve seen it at The Perfume House in Portland. Maybe they will ship?
Sometimes the discounters have Carons – not the urn scents, of course, but Aimez-Moi is one of the fragrances that does pop up online from time to time.
I’ve seen it on Amazon and Luckyscent. Luckyscent’s bottle is different, and they call it “La Selection Aimez Moi.
I’d like to buy it in person, so I can check out the bottle, and see which one matches my decant.
We are leaving for Miami later on tonight. Maybe I’ll see a store that stocks Caron.
Love that one. Haven’t bought it either, yet. But I’ve seen good deals on Fragrancenet.
If you’re in NYC, Clyde’s Pharmacy also carries it(Madison and 70something).
Not there anymore
There’s a teeny tiny Caron boutique in NYC a block or two from Bloomingdale’s. It’s in a little nook in a Phyto spa
Yes- the Phyto boutique has a small Caron store inside! It’s so lovely! They also carry their powder as well..
It sounds very lovely!
Wearing YSL Black Opium today. Very sweet on me. I wish I could smell the coffee that is supposed to be there.
I found it to be too sweet for my taste
But the dry down is good
Puredistance Opardu. Very exquisite, feminine, refined, somewhat introspective and melancholic, but in a beautiful way. Le temps perdu I suppose. Lilac, heliotrope, carnation, non indolic tuberose. It lasts and lasts on my skin.
This sounds lovely…
It is, and I find their sample box lovely and reasonably priced, especially as you don’t need to apply much for it to last very long.
I like this one a lot, but considering the price, went with En Passant for my lilac cravings.
This sounds absolutely incredible. I have a decant of Puredistance Black, and while the prices of the line are pretty reedick, you totally get what you pay for. Black is awesome!
Oh cool–I just came across my sample of this, which I haven’t tried yet. I appreciate the preview!
I love that solo coffee bean!
Today I’m wearing Balenciaga Paris, a good amount of it too. I want this bad boy to last more than a few hours so we shall see.. I love violet leaf and the carnation is good in this too.
How is BP in the heat? I always think of it as a spring scent, and haven’t wanted to go through my sample if the heat doesn’t do it any favors.
No clue; I’m in AC all day.
I should go out for a stroll around the block and see what happens..
I was about to complain that PdN often discontinues their best scents, but I think probably they are just more honest about the impact of required reformulations. That is, when they can no longer make a perfume that really smells like the original due to limitations on key ingredients, they discontinue it rather than selling something under the same name that smells significantly different.
(This is just my hypothesis. I have no information to support it other than what I’ve read generally about the impact of IFRA.)
Wearing a discontinued PdN, Mimosaique.
I sought it out a few years ago because of Tania Sanchez’s review of Farnesiana in The Guide, in which she says Richard Fraysse should smell Mimosaique in order to recalibrate his reformulation of Farnesiana.
I have no idea what Farnesiana used to smell like, but Mimosaique is lovely and subtle.
You might be onto something – I know they put Le Temps d’une Fete into that “special order” category a year or so after they reformulated it, and that was a super-obvious refo.
Vanille Tonka has been redone as well (I really miss that happy lime opening) but it’s still close to what I bought in 2009.
Also true that otherwise, the line would get so large, and then you have to have stock sitting around for years — and it isn’t a line with a huge market. I hate seeing things go, but sometimes I look at lines like Les Parfums de Rosine and can’t believe they don’t do more pruning.
You must be right about pruning. I think I was also wondering why they replace perfectly good scents with “intense” versions; that also made me think it might have been because they were forced to reformulate and it changed the character of the scent.
I was wondering about that too. Could be reformulations, could be they just sell better. No idea.
Wearing No. 42 The Flower Shop – Jo Loves. Great fragrance!
Bvlgari Black today, and ELdO Divin Enfant now that it’s bedtime, there’s a storm brewing outside, and im snuggled with a hotwater bottle under my feet and a hefty kitty on my feet anchoring me down to it, (hoping that my feet will burn and I will move them, and ta-da! a hot water bottle perfectly cat sized alll for him!)
Oh! The chain-smoking, marshmallow-gobbling infant found a motorbike?
Sounds blussfull. My hairless kitty IS my hot water bottle. They have higher than normal body temps to compensate for lack of fur.
Is your kitty your avatar? So adorable – what an irresistible face
Yes. She’s quite the little rascal. And is that your kitty? Stunning and quite mysterious looking!
Yes, he’s one of my five cats! All black and white … Can’t resist a little black and white asymmetric face!
That’s interesting about the higher temperature. I remember reading that Mexicans use their hairless dogs to warm arthritic hands.
Probably applies to those guys, too.
This is for commenter sweetgrass (and everyone else who might be interested):
http://www.rdmag.com/articles/2015/08/folk-remedies-mosquito-repellents
My fav mosquito repellent is massive sprays of Dior Escale a Portofino – lemon, lemon, lemon all the day long. Now I always associate gardening and playing with my flowers with EaP!
Love love love Escale a Portofino! I’ve never needed to test it as a bug repellant – lucky for me, my husband is apparently bug candy so as long as I have him along the bugs leave me alone.
