2011 launches: 6 posts

Justin Bieber is a young and very pretty singer, songwriter, and actor who has had a double platinum album, three singles in the Billboard Hot 100, and who has gotten involved in the fragrance industry.  Taylor Swift is a young and very pretty singer, songwriter, and actor who has won a Grammy for Country Album of the Year, for Best Country Song, and for Best Country Solo Performance. Ms. Swift has also gotten involved in the fragrance industry.

What is striking about their fragrances, Justin Bieber Someday and Taylor Swift Wonderstruck, is the similarity of the ad copy and the resemblance to Britney Spears Fantasy, a fruity, frothy thing that, as much as it might seem impossible, broke ground in this category.

Continue reading →

When we were talking about cravings for salty perfumes last week, I began to compile a list of such fragrances.  On the face of it, a salty perfume seems like a strange idea, because salt doesn’t have a strong smell. At most I notice  the tangy iodine whiff from granulated table salt like Morton’s or the slightly marine sweetness whenever I open my jar of fleur de sel — thin, crunchy flakes gathered from the top of salt dunes.  But think of what you experience when a salt crystal melts on your tongue—a rush of sweetness that’s followed by a mild saline bitterness. That’s how I imagine salty scents.

A great illustration for this salty impression is Parfum d’Empire Azemour les Orangers. Created by perfumer Marc-Antoine Corticchiato, the founder of the Parfum d’Empire line, it’s an homage to his parents’ orange grove in Morocco.  When I first tried Azemour, I was instantly smitten with its green richness, effervescent citrus notes and moss and musk drydown.

Continue reading →

by Suzanna

Swiss perfumer Andy Tauer burst onto the niche perfume scene in 2005 with the stunningly atmospheric L’Air du Desert Marocain, a breath-of-the-desert scent that twisted bergamot and petitgrain through a hot floral-woody core.  This was when Andy had just two perfumes (the other was Le Maroc pour Elle) and those two scents were available only on the Tauer perfume Web site and had to be posted from Switzerland.

Six years later, Andy has produced 21 scents, two of which (Ingrid, Loretta) are not yet released. He was especially prolific in 2011, a year in which he released six scents.  In this number was one of the most ebullient summer-sunshine perfumes you are likely to encounter, Zeta. 

Continue reading →

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

First, please let me get it off my chest. I am angry at Fendi for discontinuing Theorema, one of the perfect spicy fragrances—it smells like pomanders and smoky roses. I am disappointed that Life Essence, a brilliant perfume of mossy cedarwood, cardamom and geranium was axed. And I still don’t understand why Asja, the spicy jasmine set in amber, had to go as well. So when Fan di Fendi landed on my local Sephora shelf, I tried my best to ignore it.

Continue reading →

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

To all those fearing doom for today’s perfumery and saying that there can be nothing good under the sun, I say—smell Bottega Veneta Eau de Parfum. Here we have a big “prestige brand” launching its first fragrance that by all accounts should be either a copycat or a predictable crowd pleaser. Instead, it is a sophisticated, polished composition with a voluptuous character. Bottega Veneta Eau de Parfum intertwines leather and violet notes into an intricate accord that feels like warm silk on the skin, and—in a rare occasion of marketing concept matching the olfactory idea—evokes the sumptuous feel of Bottega Veneta’s classical intrecciato woven leather.

Continue reading →