Sometimes you don’t need a grand opera perfume to satisfy your cravings. A simple composition will do. Such is my latest discovery, Jo Malone Mimosa & Cardamom. It makes me think fondly of the early days of the house when Jo Malone offered simple, unaffected but clever compositions like Lime Blossom & Basil and before the marketing teams and accountants took over. Mimosa & Cardamom has a bright, cheerful personality, and it, refreshingly, smells like the brand didn’t skimp on the formula price. It’s a floral cologne with a spicy twist and lots of quirky charm.

The promise of mimosa and cardamom is duly fulfilled. The mimosa smells of blanched almonds and cucumber peels, with a characteristic hint of violet, while the cardamom is lemony, metallic and cooling. Both notes are clear and bright. Mimosa is a powdery ingredient, but thanks to a generous dose of spice, cardamom augmented with pepper and citrus, it feels radiant and airy. Its unconventional character also makes flowers acceptable even to the most classically minded men.

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Elisa on matching lips to rose perfumes.

Recently, my friend (and author of the perfume memoir Coming to My Senses) Alyssa Harad joked on Twitter, “I have accidentally matched my shirt to my lipstick and it’s bothering me so much I have to change.” A matchy-matchy outfit and lipstick combination may qualify as faux pas, but what about matching your lipstick to your scent? Since roses almost always smell like a shade of red or pink to me, I get a synesthetic pleasure out of wearing a color that “rhymes” with what I smell.

Here are some favorite match-ups from my rose and lip product collections.

Dark Roses & Matte Reds

L – R: Maybelline Color Sensational Creamy Matte in Rich Ruby, NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in Amsterdam, Sephora Nano Lip Liner in Real Red, Clinique Long Last Soft Matte in Matte Crimson

Dark roses are probably my favorite category of perfume, and they seem to call for drama. I don’t have the talent, patience, or eye shape for winged liquid liner, so when I want dramatic impact, I do a rich matte red lip. The Maybelline matte above (which I’ve heard is a pretty good dupe for MAC Ruby Woo) goes on super-smooth, and is a perfect match for the gorgeous, complex aged patchouli in Tom Ford Noir de Noir; it smells like red roses and bittersweet chocolate. The brighter, warmer lip pencil from Sephora is great with a classic rose chypre like Ungaro Diva or L’Arte di Gucci (try Lumiere Noir pour Femme by Maison Francis Kurkdjian if you can’t find the latter).

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Amber perfumes are some of the most popular choices for cool weather, and today Patricia explores various options, from light to dark, from simple to complex.

Ambers are crowd pleasers, the Golden Retrievers of the perfume world, ready to encompass you with a warm, furry greeting and a wag of the metaphorical tail. Granted, some are easier to love than others, and there is always someone who would rather not, but generally speaking the amber aims to please. Here are some of my favorites.

Amber for Beginners

My “starter” amber fragrance was the easy-to-wear L’Eau Ambrée by Prada.  With mandarin, rose, and jasmine to sweeten the way, I happily wore it until the patchouli drydown started to grate on me. I graduated to the warm and beautiful L’Ambre des Merveilles by Hermès, and its sweet caramel vanilla seems perfect for the cooler months. It reminds me of Prada Candy, but I much prefer its greater complexity. Every September I reach for the stunning starry bottle turned on its side.

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I love a good gourmand. Weaving notes of vanilla, caramel, and other delicious things, fragrances in this genre are my ultimate comfort blankets. The moment that days get shorter and mornings cold, the tray above my perfume drawer starts to fill up with my favorite gourmands–Pink Sugar, Lolita Lempicka, Kenzo L’Éléphant, Parfums de Nicolaï Vanille Tonka and L’Artisan Traversée du Bosphore.

The latter is interesting because the sweetness of Turkish delight and vanilla are balanced by a generous dose of crisp green notes and saffron. Created by perfumer Bertrand Duchaufour, Traversée du Bosphore is an example of contrasted gourmand I especially enjoy. Wearing it is exciting, because one moment you experience a fresh breeze and the next a voluptuous embrace. This also seemed to be the premise of Noir Exquis, a fragrance by Duchaufour that blends rich notes of candied chestnuts, coffee and tonka bean with orange blossom and citrus.

Since Noir Exquis is meant for both men and women, it doses sugar lightly and instead emphasizes the woody, balsamic layers. At first, it’s earthy and nutty, hinting at its patchouli and coffee soon to follow, but there are enough floral accents to brighten up the darkness. Based on the name, I expected something heavy and rich, but Noir Exquis is unexpectedly radiant.

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This blog can occasionally get breathless about perfume classics, and if you start me on Après l’Ondée, you’d think that you haven’t lived until smelling this Guerlain perfume from 1906. There is nothing wrong with admiring classics and sharing one’s enthusiasm about them, but I would like to provide some balance to the veneration of perfumes made before most of us were born. There is a fine line between acquiring a taste for new combinations of materials or unfamiliar notes and forcing yourself to like a perfume just because it has a pedigree.

First of all, not all fragrances made decades ago were great, so just because perfume is old, there is no guarantee that it’s special. There used to be just as many copycats, slapdash affairs, and lots of crass (and sexist) marketing in the past, so romanticizing the era misses the point. Even Jacques Guerlain created numerous failures before coming up with gems like Mitsouko and L’Heure Bleue. Similarly misplaced is the idea that liking classics is an instant mark of sophistication. I can’t think of less sophisticated perfumes than Dana Tabu, Schiaparelli Shocking or Estée Lauder Youth Dew. They’re loud, brash and impudent, and that’s their very point. Great perfumes to be sure, but refined they are not.

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