Io Carthusia

Desirability: Full Bottle

Source: Fragrantica

Philosykos EDT was the first fig perfume I owned and while I still enjoy it, I've since discovered other figs to love. There is Dambrosia which morphs from fresh fig fruit to delicious fig desserts as the hours pass to Ichnusa from the same brand Profumum Roma, an intricate green fig so very different from the gourmand Dambrosia. Another love has to be Ninfeo Mio that manages to be fresh, sweet and green at the same time, exuding a natural air that Annick Goutal excels at. 

Having had a very good first experience with Ligea La Sirena from the house of Carthusia, I was eager to try more from the line which has led me to Io. I'm not the biggest fan of aromatic scents or colognes but the thought of fig, mint and tea together sounded too good to pass up. Io is marvellous, like a bottled Spring that revives the spirits instantly or a holiday in the Mediterranean (which would definitely revive my spirits). Dry, green, fresh, sweet, woody, aromatic...Io is all of that at once and lies on the same side of the scale as Ichnusa and Ninfeo Mio.

Fresh mint, sweet fig and tart green notes are the major players in Io. I don't detect a tea note but it does smell like herbs were thrown into the concoction and in any case Io is as good a healer of the soul as a cuppa tea. It's a fig scent without being fig-centered, clearly there is more to it than just fruit and leaves. Io is not just a scent but an experience, it takes you under the cool shade of fig trees over which is a blistering sun of a hot summer's day, sipping mojitos on a hammock and watching distant waves lazily kissing the shore, not near enough to hear them but the wind sweeps in the cool salty air which rustles through the leaves above you, the music of Nature putting finishing touches on this idyllic moment.

Projection is ok and longevity about average but it's such a joy to reapply this! 

Mimosa & Cardamom Jo Malone

Desirability:Full bottle and a back up

Source: pinterest

Never say never. 

I haven't been particularly inspired by Jo Malone before. Something about the sleek minimalist bottles and transparent juice did not speak to my soul which tends to seek out the deep, dark and darker. 

Until recently that is. I have loved mimosa since Une Fleur de Cassie and having quenched my recent thirst for all things roses, my attention was caught by these delicately sweet little yellow flowers in the form of Too Much, which I chanced upon in a blind swap. Since Too Much is out of production and the bottles on Ebay have exorbitant shipping costs tacked to the otherwise reasonable prices, I was determind to find another mimosa to love. Something as sunny and ethereal as Too Much. Mimosa & Cardamom was released at perfect timing in my case and I snagged a bottle during a weekend in Hong Kong, on a five minute break between eating and more eating. Heavenly. I mean Mimosa & Cardamom but yes food in Hong Kong is sublime too. 

There's nothing dark about Mimosa & Cardamom. It's almost like the scene in Stardust where Claire Danes bursts into light and floods the entire place with brilliant illumination which somehow kills Michelle Pfeiffer. But instead of pure white light, Mimosa & Cardamom is radiant with a golden glow that warms you up and turns you into a fuzzy marshmallow inside. The cardamom does not detract from the main focus but instead lends its aromatic spiciness to the subtle sweetness of the flowers. It feels like being surrounded by mimosa trees! Projection and longevity are both pretty good. 

Comparing Mimosa & Cardamom with Too Much and Une Fleur de Cassie, I would say that Too Much is more sparkling and a lighter yellow like champagne, whereas Une Fleur de Cassie is more of a darker honeyed gold and Mimosa & Cardamom being somewhere in between. All are fantastic mimosa scents!

Tobacco Oud Tom Ford

Desirability: Decant

Source: www.buro247.ru

I met Tobacco Oud while visiting a friend during my travels and became pleasantly acquainted with it over the course of my stay. I had previously bypassed the grey-bottled Oud trio from Tom Ford partly because I was a little weary of oud and partly because I flinch at the pricing of TF fragrances. Yes the range has a few fantastic scents but seriously? Anyway I digress.

A heavy scent this one is. I don't usually give a stuff as to whether my SOTD would be better suited to colder temperatures than the tropical humidity I live in 365 days of the year but I would advise that less is more with the likes of Tobacco Oud. It does quieten down but that's after at least 3-4 hours into the wearing.

