Have you ever seen the optical illusion that looks both like an old hag and a young woman, depending on how you approach it? That’s how I feel about Parfums MDCI Péché Cardinal. Not that it has anything of the old hag. Not at all. But come at it one way, and it’s nothing but caramelized peach. Look at it through a different lens, and you get tuberose. Peach. Tuberose. Peach. Tuberose. It’s kind of marvelous.
Perfumer Amandine Marie developed Péché Cardinal, released in 2009. It has notes of peach, blackberry, black currant, davana, coconut, lily, tuberose, plum, sandalwood, cedar and musk. When I fist smelled Péché Cardinal, I decided I was smelling a peachy floral. After that, peach is what I got whenever I sniffed Péché Cardinal. It was a plush, fragrant, earthy peach, but among the riches of my Parfums MDCI sample set, it fell to the back.
During a post about perfumes that smell like Champagne a few weeks ago, a commenter mentioned wearing Péché Cardinal for New Year’s Eve…