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· December 28, 2007 12:19 AM by
Colleen Shirazi
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Posted by Dain, Thursday, December 27, 2007 8:55 PM (Eastern)
It is time I actually review these samples I obtained so long ago. I am looking for woodsy/spicey/exotic scents, and Serge Lutens is as rich a vein to mine as any.
Most perfumes in production today are urban scents, otiose confections that telegraph everything about the wearer: personality, age, income, and sexual availability. Pastoral medleys are a pleasing alternative, but often these ambient perfumes seem rough and unfinished. Chergui, however, is all polish and intelligence.
In this latter work, Bruegel's adaptation of Bosch's combinatorial demonic is not so apparent, but the allseeing omniscience (only available to artists) remains: the distortion of perspective is positively sardonic. "Everything turns away/ Quite leisurely from the disaster", the world and its humbler inhabitants loom large, while the titular character is only a pair of white legs thrashing in the surf.
Likewise, Serge Lutens has taken highly atmospheric hay, and added a sort of boozy abstraction, a sludge of mixed spices and honey. It is not the dry and herbaceous raw material of Parfumerie Générale Bois Blond, which draws refinement from the addition of sandalwood. Chergui is the country gentleman's library, not the country itself. The pure aromatics of the woods and fields might float in on a breeze, but the gentleman is immersed in his book and his mulled wine, closer to civilization than even he realizes.
Unbridled magnificence, but I'd like something drier.
Labels: perfume reviews, serge lutens
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December 28, 2007 12:19 AM,
Hay...reminds me of Annick Goutal's Eau du Ciel. It's not listed as a hay scent, particularly, yet it has this odd sunny feel to it.
I want to say it reminds me of this specific incident where I was playing hide-and-seek with my sister and cousins, on my grandparents' organic farm. I was hiding behind what, to me, was this towering flower. Years later I saw the same section of the garden and it all seemed so...short.
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