I smell tobacco, whisky and wood. A rich, sweet and aromatic tobacco that feels warm and rugged. The whisky in Tobacco Oud is a mellow fellow, I'm on the very early stages of the learning curve for whisky and I still wince at the perceived harshness of Scottish malts I've been introduced to, but there are no rough edges to Tobacco Oud, it's smooth, smoky and very delicious. The drydown is sweeter than when it first started and reminds me of incense rather than tobacco by this stage. On a side note I prefer this to Phaedon's Tabac Rouge that my friend is partial to but which I found to be a little on the sweeter side of tobacco scents and while I do have a sweet tooth I don't always indulge it and Tabac Rouge is a sweet treat. Despite the dark tobacco and smoky whisky I don't find Tobacco Oud to be brooding or masculine, certainly it doesn't conjure up images of cowboys, instead it feels like it belongs in a swanky smoking lounge or whisky club where luxury is like daily bread for the crowd there.

Phenomenal longevity, a potent beginning that lasts for quite a few hours before it fades but remaining noticeable for days! So despite me failing to discover any oud in Tobacco Oud, I still think this is worth sampling and definitely worth getting a decant at least. Since it lasts forever and a day, a full bottle may not be required unless you are of the happy breed that is content with just one perfume in your closet. 

Vetiver Lorenzo Villoresi

Desirability: Full bottle

Source: Fragrantica

I'm in trouble. This is the 4th fragrance I've tried from the Vintage Collection of Lorenzo Villoresi and I like/love them all. I would like to add at this point that if you are adverse to large doses of cumin, please bear in mind that Vetiver from the Vintage Collection has copious amounts of cumin. Not quite a cumin bomb like Rubj but there's no hiding the cumin in Vetiver. 

For the first time I would say that a scent really does smell partly like an Indian curry and partly like a sweatshop. That's how Vetiver started on me. Lots of aromatic spices and the glacial galbanum making up a mixture that is a combination of- bitter, green, invigorating, metallic (celery is one of my most hated vegetables for its metallic aftertaste and smell!) and the....cumin with its sweaty/BO effect that has always been so appealing to me. A whole lot of notes that are potent and competitive beings and Vetiver could have been a jarring disaster but it's not. Far from it. Everything blends beautifully and all the notes fall into place like a choreographed dance, smooth and seamless. It gets rather dry and dusty in the later stage and befits its name Vetiver better than the spices and galbanum did at the beginning but the green bitterness and the spices remain and contribute to the arid climate that makes Vetiver smell like it were part of an Old Western movie. 

Vetiver is softer than I like my scents to be, I have to sniff myself closely to detect the scent trail but it does have a decent longevity. A definite like which would have been a love if the projection had been stronger. 

New Haarlem Bond No 9

Desirability: Decant

Source: Fragrantica

I swapped for a half used bottle of New Haarlem, eagerly anticipating being drenched in coffee and maple syrup as others have experienced. In reality, this is what I got.

A burst of citrus greets you, its green and fresh self followed quickly by lavender and a dark woody smell, the combination of these three notes made me think immediately of male cologne. The citrus calms down and when it does I can smell the coffee and the maple syrup that many perfumistas have been gushing over. The coffee is a black bitter coffee but diluted or maybe overpowered by the thick maple syrup which conjured up images of a stack of golden brown pancakes drenched with the amber coloured syrup. So in proportions, I smell of: woody lavender>maple syrup>black coffee. On hindsight or smell I think I prefer this proportion rather than if it were an outright gourmand consisting only of maple syrup and coffee which might be a bit OTT. The cool, broody effect of the wood and aromatic lavender are a nice relief from the heavy gourmand side of New Haarlem. 

So instead of a hearty breakfast, I got an invigorating walk in the woods bordering lavender fields while dreaming of said breakfast and suffering olfactory hallucinations. 

Terralba Masque

Desirability: Sample

Source: twistedlily.com

"Forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair." Khalil Gibran

Refreshing. Citrus. Woody. Aromatic. Herbal. Salty? Breathing in Terralba feels as stress-relieving and invigorating as practising ujjayi breathing. A cool salt-encrusted breeze carried in from the sea, tinged with sour citrus fruit, filtered through endless forests green and brown before reaching you sitting perched on a rocky ledge with an eagle's eye view of miles of unspoiled nature. I'll put a gin and tonic in the picture as juniper is egging me on to give it airtime. 

I would like this as a room fragrance or to smell it on another person but not something to wear personally. I need my intense brooding Orientals and this as pleasant as it is, is too vegetal! Still, I recommend at least sampling this. Uniquely weird yet nice. 

