Today Elisa discusses perfumes that she wears not necessarily because they suit her personality, but the opposite–they become her means to fantasize and play dress up.

As a child, I never wanted to be something scary for Halloween; my costumes were always aspirational. Instead of dressing up as a witch or a ghost, I was a bride or a ballerina. As I got older, I’d pile on my grandmother’s costume jewelry to be a fortune teller; for several years in a row as a teen, I borrowed my mother’s embroidered purple suede platform boots from the ‘70s and called myself a hippie.

Whether Halloween is approaching or not, I think of everyday fashion as a kind of costuming. I admire those chic women with a well-edited closet and a simple daily uniform, but I can’t resist buying beautiful but impractical items that don’t necessarily go with anything else in my closet, then trying to find ways to mix them in. I haunt consignment shops to find my costume pieces: a tie-print Diane von Furstenberg dress that makes me feel like I’m in a Woody Allen movie; the perfect ‘80s-era ankle boots for walking in SoHo (though my ankles were killing me by the end of the night); the black velvet tuxedo vest that I fantasize about throwing on with everything (but never actually wear). When I approach getting dressed as putting on a costume, I never worry about being overdressed or looking like I’m trying too hard; I’m just having fun with it.

Perfumes too can serve as a kind of costuming. I have my go-to favorites that always feel perfectly “me” whatever the occasion – Donna Karan Gold works in any season, day or night – but I also have scents in my collection that I wear to feel less like me. These are a few of my costume scents, the ones I put on to go clandestine, escape myself, or perform a character.
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Boudoir 36 is a perfume boutique based in Catania, Sicily. Catania, a city at the foot of Mount Etna, is a sensory roller coaster by itself, but Boudoir 36 was one of the highlights of my visit.  Boudoir 36 carries an impressive collection of perfume brands and boasts an excellent customer service. Antonio Alessandria, the creator of Boudoir 36, works as an engineer by day and operates his boutique in the evening five days a week. Talk about passion for perfume! This unique place is the subject of my article for The Financial Times Magazine, October 26th issue.

“Spend a day in Catania, a baroque jewel on the east coast of Sicily, and you will understand why Boudoir 36, an artisanal perfume boutique, is such a great fit for this exuberant city. Every scent, taste and color seems more intense—jasmine draping the building facades, oranges piled into ziggurats on the sidewalks, and even the blue of the sky framing Mount Etna. The perfume selection at Boudoir 36 rivals the finest boutiques in Paris and London, but its flamboyance and opulence are uniquely Sicilian.”

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Olfactive Studio Flashback, a salty vetiver and rhubarb blend, is one of those rare fragrances that not only smell good but feel poignant. Olfactive Studio’s concept marries fragrances with visuals, and in the image that accompanies Flashback, a frame from a video shot by Laurent Segretier of his long-distance girlfriend, you see very few details–the delicate tilt of a girl’s head and a thick fringe framing the face. This photograph was the brief to perfumer Olivier Cresp, who tapped into his childhood memories to create Flashback. For my part, when I smell Flashback, I’m reminded of collecting shells along the beach and helping my grandmother make rhubarb jelly.

While childhood memories are often saccharine, there is nothing cloying or precious about Flashback. When I was collecting notes for my article about salty perfumes, it quickly turned out to be one of the best recent examples of salty vetivers. It’s also polished and elegant, suited for both men and women.

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I have an article in the September 2013 issue of Perfumer & Flavorist magazine. It’s called “Story in the Bottle : Supporting Natural Ingredients Article,” and it’s about benzoin production in Laos. Benzoin is a vanilla scented resin used widely in fragrances and flavors, but its supply chain is extremely fragile. It’s mostly grown in the mountainous regions of Laos where small communities gather it to supplement their income. As the younger generation moves to the cities and other sources of income become more appealing, traditional activities like benzoin collection disappear. A loss of benzoin could have significant consequences to perfumers’ palettes.

A similar story could be told about many other natural raw materials used by the perfume industry, and I take a look at the current situation and what is being done to support the producers. Perfumer & Flavorist is aimed at the professional audience, so the article is on the technical side. Still, if you’re curious about such topics, you might like to take a look.

“The northern regions of Luang Prabang, Phongsali, Houaphan and Oudomxay supply the bulk of the benzoin used in the perfume and flavor manufacture. Benzoin is a balsamic resin obtained from the genus Styrax. The Laotian resin, tapped from Styrax tonkinensis, is considered to be of the highest quality, given its unique blend of vanilla, cinnamon and almond facets. In perfumery, benzoin can be found all over the fragrance wheel, from citrus colognes to orientals. Classics like Chanel Égoïste and Guerlain Shalimar rely on its velvety accent, while the addictive richness of this balsamic note is important for the caramel and chocolate flavors in ice creams and pastries.”

The magazine is currently available at www.perfumerflavorist.com.

If you’re curious to read more about benzoin and other resins, please take a look at my post Perfume Vocabulary: Resins and Balsams. Prada Candy contains the high-grade Laotian benzoin, and it’s one of the most interesting benzoin dominated compositions on the market. Despite a  generous dose of this rich, warm resin, Candy has a luminous, bright quality. On the dark and brooding end of the spectrum, I love the layer of benzoin in Chanel Coromandel. 

Photography by Bois de Jasmin, benzoin tears.

Does salt have a scent? “It depends on what salt you’re talking about,” says Benoît, who hails from Guérande, a French town in southern Brittany famous for its salt marshes. We meet by chance  at an airport lounge, and as he observes a book I’m reading, Jean-Claude Ellena’s Le Parfum, we strike up a conversation about scents. “Guérande’s fleur de sel smells of violets.” As he explains, refined table salt is about 97 percent sodium chloride and it’s virtually scentless, but sea salts from different regions have  impurities that give them a distinctive flavor and scent. Fleur de sel is hand harvested salt from the tops of salt marshes, and while Benoît is passionate about it, he urges me to try different salts and compare. “If you create a perfume based on Guérande’s fleur de sel, please let me know,” he says as we bid each other goodbye.

While I’m yet to visit Guérande to experience the violet perfume of its famous salt ponds, I’ve been noticing the salty nuances in my perfume bottles. My salt collection has likewise grown. Even the sharp iodine scent of table salt now seems obvious to me, not to mention the roasted aroma of Korean bamboo salt or the earthy bite of Javanese lava salt. I’m suddenly discovering a whole new universe of saline flavors.

Along with sweet, sour, bitter, and umami, salt is one of the five basic tastes and it’s much easier to understand it as such–the sensation that you experience when a salt crystal melts on your tongue. But in perfume, the effect can also be distinctive. Spray The Different Company’s Sel de Vétiver or Lalique’s Encre Noire and notice the briny note that you can almost taste.

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