Same with me. Maybe that’s why the EaP always works, lol. If my hubbie is outside with me, I am safe from the buggies.
Ha I wondered why this was directed to me until I clicked the link..lol. Thanks!
Interesting to know that the reason Avon Skin So Soft works as insect repellent is coumarin. So in theory a perfume with a lot of tonka should do the job too.
SOTD is Penhaligon’s Lily of the Valley. Green and soapy — I usually wear it when I’ve got plaid on, either polite plaid or grunge plaid.
I drink whiskey with my girlfriends on Wednesdays, and tonight I’m going to unload some samples on them. It’s so fun to see them react to all the smells. Helping someone else pick out a scent momentarily diverts my attention away from buying even more for myself, haha.
I actually totally get the lotv/plaid association, in the same way I think it would also go with tweed.
Love that you have whiskey Wednesdays! Sounds like an awesome regular date!
I’ve been giving small decants to one of my girlfriends who eventually picked out Chanel Beige. She bought the extrait, and I think I got more excited about the unboxing than she did!
Fascinating. I would never have thought to pair LOTV with plaid, but now that you mention it, I can kind of see it working…
SOTam was Mimosa Pour Moi. I wanted that plushy comfortable mimosa, and am also trying to stave off the urge to blind buy the JM Mimosa and Cardamom. But the heat this morning totally crushed MpM, so I reloaded at lunch time with some vintage No 19 to carry me through the rest of my day.
No 19 will help you get through the day! I find it to be my “power” scent
BPAL Alice for me today. Milky honey goodness to go with my homemade chai tea latte. I just found a way to make foamy milk at home with no espresso machine! So easy – just shake milk up in a jar then microwave.
SOTD is Sous Le Vent… refreshing….
my to buy list is filled to the brim (usually 20 max, that is until i get some free space for the new ones…) I usually restrict my discovering range or else it is just too difficult for my wallet to bear…I was behaving nicely for years but recently I’ve unleashed my inner hoarder
I’m wearing this, too, also from a decant. Refreshing and spicy, but I don’t know if I need a whole bottle.
Still not over my cold, my sniffer is off, off, off. I tried Ubar this morning, and got first finger nail polish remover, and then bug spray. AcK!!
Scrubbed and went with Mitsouko…much better….
I find that when my nose isn’t working the descriptions of perfumes on Lucky Scent are much more beguiling. I went there to see what notes Opardu had, and ended up with 9 samples in my cart!
Interesting how those things just end up in that cart while just doing some innocent research
(happened to me just last night!)
Hope you recover your sniffer soon!
Shockingly, today I am back in Orange Sanguine. I think I have 1-2 more wears left in the 7.5 mL spray bottle. Then I can focus on other stuff and see if I want to replace it next summer.
Wearing L’heure de Nuit today. I had forgotten how much I loved it.
Wearing Natori today from a sample from a generous NSTer(looking at you, IhadanIdea!) It’s soft and feminine, with a retro vibe. Nice!
Heavy storms last night ended the heat/humidity of the past few days and morphed into a moody, blue kind of morning, prompting my choice of Jean Charles Brosseau Fleurs d’Ombre Ombre Bleue edt as my SOTD. Honeyed florals/woods/amber with a soft sand note in the drydown like white flowers growing near a sand dune. Always a reminder for me of the duality of the Mediterranean Sea: melancholy like this morning, sparkling like the day as it has become. Another one of my favorite scents I wear rarely for fear I won’t love it as much if I do, especially the early parfum version I treasure so much.
I’m wearing Wood Sage & Sea Salt to go with a day on the beach, although I wasn’t really by the sea. But lake Peipus is the fourth biggest lake in Europe, so it almost qualifies. Still enjoying my vacation very much, but running out of scents to wear…
Eau de Peipus, then!
I’m in Portland and like SheriG, I’m sweltering in this 90F+ heatwave. It was too hot to sleep in my house last night (no A/C, must remedy that next summer). I am pretending I’m on an exotic tropical island wearing Montale Intense Tiare.
Hang in there, foxbins – word is it will be as much as 20 degrees cooler tomorrow. There might even be a cool-ish breeze to let in your bedroom window tonight.
I’m wearing something else from Slumberhouse today – Kiste. It’s another cool day in the Midwest and they’re predicting it will warm up again in the next day or two, and I know I’ll want a floral perfume then.
I have heard good things about that one. I really need to try this line.
Good morning, NST. Hope your Wednesdays are behaving properly. I’m beginning my day in a happy cloud of Traversee du Bosphore. I’m working at home today, and my cats are milling around my computer chair, uncertain about my scent (mind you, Dakkie is uncertain about almost everything; the world is full of wonderment to him) so they haven’t settled beside me yet. I love TdB — it’s pretty and charming without being at all pink.
I currently have a kitty sitting on the chair behind me, it’s the best way to work, really. Also, LOVE TdB, and agree that it’s feminine but not girly – you smell wonderful today!!
Thank you! It’s certainly a fun contrast to the soul-numbing task I have at hand.
