Vacation sunscreen, developed for Poolside.FM by Carlos Huber of Arquiste and perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux. It is "is designed to capture and bottle the complete sunscreen experience from coconut, to pool water, to swimsuit lycra and everything in between" (other notes include banana, orange blossom and vanilla). You can pre-order a 100 ml tube now at Vacation for $20, or skip the SPF and just buy 30 ml of the Eau de Toilette for $60, or read more about the project at Fast Company.
The hottest I’ve been on Earth was in Tucson, Arizona, one July, long ago. My partner and I were driving from Virginia to Los Angeles, and one day, near the end of our journey, we stopped for gasoline and lunch in Tucson. Nearing the city, the car’s air conditioning was overwhelmed; the inside of the car became stuffy, warm like an…oven. Perspiration dripped from my nose. When we stepped outside the car, we were stupefied and in the dry heat all sweat evaporated. The air was as still as the inside of a tomb (and speaking of tombs, Tombstone, Arizona, was just an hour’s drive south). Heat, visible waves of it, attacked us from all directions: below, above, sideways. We were in Hell’s reception room: 113 degrees Fahrenheit. All we needed to complete the scene was the sound of a rattlesnake’s tail in full swing…
I’ve never thought as much about hand sanitizer in my life as I’ve thought about it over the past five months. Sure, I typically had a half-used bottle of the stuff floating around in my tote bag, for moments when I want to clean my hands after touching an ATM or eating something messy on the go. Who ever thought hand sanitizer would become a hot commodity in Spring 2020?1
As I’m slowly inching towards my return to mass transit and the workplace (part-time, at least), I’m taking inventory of my hand sanitizer stash…
Earlier this year, Arquiste celebrated its tenth anniversary and launched Misfit, a patchouli fragrance developed by perfumer Rodrigo Flores-Roux. And one morning soon after Misfit’s launch, I met with Arquiste founder Carlos Huber in his Manhattan apartment and we spoke in his dining room, which also serves as a non-typical and beautifully appointed meeting-space.
Once I’d had a chance to admire some of the room’s details (pieces of black jasperware, a cluster of decorative obelisks, wallpaper patterned with a fantastic scene of Indian gardens), Carlos gave me a run-through of Misfit’s notes and backstory. Our conversation drifted into a few tangents about nineteenth-century perfumery, fashion and architecture. I’ve always admired Arquiste’s poetic yet accurate use of historical narratives (I can’t think of any other perfumery whose website includes a bibliography!), and it was a treat to chat with someone whose interests overlap so much with mine.
While I’ve been trying and trying to write this review over the past month, and making little progress, I gradually realized that the memory of that visit has been haunting me. As we enter our ninth week of lockdown here in the New York City metro area, that morning now seems inconceivable…
Coconut-milk sunscreen. Specifically, Le Tan, which I love. It’s Australian. I actually based one of the perfumes on the idea of vacation. We included an accord of that coconut-milk sunscreen. It’s called Sydney Rock Pool, and it’s my go-to fragrance for beach vacations because it kind of smells like what you smell like after being at the beach all day.
— Carlos Huber of Arquiste on the smell of vacation. Read more in For This Fragrance Developer, Vacation Smells Like Australian Sunscreen at The Cut.