A new fragrance from L’Occitane has debuted already. It is called Eau d’Iparie, and it is based on incense, myrrhe, rose and pepper (thanks to Tracey).

A new fragrance from Yves Rocher, Voile d’Ambre, offers an ambered oriental composition. The notes include green mandarin, cardamom; incense, myrrh, opoponax, patchouli, sandalwood, vanilla.

Its creator, Olivier Pescheux has been working for Givaudan for the past seven years. In creating Voile d’Ambre, he layered the base of amber and incense with sparkling spice notes. Yves Rocher provides a very well-documented overview of the creation of Voile d’Ambre, from the history of amber to the perfumer’s story on its website (in French).

Beautyhabit is offering 25% off every purchase and free signature deluxe sample pack with the code dailycandy. The offer is good till 10/18.

Star rating: 5 stars–outstanding/potential classic, 4 stars–very good, 3 stars–adequate, 2 stars–disappointing, 1 star–poor.

Among the fragrances André Fraysse created, none can rival Arpège, which the perfumer composed in 1927 for the French couturier Jeanne Lanvin, in collaboration with Paul Vacher.  Scandal (1932), Rumeur (1932), and Pretexte (1937) followed after the success of Arpège. Jeanne Lanvin dedicated Arpège to her musician daughter, Marie-Blanche, who picked the name for the fragrance.

The original 1927 formulation of Arpège is true to its name–a musical concept of arpeggio–in a sense that individual notes are played distinctly one after another instead of simultaneously. Rose dusted by opalescent aldehydic shimmer unfolds first, followed by rich jasmine.

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Guy Robert, the creator of fragrances such as Hermès Calèche, Christian Dior Dioressence and Rochas Monsieur Rochas, during the course of a lecture given in April of 1998 to the British Society of Perfumers brought up a very interesting point about perfume creation. He notes that “our art is so mysterious, most of the perfumers cannot explain the proceedings they use to build a perfume. Our method could be compared to the Art of Cooking, a sort of “rule of thumb” (empiricism), and I agree this is not looking very serious!”

Recognizing the relationship between music and painting, Robert proceeds to offer two theories, even though they have not been defined. First, “for every perfume note there are several levels, like what the musicians call “octaves”.

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What makes a fragrance masculine or feminine? In many ways, the distinction that women smell of flowers and men of citrus and musk is taken for granted, whether it is used as a guideline to select a perfume, or whether it is ignored by those of us who frequently cross olfactory gender boundaries. However, when one learns of the role of scent in other cultures, one begins to realize the sheer complexity of the issue. In the East, the scent would not have such clear gender divisions as it does in the West. In the Middle East, men wear rose based fragrances, because yellow rose is the cherished flower in Islam. In India, traditionally both men and women are perfumed with the same essences–sandalwood, jasmine, vetiver, henna flowers, attars. …

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A group of fashionable gals with a hot male model in tow test various masculine fragrances in order to determine how they would like a man to smell. Read the article (including reviews) in Sunday Times.

My own choices would be Divine L’Homme de Coeur, Guerlain Vetiver, Yves Saint Laurent Rive Gauche Pour Homme and new Lanvin Arpège Pour Homme.  If you have your favorites, I would love to hear.