I’m wearing SL Cédre today. I’m really liking it. At first the tuberose is almost cidery, so I think it will be great for fall. I’m thinking it might need to be a birthday present to myself (my b-day is next month).
I’m looking for a good fall scent, and this is one of the few Serges I haven’t tried in their export line (I haven’t tried a majority of the non-exports: of course it figures that my top three favorite Serges are ISM, De Profundis, and Sarrasins).
I’m also a big tuberose fan — what else are you getting out of it?
I liked Cédre a lot. I’d say that the tuberose is definitely present, but I don’t know if it’s really the most dominant note. Granted, I know know all the notes, but I think the best description I can think of is warm spiced cider, with tuberose and wood. Luckyscent lists the notes as “Cedarwood, tuberose, musk, amber and cinnamon”.
CB I Hate Perfume’s Burning Leaves. The smell is good, but this is a particularly weak water perfume for his line. When I spray it on my clothes, the results are much better. I just don’t know if I buy into the whole “water perfume” thing – but somebody feel free to disagree!
Ok, sure, sort of
I believe these water perfumes are made up of water plus preservatives plus fragrant materials (that are chemically like oils and ‘don’t mix’ with water) plus emulsifiers (chemicals that help tiny droplets of oily fragrance to stay suspended in the water rather than separating like oil and vinegar). Ordinary perfume has alcohol instead of the water and preservatives, and it might not need emulsifiers because the oily fragrant materials mostly do mix with ethanol. So, the key differences between water and alcohol. ..
First, water has no smell by itself, whereas alcohol has that assuring, familiar odor. My understanding is that CB makes water perfumes to avoid that alcohol smell. I think he has a point there. No one lists alcohol as one of their favorite perfume notes, right?
Second, alcohol evaporates much more readily than water does, and it will carry some of those fragrant oils with it. All other things being equal, that means an alcohol perfume should have larger projection and shorter longevity than the same formula in a water base. For me the value of that would depend on the composition and context, so I have no general opinion.
Third, in a water perfume you have those tiny droplets of fragrant materials, whereas in an alcohol perfume I think most of the materials are distributed very evenly throughout the alcohol. I could imagine this making a difference when you dispense the perfume (do you get enough droplets in each spritz? ), at the skin (do the droplets break open readily, exposing their contents to evaporation?), and during evaporation (do the fragrant materials evaporate differently when bunched together?) I could also imagine that none of these differences would be detectable.
My bottom line is: I’d like to know more about those preservatives, but if they’re safe and effective, then water perfume sounds great to me!
In practice, I’ve worn Burning Leaves a couple of times and recall strong impact with small projection and reasonable longevity (a good combo for me in most situations). Once I wore his earlier narcissus scent (not from the more recent Expensive Flowers series, or whatever it’s called), and that was light and small and gone in less than an hour. I blamed the composition, not the water, but I could be wrong. Anyone, please feel free to disagree with me as well.
I don’t really want to agree or disagree, just add that I got a small decant of 7 Billion Hearts and it lasted a nanosecond on me. Not sure if the decant process affected longevity? This is expensive stuff! Call me demanding, but I would like it to last a decent amount of time.
I’m not sure why there aren’t more choices in western perfumes? I love fragrance oils myself and wish more perfumes came in this form/concentration. Kind of along the line of the Vero line- Extrait, VdE, and edp….Love those options
Fascinating … as always. I might be developing a crush on leathermountain.
I found two different samples of 31 Rue Cambon this morning, each from a different source and each a different color. One is pale orange/dark yellow and the other is pale yellow. One sample has a tiny crownlike symbol on the bottle, but even with a magnifying glass I couldn’t make out the lettering underneath. I wore one of the samples on one wrist and Miller Harris’s Bois de Terre (hope I remembered that right) on the other. Tomorrow I’ll test the two Cambons.
I meant Terre de Bois, haha.
I know The Perfumed Court samples have crowns on them? Or something like that…
Yes, that sounds like their symbol.
SOTD is Costes! I love this stuff.
I keep meaning to try Costes and forgetting…maybe I should actually make a list.
CBIHP Tea Rose over yesterday’s Eau des Merveilles makes a fun chemistry experiment. Even after a shower last night I could still smell EdM. Today something in it is pushing Tea Rose from subtle into a delightful cloud of salty petals.
Interesting experiment! I’m trying to imagine tea rose + EdM = salty petals, but I know what you mean about the EDM lingering and never quite going away. I love being able to get a whiff of its saltiness long after I think it’s gone. Will have to try something similar to your experiment in the future. I’ve never layered EdM with anything other than Caswell Massey Sea Grass lotion.
Shout out to Sapphire – are you out there?? You win the enabler pin for yesterday’s post about the sale on Arquiste for J. Crew No. 31 and No. 57. I didn’t even know I wanted/needed those until I read your post! Fortunately I’ve had good luck with blind buys from Yann Vasnier. Figure if I don’t like these at least the price was right! Thanks!!
Sold PdN Fig Tea. Great for a hot, humid day.
Just saw this – very interesting:
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2015/08/20/nyregion/new-york-city-summer-smells.html?ref=nyregion
A bit late to post it, but I’ll probably forget in the morning.