Lolita Lempicka Parfums Lolita Lempicka

Desirability: Full bottle

Sweet and gourmand without the gag or diabetic factor. 

Ok so there are way too many fruity floral gourmand combinations out there, most of them smelling too similar and generic. Ok so I get totally confused by how many flankers there are for the Lolita Lempicka fragrances, it's just as bad as the spinoffs of Thierry Mugler Angel, Alien, Womanity and almost more numerous than the progeny legitimate or not in some ruling families. Anyway I digress...

Lolita Lempicka (the original I speak of) like Mugler's Angel is one of few scents that I will always have in my wardrobe no matter how ridiculously large it gets or how many white hairs or lack of hair I have in the future. Lolita Lempicka and Mugler's Angel in my opinion are THE royalty of gourmand scents. 

A fanfare of syrupy black cherries on vanilla ice cream before the protagonists come in. The major players star anise and licorice add a nice twist to this sweet gourmand, a spicy sharpness contrasting the thick creamy praline, giving Lolita Lempicka a darker side like the wicked witches and sisters that are a staple in any good fairytale. I've mentioned a lot of sweet treats but Lolita Lempicka in reality isn't that sugary, it's nicely balanced between the spicy aromatic herbs, the sweet bits and carrot-iness of the iris/orris root. Feminine and fun! 

If you need any further persuasion look at that bottle (ok maybe not the best argument if I'm selling this to a guy), that polished apple that looks like it was made by fairies is whimsical and cute without being childish. And the price tag? I highly approve and wish many more perfumes could be priced as sensibly. Plus Parfums Lolita Lempicka could give a few niche houses lessons on projection and longevity. 

CiocoSpesizissimo Hilde Soliani

Desirability: Sample

Source: Fragrantica

The opening of CiocoSpesizissimo smells quite similar to CiocoRosissimo except that the rose note is replaced with green aromatic spices. I scrounged around my mother's kitchen searching for basil to do a side by side comparison since basil is listed as a note in CiocoSpesizissimo (seriously where do these names come from?) but I can't honestly say I smell basil but I do smell green herbs( in general) and mixed spices sort of like an all spice blend. Same level of sweetness as in CiocoRosissimo, which is not too sweet at all, the chocolate here being of the bitter dark chocolate variety but whilst in CiocoRosissimo the chocolate does a disappearing act before the drydown, here it stays put throughout, keeping the green spices company. 

CiocoSpesizissimo has a light projection but good longevity and overall is quite natural smelling if unusual (mint chocolate I have tried but aromatic herbal chocolate?). Its piquancy mellows over time and the scent gradually grows cosier and woody, bringing to mind the smell of freshly shaved wood planks. The development from the initial verdant-ness to the woodiness in the drydown makes me think of seasons changing from summer's vivid greens and blues to autumnal reds and golds. 

Angélique Noire Guerlain

Desirability: Full bottle and back up

Source: www.lesflaconsdeparfum.com

Complete and peaceful. 

Like a recovering addict, I've done my best to steer away from the sole Guerlain counter that carries the exclusive range and even went to great lengths to avoid the shopping mall in which its housed. However I recently bought in on a split of Angélique Noire which I briefly smelt and loved a few years ago. From the line L’Art et la Matière, Angélique Noire and Tonka Imperiale stood out the most for me. Actually I'm pretty crazy about my tiny decant of  Angélique Noire to the point that words and reason failed me when I tried to explain why (the crazy part that is). I'll say it's Guerlain at its best...just call me a groupie.

A pleasantly strange fragrance, vanilla is obviously part of the composition but there's a faint peppery greenness about the vanilla that makes it different from any other vanilla I've come across. Vanilla usually adds some weight but Angélique Noire remains quite...Twiggy-esque for a lack of a better word. Spicy without being fiery, sweet without crossing into gourmand or sickly and aromatic without being too green. Delicate and rarefied but not limp. Musk and faint incense appear in the drydown which feels like a warm golden shawl around your shoulders, conjuring up images of perfect perfectness like the duck scene in The Notebook. Moderate projection and very good longevity.

Source: pinterest.com

Trivia: Angelica or angelica archangelica as an essential oil is purported to be an excellent restorative to help ease anxiety, lift depression and alleviate tension. 

