Meet the Staff: The Sketchbook
· Blog Home
· Profile
· MySpace
· Contact Us
· FAQ/TOS
Older Articles
· Beauty Notes: Comme de Garçons (Original) Review
· Beauty Notes: BVLGARI Blv Notte Pour Femme Review
· Farewell, Colleen!
· Fantasy Web Find of the Day: Justin Porter Handmad...
· Beauty Notes: Santaverde Aloe Vera Sunscreen Emuls...
· Beauty Notes: Il Profumi Musc Bleu Review
· Culture Notes: Mos Def, Cornel West, and Bill Mahe...
· Fantasy Web Find of the Day: Marie-Helene de Taill...
· Beauty Notes: Alexander McQueen Kingdom Review
· Beauty Notes: Desert Island Stash (Part 2)
Comments
Archives
· Beauty Blog (2003-2004)
· Fashion Blog (archive)
· New Releases Blog (archive)
· Beauty Articles (archive)
· April 2005
· May 2005
· June 2005
· July 2005
· August 2005
· September 2005
· October 2005
· November 2005
· December 2005
· January 2006
· February 2006
· March 2006
· April 2006
· May 2006
· June 2006
· July 2006
· August 2006
· September 2006
· October 2006
· November 2006
· December 2006
· January 2007
· February 2007
· March 2007
· April 2007
· May 2007
· June 2007
· July 2007
· August 2007
· September 2007
· October 2007
· November 2007
· December 2007
· January 2008
· February 2008
· March 2008
· April 2008
· May 2008
· June 2008
· July 2008
Recent blog posts:
Links
Barneys
refinery29
The Sartorialist
Jargol
Perfume Shrine
Ambre Gris
Polyvore
The Fashioniste
The Powder Group
LA-Story.com
Dain's Literary Attempts
Colleen's Beading Blog
Colleen's Adult Acne Blog
The Beauty Blog Network
Eponym Blog Directory.
TBF Project:Blog
Posted by Dain, Sunday, March 30, 2008 4:36 PM (Eastern)
Brenda, who'd pretend to shop for funerals, without a hint of
guilty conscience, just to prove a point, would wear Nuit de Noël.
guilty conscience, just to prove a point, would wear Nuit de Noël.
All perfumes are representations. Even straightforward soliflores are not so straightforward in the making, because nature is either extremely expensive, or impossible to extract and must be reconstructed using synthetics, as is the case of lily of the valley. In that sense, you could easily argue that the contemporary Diorissimo, which smells of exactly like the delicate bells on a dewy May morning, is an abstract perfume. Chypres, first conceptualized by Coty in 1917, are intended to recreate the natural atmosphere of the woods, by pairing of bergamot with an oakmoss and ambergris base, usually bridged by a heart that may be floral, leathery, fruity, or green. In that case, Mitsouko is also an abstract, because I've yet to walk in a forest that smells like that. Let us take another lesson from history: 1921's Chanel No. 5, le monstre, the iconic floral aldehyde. Two divas, rose and jasmine, sing a duet, and aldehydes are like the bottles of champagne that make that old song splendid again. This impression is deliberate, as Coco Chanel explained, "I want to give women an artificial perfume." In comparison, Diorissimo is a kind of realism, easy to forget that the image is merely paint on canvas (hey, you smell like lily of the valley!), while Mitsouko might be impressionistic, wherein the paint itself is a crucial part of its expression (aldehyde C-14, the note like unripe peach flesh).
Nuit de Noël is assuredly abstract, but its abstraction is not physical but metaphysical, built around an idea, Christmas Night. However, it is not what you might expect; there are no pine needles nor no mulled cider. Nuit de Noël is in fact a very proper, proper perfume without a hint of kitsch, classical notes that exist in a million others: the perfect degree of aldehydes, just enough to smooth the distinction between rose, jasmine, iris, and ylang ylang, lain atop a creamy base of vetiver, sandalwood, vanilla, and oakmoss. A million other perfumes. And yet I sit here—sniffing, marveling—let me tell you, Nuit de Noël is something else: dreamy and refined, lightly floral-sweet-powdery but absolutely seamless, so restful, like the diffusion of golden light from a fire, warm and comforting. In a rare instance of accurate copy, Caron describes this "en hommage à toutes les mères, tel un hymne sacré à la maternité" (in homage of all mothers, as a sacred hymn to maternity). The final word in comfort scents.
Ah, Caron. You tempt me sorely, as ever.
Labels: beauty notes, caron, perfume reviews
subscribe
in a reader
Post a comment (NO SPAM)
Links to this post:
Create a Link