Persolaise Connecting With Ancestors
We’ve been seeking comfort lately. At Maison Persolaise, that means candles. I’ve often wondered why such a simple object should be as soothing as it is. How does a single…
Persolaise Review: Madagascan Jasmine from Grandiflora (Michel Roudnitska; 2015)
He may not be prolific, but Michel Roudnitska must surely be one of the most fearless perfumers working today. With an apparent disdain for the path of least resistance, he…
Christopher Chong Lecture In Cambridge
image: Kevin Jaako Here’s something that doesn’t happen every day: Amouage‘s Creative Director, Christopher Chong, will be delivering a lecture on perfume in Cambridge on Wednesday 28th October. The event…
Shade Of Green
Not an accurate representation of Jardin Persolaise From shed to lawnmower to compost bin to hanging baskets and back to shed again. Gardening has been the theme creeping through many…
Persolaise At You Magazine Big Beauty Weekend
I’m extremely excited to announce that on Saturday 10th October, I’ll be taking part in You Magazine’s Big Beauty Weekend in London: Jo Fairley will be chatting to me about…
Lutens Keep Playing
…continued from yesterday’s post (click here to be taken to it) The latest entries from some of the more bling-tastic brands haven’t registered on my fragrance radar. I have sniffed…
Getting A Masterpiece
Bulgari’s Le Gemme Orientali Perfume prices continue to leap with a vigour that’s normally the preserve of Olympic athletes. Last year, Serge Lutens made a brave jump with the first…
Making Wasabi – An Interview With Céline Verleure Of Olfactive Studio
Regular readers will be aware that Olfactive Studio‘s Panorama is without question one of my favourite perfume releases of the year so far. With its juxtaposition of a laser-charged, green…
Persolaise Review: Florabellio from Diptyque (Fabrice Pellegrin; 2015)
How thrilling it is when an idea manages to survive the journey from thought to creation. At the London launch of Florabellio, perfumer Fabrice Pellegrin explained that the vision he’d…
Try To Negotiate
There’s lots and lots to do whilst life and I try to negotiate the most pain-free way of slipping back into regular routines. For one thing, I seem to have…
A Perfume Explosion At London’s Burlington Arcade
It’s all happening at Burlington Arcade! Penhaligon’s have had a branch there for years, of course, but Chanel unveiled a store beneath the elegant, arched ceiling not too long ago,…
Persolaise Review: Sunshine Man from Amouage (Pierre Negrin & Fabrice Pellegrin; 2015)
Ah, dear old lavender. When it’s misused – as it so often is – it’s a whopping clanger of a cliche, plunging a composition into the depths of the generic,…
The Rising Notes
Perfume and death. Connections between the two have been made for centuries. Roses are snuffed out so their essence may be captured. White flowers reveal their most seductive odours just…
Persolaise Review: Nanban from Arquiste (Rodrigo Flores-Roux; 2015)
After a side-step that saw him produce two scents in collaboration with J Crew, Arquiste‘s Carlos Huber returns to his signature range and quells fears that his sensibilities may have…
The Sweet Crust
Health & Safety be damned. The other day, I went to our local hospital to visit the ailing relative I mentioned in a recent post, bearing food for various family…
The 500 Greatest Modern Perfumes On Basenotes
Oh my goodness! Geek fest! Look at what Basenotes are doing. To celebrate their 15th anniversary, they’ve compiled a list of the “greatest perfumes” – as per various criteria described…
Simmering The Fruit
It really is a stultifying cliche, but the power of smells to evoke memories is tremendous. And always surprising. And often difficult to comprehend fully. I mentioned plums and jam…
A Therapeutic Business
Although the blue skies outside my window would suggest otherwise, the chill in the night air and my calendar tell me that summer is definitely over. Soon, I hope to…
Persolaise Review: J’Adore Touche De Parfum from Christian Dior (François Demachy; 2015)
The J’Adore family welcomes a glamorous new cousin, dubbed Touche De Parfum. With her oil-based constitution, she may well have been brought into the fold to woo the Middle Eastern…
Persolaise Review: Sauvage from Christian Dior (François Demachy; 2015)
Sigh sigh sigh. There are several springboards from which I could leap into my review of Dior‘s new Sauvage (composed by in-house perfumer, François Demachy), but despite my best efforts…