Fidelis Histoires de Parfums

Desirability: Full bottle

Source: Fragrantica.

Not a scent for the fainthearted.

Fidelis is a heavy hitter from the very first spray. I tend to overspray with hefty pumps thanks to my slight anosmia secondary to chronic allergic rhinitis, but with Fidelis I am cautious not to go above two gentle sprays or else I run the risk of engulfing everyone else around me with its monster projection.

Many if not all houses from niche to mainstream seem to have done a rose/oud/patchouli combination by now and we perfume lovers have one if not several favorites from the glut of choice available. Some of us may even be fatigued by it! Enter Fidelis and a break with tradition. 

Unabashedly loud, almost brash, Fidelis is nothing like the smooth, romantic rose/oud combinations I lean towards. THIS is oud. Upon application, this giant of a scent is almost unbearably bitter with a medicinal oud so thick you could imagine cutting the air in front of you with a knife. Saffron, cardamom and cumin are looted from the spice cupboard and applied with a liberal hand. Their spicy harmony provides a dry, crisp respite (a breath of spicily fresh air literally) from the majestic oud. Patchouli enfolds you in its warm familiar vegetal sweetness, somewhat akin to rolling around on damp forest ground. Rose neither delicate nor syrupy blends a floral theme into the bold and earthy mixture and I suspect allows for my more feminine tastes to better enjoy Fidelis. 

An Original in a sea of rose-ouds which takes you on an endless and passionate journey. Fidelis is not a scent I frequently reach for, as truthfully I find it a tad too demanding for my sensibilities for a regular fixture but on the days I want complexity as well as a major case of intensity with my roses, this is a good one. 

Rose Nacrée du Désert Guerlain (Les Déserts d'Orient)

Desirability: Decant

Source: whatmenshouldsmelllike.com

A oud/rose/patch combo that went through finishing school.

Most perfume lovers are well acquainted with rose/oud/patchouli combinations from the coarse to the refined- well at least perfume lovers who have little or no aversion to oud. Guerlain's offering Rose Nacrée du Désert rests on a throne along with the upper crust. I'm biased where Guerlain is concerned, if Guerlain made it, it's well-made be it the revered classics or the newer offerings. I don't  necessarily like all that the house produces, for example the biggest strike out would be Chypre Fatal, however the quality is evident in all of them.

Rose Nacrée du Désert like a generous bosom barely restrained by its corset, spills over with luscious rose blooms, flooding the senses with their heady sweet smell. Dry sweet saffron, a non too pungent oud, earthy patchouli and a warm resinous base complete this well-rounded and sophisticated fragrance. It hints of rugged beginnings that were polished over centuries like the lineage of a self-made family that became "respectable" with time and money.

Rose Nacrée du Désert is undeniably luxurious and alluring. If I didn't already have a few too many rose/patchouli/oud combinations or if I had unlimited perfume funds, I would consider adding this to my perfume wardrobe. Still there's always birthdays and holidays!

Bois Satin Keiko Mecheri

Desirability: Adoption by a more appreciative nose

Source: www.basenotes.net

Syrupy leather.

I get boozed up syrupy sweet fruit followed by the smell of wood which is quickly followed by a smooth sweet leathery smell. Leather in fruit syrup may sound weird but that's what I think of in the drydown of Bois Satin. The wood notes that were present at the opening are nowhere to be found, probably fell victim to deforestation. I enjoy leather scents like Les Exclusifs de Chanel Cuir de Russie, Cuir Mauresque by Serge Lutens and I don't mind gourmand leathers like Dzing! by L`Artisan but Bois Satin doesn't rest easy on my stomach, I find the proportions of leather and fruit syrup too jarring here and frankly it makes me queasy. 

Average projection but longevity isn't the greatest, I clocked a maximum of four hours with two wearings. 

Daimiris Laboratorio Olfattivo

Desirability: Full bottle

Source: Fragrantica

March 2015 is my month for "Eat, Pray, Love". I can't remember the last time I was off for a whole month. Since I'm between jobs I decided to run away from my tropical home to the other side of the world with little stops on the way. Packing for a month especially when one is going to experience all four seasons through that month is no joke and in order to keep my luggage weight reasonable, I obviously had to tone down on the perfume bottles. The problem is when one has so much choice and favourites it gets difficult to choose ONE, I know, first world problems right? Anyway in the end my scent of the moment Daimiris got to come on my soul searching trip. My arguments for choosing Daimiris were as follows.