Fiore d`Ulivo Xerjoff

Source: www.nobaharshop.com

A light floral citrus and the odd one out of the four scents in my Casamorati discovery box. The citrus isn't jarring but instead its pale yellow freshness gives a bit of a kick to the watery floral notes. The drydown is a "clean as fresh bed linen" floral musk and overall the scent feels like the pastel colours of candied Easter eggs without the sugar coating. Fiore d'Ulivo has the same style as Amouage Reflection for Women but Reflection despite being made up of "light" notes manages to keep itself heard the whole day whereas Fiore d'Ulivo becomes a skin scent by the third hour. 

Source: suchprettythings.typepad.com

It's nicely done, a refreshing floral citrus with an elegant demeanour and although it's too mild tempered for my tastes, I will enjoy my little bottle from the discovery set. 

Ambra Lorenzo Villoresi

Source: Fragrantica

I've said it way too many times probably that Ambre Sultan is THE amber in my humble opinion and I've never wanted another amber since meeting that Lutens. Some ambers have been too powdery and many more have been too sweet and not resinous enough for my taste. And then there is Lorenzo Villoresi's Ambra from the Vintage Collection. 

You say amber, I think warm, inviting, smouldering, oriental, resinous etc. The opening of Ambra has none of that. "A misnomer", I thought, wrinkling my nose up at the sharp citrus and heavily peppered opening. Elemi is very evident with its fresh, spicy and citrus-like smell. Exotic spices join the line up like cardamom with its green aromatic sweetness, cloves with their unique minty spiciness and a heavy dusting of black pepper. Potent and commanding it most certainly is, the notes teetering on the edge of dissonance. 

It becomes more "amber like" in the later stages, the rough edges of its earlier self smoothed away. The "marine" salty muskiness I've come to associate with ambergris, accompanied by soft powdery woods and sweet smoky resins all lightly spiced, warm and comforting, as if Ambra has matured from a coltish young one to a graceful and loving swan with a mild temperament. Powerful opening that lightens into moderate projection thereafter and overall good longevity. 

Doolciiisssimo Hilde Soliani

Desirability: Full bottle

Source: Fragrantica

I tried three Hilde Soliani scents today including Mmm and CiocoRosissimo and while all were interesting experiences, some more than others, Doolciiisssimo has the siren call that keeps drawing my nose to my wrist to inhale the scent over and over again.

I enjoy tobacco in lighter doses such as in Serge Lutens' Chergui and L'Artisan's Havana Vanille, cherry can be difficult and most times either smells quite artificial or fleeting, the most promising I've chanced upon recently was Hilde Soliani's Bambolina. Cherry and tobacco though? I had my doubts. Proved unfounded. This is no cigarette ashtray or the malodorous smoker's breath.  It's like sweet aromatic cherry flavoured pipe tobacco and smells nothing like cigarettes or cigars. On a side note I never realised that pipe tobacco is about as complex and interesting as wine, what with the different tobacco leaves, the different ways of curing the leaves, mixing and blending several types of tobacco and the addition of casings to give it flavours like whisky, maple syrup and cherry for example. The cherry note in Doolciiisssimo is so realistic that visions of the dark red succulent fruit come to mind with every sniff and I can practically taste the tart sweetness. Vanilla is there in the background, sweet and creamy but whilst there are suggestions of gourmand in Doolciiisssimo, it is not very sweet for those who are wary of smelling like dessert platters.

After finishing the rest of my sample, I've decided that I do want this cherry tobacco scent in my life and as luck would have it, Luckyscent currently has it on discount! 

Quercus Penhaligon`s

Source: www.penhaligons.com

I will confess that I blind bought Quercus after having a bout of infatuation with Jilly Cooper's books where Tabitha Campbell Black was purportedly using the cologne and driving all the men crazy. I was curious as to what was so alluring about it. Answer. Nothing. It's not sexy and I assume the men were probably lusting after Tabitha so much that anything associated with her was taken as arousing. 

I don't tend to gravitate towards clean/fresh/aquatic/aromatic/cologne types. However Quercus has been a staple in my closet since the first bottle along with its accompanying liquid soap and body lotion. Not very original, it reminds me of so many other cologne types ranging from department store CK One to niche brands but there's something about it that makes me choose to replenish instead of replacing it. Talking about CK One I disagree with the pooh-pooh reviews that Quercus is a dead ringer for CK One, in a side by side comparison the former is softer and elegant and the latter loud and brash. 

