Guess will launch Seductive I’m Yours, a new fragrance for women, in August. Seductive I’m Yours is a flanker to last year’s Guess Seductive perfume, and follows the recent Seductive Wild Summer…
Two and a half vetivers ~ fragrance review, and a quick poll
I used to think there were some notes that simply couldn’t be done to death. The fragrance industry has proven me wrong on that score. Raise your hand if you’d just as soon not see another new oud fragrance for a few years?
Vetiver hasn’t yet reached that stage.1 We’ve seen a slow but steady stream of new vetivers over the last couple years, but nothing like the fever-pitch rate of new ouds. On the other hand, you know, there are lots of vetivers out there already, and vetiver, like oud, has a tendency to dominate whatever composition it’s in. So the bar is set high for a new vetiver fragrance.
Today, I’m looking at new(-ish) vetivers from Escentric Molecules and Chantecaille. Many perfumistas already know about Escentric Molecules, the niche line of perfumer Geza Shoen. They’ve released three fragrance duos, each consisting of a single note diluted in alcohol, and a fragrance built around that single note. The third duo, which debuted last year, features vetiver. Molecule 03 (the fragrance I’m counting as a half in the title since it isn’t really what you’d call a finished fragrance) consists of vetiveryle acetate diluted in alcohol, nothing else. As with Molecule 01 (iso e super) and Molecule 02 (ambroxan), it’s probably not the most cost-effective way to get yourself a straight-up aroma chemical, and I’ve always wondered why they don’t release the Molecule fragrances in very small sizes…
Ellen Tracy Bronze ~ new perfume
Ellen Tracy will launch Bronze, a new floriental fragrance:
Ellen Tracy Bronze is a captivating new women’s…
Chantecaille Kalimantan, Petales and Vetyver ~ new perfumes
US-based beauty brand Chantecaille will launch a new trio of fragrances for women, Kalimantan, Pétales and Vetyver, later this month:
Kalimantan (shown) ~ “Warm, woodsy, sensual, rich, and deeply exotic. Kalimantan is a bold, intense fragrance…”
Robert Piguet Fracas ~ an appreciation
Fracas was launched in 1948 by Robert Piguet. Like yesterday’s Bandit, it was created by perfumer Germaine Cellier, and like Bandit, it eventually disappeared from the shelves. In 1996 it was reformulated by perfumer Pierre Negrin and relaunched. The notes are bergamot, mandarin, hyacinth, tuberose, gardenia, jasmine, lily of the valley, jonquil, violet, neroli, rose, orange blossom, iris, musk, vetiver, cedar and sandalwood.
Fracas, love it or hate it, is indisputably the queen of all tuberose fragrances. “Every single person making a tuberose fragrance is trying to knock off the classic, which is Fracas,” commented Frederic Malle when discussing the creation of his own tuberose scent, Carnal Flower (via Women’s Wear Daily, 9/30/2005). Roja Dove notes:
Fracas is the big tuberose reference of perfumery, and tuberose is the most carnal of the floral notes. It smells like very, very hot flesh after you’ve had sex — that’s the bottom line. It’s very much in fashion just now, but current fragrances don’t use such an incredible concentration of it. While they may nod towards something carnal, Fracas is carnal all the way. (via The Independent, 12/14/2002)
Fracas, as the name suggests, is not a subtle fragrance. It is in-your-face tuberose…