Carthusia’s Mediterraneo fragrance — a bright and sunny mix of lemon, verbena and green tea — has long been a summer staple of mine. So far, nothing else in the line had really captured my affections, although I’ve been meaning to revisit the florals since I haven’t smelled most of them in quite some time (if you have a favorite, or if you’ve had the chance to try any of the solid perfumes, do tell). Their new 1681, though, was a pleasant surprise.
1681 is named for the year the Carthusian monks of the Certosa di San Giacomo on the island of Capri reportedly began crafting fragrances using local materials…
The first and only time I went to Italy I was sixteen, and on a six-week trip of Europe with a large group of girls who had fundraised for the trip through Girl Guides (Scouts). Using the blitzkrieg method of Old World sightseeing favored by many generations of North American young people, we “did” Italy by spending a day-and-a-half in Venice. It was high summer and with the callousness of youth, I wrote Venice off with a few lines in my travel diary: “It’s like a museum covered in pigeon poop. The canals smell of sewage, and there is a haze hanging over the water. No oilies as of yet.” This last bit was because our uniforms apparently made us look like an enormous gaggle of young stewardesses and so we attracted camps of hopeful, slick fellows most places we went. Despite their absence in Venice, I came away with an impression of the place that might have turned me into the sort of traveler who