I am ambivalent about citrus as it can get screechy on me but in Quercus it smells like a basket with various citrus fruit, not just one type, fresh, green and sunny. A bouquet of delicate white flowers. There's a tiniest bit of spice and the usually gregarious galbanum is muted here. In the drydown there is a sheer musk and mossy wood notes. It's as if all the ingredients were thrown into water and diluted to soft impressions of their usual selves. Average sillage and longevity. Natural smelling and well constructed. Lovely. 

Embruns Keiko Mecheri

Source:  www.allaviolettaboutique.com

Embruns. Sea spray.

Probably not the most attractive description of Embruns but it smells like salted orange peels that were dipped in water in an attempt to wash off some of the salt and preservatives. Embruns has peppery opening overlaying the citrus and salt water notes, the pepper doesn't tickle the nostrils and perks up the other two notes but does not last for long, leaving the salt and citrus to be joined in the drydown by smoky woody notes.

It's unisex but not my cup of tea (which I prefer rich and thick) and I agree with those who think this aromatic aquatic composition would work better on a man, being so fresh and lightweight it feels more like a eau de cologne than an eau de parfum.

My grumble about Embruns would be that it is barely a skin scent on me even after smearing on most of my sample from Luckyscent. Another fragrance lover suggested it might project better if sprayed on as opposed to dabbing but I'll have to get another sample to test that hypothesis. 

Bois Naufrage Parfumerie Generale

Source: Fragrantica.com

Bois Naufrage was inspired by a photograph entitled 'Nu au Bois Flotte' (naked on driftwood) by the legendary Lucien Clergue in 1971. In French, bois flotté is translated to driftwood; naufragé means shipwrecked.

This is a warmer and more polished ode to driftwood and the sea in general, as compared to the cool and bracing air of Arran Aromatics' Driftwood. I smell and envision a warm, salty sea air on a sunny afternoon by a beach dotted with washed up bodies of driftwood, polished smooth by the sea.

 There is a subtle sweetness in Bois Naufrage that reminds me of figs, more green like in Profumum Roma's Ichnusa as compared to the milky fig Dambrosia from the same house. The wind carries the smell of wildflowers and grass that cling tenaciously to what soil there is by the seashore. Where Arran Aromatics' Driftwood takes me back to the cold shores of the Atlantic in fall, Bois Naufrage takes me to the warm blue-green waters of the Mediterranean, accompanied by the light-hearted freedom of summer holidays.

It has a raw and piercing opening but quickly settles into a snugly, wind-swept, brine-encrusted woody scent that would lounge comfortably on both smart attire or casual wear. Bois Naufrage has an average projection and longevity on me after settling down from its brash start. I think its easily unisex but personally I would prefer to smell this on the right guy. 

L'Art de la Guerre Jovoy

L'Art de la Guerre. The Art of War.

It smells grey-green. Let me explain.

The opening is reminiscent of Mona di Orio's Violette Fumee's introduction on me, cold and astringent, an icy herbal. Thankfully like in Violette Fumee, the ice thaws quickly and a tart and sweet herbal scent arises through the cracks. I have never smelt fresh rhubarb but Ayala Moriel at SmellyBlog describes it as such:

 "It smelled like crisp grass, unripe berries or fruit and ozone. The latter element is what makes it every so slightly repulsive and ever so much more interesting and not at all like its earthly Swiss chard friends."

What does ozone smell like? Among my perfumed friends, it's taken to mean "airy" or "light" and interchanged with "aquatic", or as one of my more jaded friends calls it, "watered down". Besides residing as a layer above us in the atmosphere and protecting us from UV rays, ozone resides here on earth, produced by lightning strikes during storms and creating that "clean and fresh, after a rain" smell, that smells like nothing else and inspires creations such as Guerlain's Après L'Ondée, which celebrates the fine weather after a shower of rain, Arran Aromatics After the Rain, Hermes' Un Jardin après la Mousson and Annick Goutal's dewy floral Un Matin d'Orage.

So back to L'Art de la Guerre. Besides the strange tartly sweet herbaceous note that I assume is the rhubarb, I smell the unmistakable lavender and the metallic tinge of violet leaves...I was looking forward to a syrupy immortelle but I suspect it's portraying it's hay/straw-like trait here and not maple syrup, keeping L'Art de la Guerre in the style of aromatic fougère...grey-green!

It's dry down reminds me of another scent, this time Parfumerie Generale's Coze and its spiced boozy dark wood. L'Art de la Guerre has leather (lots of) instead of booze but is lightly spiced and earthy too. As the day goes on, L'Art de la Guerre becomes more mellow and easier for me to wear, I am afraid I have never been a fan of the Fougère family classic or modern, it's way too cool for a passionate soul.

