There was a good deal of heat in the air during my recent set of Love At First Scent broadcasts, thanks to the new Spirit flanker of Guerlain Habit Rouge, as well as Crivelli’s Safran Secret and the debut perfume from Matthew Zink. Here are links to both review videos, followed by some musings on a few of the scents: Guerlain Habit Rouge Spirit review — Maison Crivelli Safran Secret, Armani Acqua Di Gio Elixir, Matthew Zink By Matthew Zink, Francesca Bianchi The Code Of Emotion and Angela Flanders Shantung Dream reviews.
Armani Acqua Di Gio Elixir (Alberto Morillas) 2:28
Angela Flanders Shantung Dream 11:17
Francesca Bianchi The Code Of Emotion (Francesca Bianchi) 18:45
Maison Crivelli Safran Secret (Gael Montero) 27:44
Matthew Zink By Matthew Zink (Yann Vasnier) 37:28
Francesca Bianchi’s work is always worth seeking out, but although the mango in The Code Of Emotion is an intriguing note with which to open a fougere, I’m not sure the rest of the composition is quite as striking. Still, hats off to her for attempting some measure of originality. She remains one of the independent scene’s most idiosyncratic spirits.
It would seem that Crivelli’s Safran Secret is not a new scent at all, but a repackaging of a composition that was available only in certain markets for a while. What impact this has on the brand’s story about the fragrance being inspired by fog-shrouded crocus fields is an issue I’ll leave you to sort out amongst yourselves. Putting aside any previous history, what we have in this release is an attempt to balance all those hard-hitting, broad-chested, pseudo-sandalwood notes that blight the atmosphere at Harrods, with a far more interesting, more contemplative steamed saffron facet. I hate to say that I think the tussle is just about won by the former, although the extended battle between the two camps makes for an absorbing wear.
The Matthew Zink fragrance (I have no idea whether we’re meant to call it ‘Matthew Zink’ or ‘By Matthew Zink’ or perhaps even ‘Charlie By Matthew Zink’) comes with a near orgiastic-level of leather-harness-flaunting hype. It certainly delivers in the smoke-and-embers department, but it seems to think it’s the olfactory equivalent of the nude wrestling scene in Women In Love, whereas I’d say it goes a bit shy and covers up its modesty just when you want it to abandon all decorum. It turns out the satyr has been a polite gentleman all along. Maybe that’s no bad thing.
Finally, all this talk of Harrods and leather and gentlemen brings us to Guerlain Habit Rouge Spirit, the latest flanker of the brand’s 60 year old bestseller. Put together by Delphine Jelk, it’s being sold as an iteration of last year’s ‘Parfum’ version with the following twist: the juice has been infused in oak barrels. As I said in the video, the proliferation of HR flankers means that we can now discern two distinct types: those that closely follow the dry+sweet aesthetic of the original and those that delve more readily into vanillic, gourmand-esque, Arabian territories. From this point onwards, I am going to refer to the latter as Habibi Rouge, and Spirit certainly falls into that camp, although it displays sufficient parched woodiness to lift it above the cloying, calorific heaviness of some of the other Habibis. The supremacy of the original edt remains unchallenged, but Spirit is one of the better incarnations of recent years. If asked whether it’s worth heading to a Guerlain counter to have a sniff of it, I would have no choice but to nod and say, “Yalla, habibi.”
Persolaise
[Review samples provided by the brands, with the exception of the Guerlain and the Matthew Zink, which were obtained by me.]
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