Champaca Absolute Tom Ford

Source: irecommend.ru

Although I agree with the general consensus that the perfumes are well-made and smell expensive, I like but do not feel the need to have most of the fragrances I've tried from Tom Ford except for a few that include Champaca Absolute from the Private Blend range. It's probably down to chemistry but where many get all sorts of dirty business with Black Orchid all I get is floral talcum powder and perhaps Noir de Noir would have been more attractive in 2007 than when I first smelt it in 2012 along with other versions of the same song Rose-Patchouli. 

Champaca Absolute has a short spurt of dark booziness when first applied before turning sweet and sheer with floral notes of magnolia (with its usual creamy thickness stripped away), violet and the smell of a newly ripened banana with no black spots marring its pristine yellow colour as yet. The freshness gradually slips away and leaves a dusty layer over the flowers and fruit (well just the banana that is) with a scattering of new wood shavings on top. It doesn't get any darker than this and remains like a gauzy veil wrapped around you for about six hours or so. Overall I find it original, bright and leaning on the feminine side of the scale. 

PHI Une Rose de Kandahar Tauer

Source: Luckyscent

I can now spray my Tauer PHI without worrying that I will run out anytime soon, when I noticed that it was back on the market and labelled a "limited release" I broke my no-buy rule and snapped one up, having been a miser with my 15 ml from an explorer set purchased in 2013. 

I love how my perspective of scents have changed from when I first got into my perfume obsession. I put it down to experience, having smelt more and learning to identify notes and their variations/combinations and still getting them wrong, re-discovering old loves and ending/starting relationships when I find a different side to them that I didn't notice/understand before. 

When I first wore PHI a year ago, I could only appreciate it as a salty musky rose, a beautiful one at that but I missed out on the rest of PHI until recently when we got re-acquainted. The opening is sour and sparkling citrus that does a quick pirouette and exits, making way for a fuzzy complex rose, made up of powdery notes, a soft and demure fruity non-screechy rose, salty musk and a light bitter almond which is similar to the almond in loukoum scents like Serge Lutens' Rahat Loukoum but it does not turn PHI into a gourmand. Fuzzy like a long-haired cat is the vibe I get from PHI. Further along the day, I smell incense and spices but at a muted volume, not like in previous Tauer creations. 

Andy Tauer wrote in his blog that the formula for PHI remains unchanged and I would agree that both my bottles smell the same. A rose like no other. 

Gardez Moi Jovoy

Source: www.nobaharshop.com

Gardez Moi. Keep me.

The name was the first thing that appealed to my romantic sensibilities and since it was touted to be a big fat white floral (BFWF) of which I am a huge fan, I went for a blind buy. No regrets. 

Gardez Moi is indeed a BFWF, not as grandiose as Fracas and obviously without tuberose, not creamy and fruity sweet like my other BFWF love, the intoxicating Isabey's Fleur Nocturne and although a classy white floral of tuberose/jasmine/gardenia, Estee Lauder's Private Collection Tuberose Gardenia was too light and straightforward for me and got swapped away. 

Gardez Moi is an enormous bouquet of freshly cut white florals, as if they have been brought in from a dew-laden garden that's just waking up. The opening is all about outdoorsy, words like "crisp", "green", "watery" come to mind. The aldehydes that enter after the white floral notes enhance the brightness with their powdery green citrus smell, giving Gardez Moi a vintage air. 

The base is a delicately powdered balmy musk, smelling faintly as if just a memory of the young and boisterous white florals.   

Bambolina Hilde Soliani

Desirability: Decant

Juicy and bright, Bambolina smells youthful and is radiant with good health. 

Crochet wig. Source: http://www.hiddeninfrance.typepad.com/

I scoffed when I read the listed notes for Bambolina, what on earth are aquatic fruit? Sea coconuts? Now I know and no it's not sea coconuts. Bambolina smells...watery. It's as if you took some fresh fruit (juicy cherries front and centre), crispy greens and citruses, sliced them up and immersed them in iced water, letting their juices diffuse and create a delicious thirst-quencher.

I was puzzled when i smelt roses when there aren't any listed. Luckily my nose isn't wrong, it's the cherry blossom note. I was 3 years old when I enjoyed my first and since then last, Hanami in Japan so I won't be a reliable source for how cherry blossoms smell. However, Google says that cherry blossoms smell green and fresh with a similarity to roses. Puzzle solved.

The inspiration for Bambolina was purportedly a walk in the middle of June when a shower of rain caused Hilde Soliani to seek cover under a cherry tree.  This scent replicates that scene to a T, from the brilliant sunshine, the cooling raindrops trickling down, the smell of the fruit on the tree and the faint muskiness that rises off skin in humidity. Sheer bliss!

This elixir of relaxation does not project much but has excellent longevity. Another for the wish list!

Isparta 26 Parfumerie Generale

Isparta opens up with piquant red berries and sweet jammy roses that remind me of PG's Brulure de Rose or Tauer's Une Rose Vermeille. The sweetness level is up there with Juliette Has A Gun's Miss Charming, fruity rosy sweetness...like Montale's Roses Elixir but edit out the citrus opening and swap the strawberries for tangy red berries. Ok the resemblances stop there.

The bright sweetness dissipates quite quickly on me and Isparta takes an abrupt turn down the earthy, herbaceous path where it's darker, patchouli and oud being responsible for the change of mood. It's not all gloom and doom with the warm, jammy rose still going strong. It reminds me a lot of Ex Idolo's Thirty-three with the rose/patch/oud combination but the rose in Thirty-three is very much darker than in Isparta where it smells...pinkish-red? In Thirty-three the rose makes me think of dark almost black red roses, goth roses. The oud does not have the synthetic vibe some other "ouds" have, but it lacks the thick, oiliness I enjoy (that being said, even authentic oud has many different odours just as wines have bouquets).

Daiquiri

I enjoy the quick turnabout that Isparta took, from the initial cutie Strawberry Shortcake character type before fast forwarding ten years when Strawberry Shortcake got some tattoos and attitude. The scent projects in a major fashion on me even from a dab sample and it lasted the whole night into the morning and still going strong.

The rose is less syrupy sweet than Brulure de Rose or Une Rose Vermeille were on me and definitely has more character than the sweet and simple Miss Charming. Like others from the PG line, Isparta obviously comes from good stock but if we talk about interesting...the abrupt mood swing is about the only major difference that sets Isparta apart from other rose/oud/patchoulis.