Biases aside, L'Art de la Guerre smells like a thoughtfully crafted scent that comes across as sophisticated and elegant. It leaves a scent trail of about an arm's length and has a good longevity. 

PG02 Cozé Parfumerie Generale

Marijuana plants give off a lot A LOT of scent especially when flowering thanks to the aromatic qualities of the plant's terpenoids. Depending on which strain is grown, the smell can vary from green notes like leaves or grass or pine, fruit notes like berries or citrus, musky, skunk-like, spicy like cloves and cinnamon or any combination of the above, creating a smell that is almost indescribable.



So is Cozé almost indescribable. The opening is sharp and astringent, peppery almost and medicinal cloves burning my nostrils. When my head stopped spinning, I could pick up the woody aspect of the scent. The shrillness dries down into a very boozy patchouli with the spices and wood notes still lingering. I get no coffee or chocolate so I assume someone had the munchies and stole mine. Leaning on the masculine side, it is still comfortably unisex but not for the faint-hearted. Spicy woody, unconventional. Not quite chatty or cosy but an interesting trip for sure. This would be as close as I get to weed in this country.

Sillage is good so you might get arrested for possession. Longevity is decent, I clocked half a day.

Verdict: Haight Ashbury minus the incense.



P.S: to whoever stole my Grateful Dead tee, I want it back!

Cristalle Eau Verte Chanel

Cristalle Eau Verte, Chanel

I find Cristalle Eau Verte friendlier than her older sibling Cristalle. Perhaps due to her youthful nature, she comes across as a breath of fresh air, sweet and relaxing. A perfect scent for a humid, tropical Sunday morning before heading off to yoga (I can't resist sneaking in a spray or two under my yoga top but not when I'm going for hot yoga classes). My "yoga scent" is usually a choice from: Cristalle Eau Verte, the Vagabond Prince's Enchanted Forest, Annick Goutal's La Violette, Calvin Klein's Truth, Annick Goutal's Nuit Etoilee, Guerlain's Apres L'Ondee or Penhaligon's Violetta.

It starts off as a green citrus burst, slowly evolving into a florally sweet perfume, more floral than verte to my nose, whereas Cristalle has always been a more bitter herbal green on me. It's a skin scent pretty much for its short-lived duration on me (spraying on clothes liberally appears to prolong it a little more than the couple of hours it stayed on my skin). 

The "green" DNA affirms that Cristalle and Cristalle Eau Verte are siblings, but where it is amped up in Cristalle, it plays a much smaller role in Eau Verte, allowing the translucent florals and sweet citrus to come forth instead. 

A straightforward and cheerful scent that's elegant and disarming, without any underlying dark complexities to ruffle one's feathers. 

Namaste. 

Eau des Merveilles Hermes

Good morning. Today I feel pretty drained out despite it just past the 9 am mark and also being a Friday. To give you a gist, this is what I feel like :)

Cholmondeley Oudry, White Duck

I needed a pick-me-up scent today and reached for Hermes Eau des Merveilles, which I was introduced to this year and am slowly developing a taste for, being more of a dark Oriental lover than a fan of aromatic marines( I know Fragrantica lists this as an Oriental Woody but I don't find it Oriental. Woody I would accept. Maybe Aromatic Woody?).

Perfumes from Hermes are the only reason I step into the store, the coveted silk scarves being out of my financial reach(and seriously what would I do with them anyway? I work with spit and blood, not in Vogue) and the bags I developed a dislike to after seeing them on none too classy reality TV people. 

After much dithering, I left with both Eau des Merveilles and Elixir des Merveilles, just in time for a getaway in Bali. Perfect choices for an island holiday really. The Eau starts off with a citrus blast without smelling like dishwashing liquid, it smells like when you dig your fingernail into an orange. It's a bracing salty sweet scent, not like salted caramel but literally gourmet rock salt and a tad of something that is naturally sweet, I suspect it's a combination of the amber/elemi/fir. 

It's perfect for hot tropical weather and when feeling under the weather. Sillage is good on me but longevity I get about 4 hours tops before it pretty much disappears. Since I have a habit of lugging the SOTD around, that's not much of a problem for me. 

So post liberal spraying of Eau des Merveilles, I will make my foray out today, feeling a little more like this. Enjoy your Friday :)

Certain Uncertainties, Christian Vincent