A quick reminder: the freebiemeet will be next Saturday, the 29th.
Today, a repeat of a poll we first did in 2010, about transitional fragrances: what are your favorite fragrances as summer turns to fall? What scent makes you happy as the nights get chilly and the days take on that crisp edge? And tell us what perfume you wish you owned for chilly weather.
Or, as always, talk about something else…
While growing up in the hot and steamy South, I loved autumn and its coolness, and you’d think that after Seattle’s oven-like temperatures and dangerously smoky skies this summer, I’d be looking forward to autumn. Wrong. I’m already counting the weeks till spring and wishing I could move to Buenos Aires for the next six months and enjoy spring and summer all over again. Perhaps I’ve changed (emotionally?) but fall feels sad this year; I reckon it’ll be dark, sodden, the beginning of The End — the interminable winter months.
This year I’m going to avoid sentimentality, Japanese death poems, lethargic piano music and drama (I won’t be stoking my self-pity). I’ll tackle my negative autumn (and winter) moods with fun things…
Autumn is the perfect time to wear a chypre perfume. Something in a chypre’s mossy, musty base echoes leaf mold and feels right at home on days with cold mornings and sunny afternoons. Among chypres, fruity chypres are especially nice. The fruit adds sweetness and color — so nice on a rainy day — without going all pumpkin spice.
Here are five fruity chypres to sample:
Guerlain Mitsouko: I’ll kick off the list with the queen of fruity chypres…
(Quick PSA: I am on the road today and heading to a place with very limited internet access. I’ll be slow to answer comments or questions all weekend long, but I’ll do my best.)
Fall is not my favorite season, but even I will admit that it’s probably the best time of year for perfume. You can wear just about anything, and for many of us, it’s a joy to finally pull out some of the heavier woods and orientals that we’ve been neglecting all summer. I’ve already done autumn posts covering iris, incense and vetiver, now I’m turning to vanilla (and Angela will join in the fun on Monday, with 5 fruity chypres for fall). As always, these are just my suggestions, and again as always, the line between the seasons is perhaps a bit arbitrary and/or personal: some of these fragrances wear just as well in summer or winter, and some of them work perfectly fine all the year round.
Indult Tihota: Vanilla cake, yes, but vanilla cake from perfumer Francis Kurkdjian…
Where I live, it is the first day of autumn, and this year, September is the new August: after a wet and confusingly mild vacation season1, we look likely to celebrate a glorious Indian Summer. I have always loved the early fall, so I’m tempted, each time I select the autumnal Top 10 at Now Smell This, to stack it with all my favorite chypres, floral ambers and woody orientals. This time, to avoid boring you with repetition, I’ve chosen fragrances released in the last two to three years. I can’t promise there will be any less oakmoss than usual, but I do think I’m fruitier and more craft distilled today…