New Perfume Launches: 74 posts

Just like Tom Ford Noir, Sahara Noir is a perfect cross-over perfume and a good case for disregarding arbitrary gender marketing. In the case of Sahara Noir, you only need to love incense and amber. And love them a lot, because this perfume is incense and amber to the power of 10. A part of Tom Ford’s Signature Collection, along with Violet Blonde, White Patchouli, Black Orchid and Grey Vetiver, this is a dramatic and dark blend that delivers on its noir promise.

With Sahara Noir Tom Ford is courting Middle Eastern perfume consumers, whose tastes gravitate towards opulent. “A perfume can’t be rich enough,” says a friend who works for a fragrance company in Dubai. Incense is used to perfume homes and public spaces, and a splash of rosewater and a cloud of oud smoke begins and ends any auspicious function.  Sahara Noir would fit right into this scented environment and even hold its own. Depending on your tastes for heavy perfumes, consider yourself warned.

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If you’ve never tried any Comme des Garçons fragrances, think of the stuff you might smell at your car mechanic–tar, machine grease, burnt rubber. Today’s collection includes more than a dozen perfumes, so there are exceptions, but by and large, they have an industrial, deliberately synthetic feel (even if it’s created through natural materials.)  To some people, these are the ultimate edgy perfumes, to others–they are smells you want to cover up, rather than sport on your skin.

Whatever camp you belong to, the new Black Eau de Toilette is likely to be a love or hate perfume. Black doesn’t lie–this is a dark, potent brew. If you’ve ever dreamed of smelling like molten asphalt or barbecued ribs or some cross between the two, then your wish can come true thanks to the folks at Comme des Garçons.

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When I reviewed Annick Goutal colognes recently, I mentioned that the trio would be great for those who are new to this fresh citrusy genre. The Hermès cologne collection would be my other recommendation. You can have a cologne flight starting from the champagne dryness of Eau d’Orange Verte and continuing with the white wine effervescence of Eau de Pamplemousse Rose. If you’re ready to try something more challenging, Eau de Gentiane Blanche offers a cocktail of green peppers and milky sap oozing from dandelions.

With Eau de Narcisse Bleu and Eau de Mandarine Ambrée having recently joined the collection, you have even more interesting choices. The fragrances round out Hermès’s cologne offerings with the elegant interpretation of spring flowers and sweet citrus. Both fragrances are polished and refined in a way that is typical of most fragrances by Jean-Claude Ellena, and either would be equally suited to both men and women.

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If you’re a fan of citrus colognes, you soon discover nuances in this effervescent perfume genre. Citruses can be classically austere (Hermès Eau d’Orange Vert), sexy (Thierry Mugler Cologne), exotic (Guerlain Eau de Cologne Impériale), or impeccably elegant (Thirdman Eau Moderne). But if you enjoy colognes only when the mercury levels rise and anything else seems too heavy, they all may smell, well, lemony. That’s why the new Annick Goutal cologne trio–Eau d’Hadrien, Néroli and Vétiver–is great for those who are not sure what they like, but are curious to learn more. It has three distinctly different scents which are easy to wear all year round.

Cologne collections are nothing new, of course. Hermès has one, Atelier Cologne made its name by blending all sorts of things with citrus, and half of L’Artisan Parfumeur’s fragrances can be worn as fresh colognes. The simplicity, on the other hand, is what I enjoy about Annick Goutal’s play on the lemon, orange blossom and vetiver themes. The lemony Eau d’Hadrien smells zesty. Néroli is a mass of white petals. Vetiver smells of driftwood and sea breeze. All would fit equally well for both men and women. All three are well-crafted, but of course, I have my favorites.

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Do you know the feeling when you try an outfit and can’t decide whether it suits you or not? You think, “maybe it would be fine if I were to add a different purse or wear my hair up…” Those are the kind of pieces that end up gathering dust in the closet. Perfume is not exactly like clothing, because some fragrances don’t cast their spell on you immediately, but as my recent experience with Chanel 1932 proved, sometimes the first instinct is the correct one.

I admit to having a certain reverence for Chanel. Its perfume collection includes some splendid gems like No 5, Bois des Iles, Cuir de Russie, and No 19, and even releases like Allure and Coco Mademoiselle have the kind of attention to quality that one rarely finds at department store counters. For this reason, I wasn’t ready to give up on 1932, a new addition to the Les Exclusifs collection, but when I first tried it on my skin I found it to be pale and limpid.

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