I’ve often thought that there’s a perfumery equivalent of The Wall Of Sound — the studio production technique devised in the 1960s to produce a monumental ‘block’ of music that somehow manages to convey both size and detail. Several scents display this voluminous style, and I guess the most famous fragrance-creator who adopted a comparable approach in her work is Sophia Grojsman. Indeed, the word ‘block’ has often been used to describe her technique of taking a signature base – composed largely of musks – and embellishing it with different facets from one scent to the next. It’s a method that served her well: she was, after all, responsible for enduring creations such as Estée Lauder White Linen, YSL Paris and Lancôme Tresor, to name but three.
Her influence remains with us to this day, and to smell it for yourself, you need look no further than Narciso Eau De Parfum Ambree, the latest flanker to the Narciso scent released in 2014 (not to be confused with the original Narciso Rodriguez For Her from 2003). Here, Aurelien Guichard has returned to the huge cocktail of musks from his 2014 original, arguably made it even stickier and more vanillic (to justify the Ambree in the name, I suppose) and has topped it with an orange-blossomy, violet-lipsticky, red-berryish top attached to an oversized, honey-frangipani heart. The effect is attractive – if a touch familiar – and it serves to remind us that sometimes perfume, just like music, doesn’t need to apologise if it feels like shouting.
Persolaise
[Narciso Rodriguez Narciso Eau De Parfum Ambree review based on a sample provided by the brand in 2020.]
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