Spicy and warm, the smell of cardamom and saffron is unmistakeable in the dusty and earthy opening of Daimiris. Beneath the spices you have a blast of heady booze and rich leather, all perfectly proportioned with no rough edges. When I first tried Daimiris while in a hurry a few months back, I could not make out the candy note and vowed to go back for a more leisurely second try and voila! The "daim candy" note is so yummy and true to the taste of the crunchy chocolate almond candy but despite the candy note, Daimiris is not all that sweet and I would say it is more of a spicy oriental than a gourmand. Iris which gave the dusty and earthy/rooty effect of the opening is very much present in the drydown showing its buttery side, saffron prevailing till the end with a subtly sweet amber and an animalic musk contributing to the happy coziness that is Daimiris. Despite all its richness, I find Daimiris to be more of an alluring reddish-gold silk than a thick blanket of spicy warmth.

So gourmand + musky + oriental. It has a few of my favourite things, good projection and longevity and is one of those well-rounded and charming fragrances that you can wear anywhere, even on long haul flights without invading the personal space of the person in the seat next to you. Into my bag it went, wrapped in my wool scarf for insurance against baggage handlers using my luggage for discus practice. 

PG21 Felanilla Parfumerie Generale

Desirability: Decant

Source: bloomperfume.co.uk

This smells good. This smells like the badass biker sibling to Guerlain's Shalimar (which is what heaven might smell like in my opinion) whose leather note escaped me time and time again. If not a Hell's Angel in leather well then this sibling keeps a zoo of exotic animals. 

Sweet vanilla, powdery iris and leathery spicy saffron greet my nose upon application but the saffron eases up with time and the leathery and spicy effects slip away. Dusting off the powdery notes by the drydown, Felanilla gives the sensation of cottony soft vanilla clouds all puffed up against a blue sky on a warm dry day, with a background of honeyed wood notes. A lovely woody vanilla as a finale with a far more exciting introduction, I only wish that the sillage could be beefed up so that it is more than a skin scent from the word "go". Felanilla reminds me a little of PG 14 Iris Taizo which is an interesting spiced honeyed wood instead of woody vanilla and in the introduction you have cardamom in place of saffron. 

Daphne Comme des Garcons

Daphne Guinness collaborated with Comme des Garcons and released her signature fragrance in 2009, which she described as a "battle of contradictions". A battle or a bottle of contradictions? 

The description on the Comme des Garcons website is as such: "The fragrance DAPHNE gleans images from childhood memories in gardens, family houses and mysterious church rituals of an imaginative young girl."

Official listed notes lifted off the CDG page are: Bitter orange from Sicily, Incense, Saffron, Rose centifolia, Tunisian jasmine, Tuberose from India, Florentine iris, Indonesian patchouli, Oud wood, Amber, Vanilla from Madagascar. 

Comme des Garcons is all about the artsy and the experimental, from fashion to fragrances. As much as I like quirky, the clothing isn't wearable in my line of work nor does it quite gel with my personality i.e I'm not fashionably flexible enough. So I content myself with their their radical line of scents instead. My first ever CDG take home was their first and eponymous fragrance which has a very spicy and resinous unisex personality.

Daphne lives up to her name and the brand she is part of. I've admired Daphne Guinness for being fashionably eccentric and carrying it off with insouciance that cannot just be copied. It's something you are born with. Read more here. She's witty and I enjoy reading her quips. She was once quoted saying, "Nothing terrifies me more than being social."- ditto here. Other quotes I enjoy:

" I spend alot of time upside down. It increases the blood flow to the brain, so it really helps your creativity."

"Life is full of banana skins. You slip, you carry on."

So back to the scent. Bittersweet, more bitter than sweet, like the taste of Hédiard's bitter orange marmalade. A leathery, dusty saffron opens the scent with heady tuberose and spicy, smoky incense. They are followed by a metallic, powdery iris and an earthy patchouli. I smell the patchouli more obviously as time passes and it's paired with the oud, that's perceptible but not overpowering.

Daphne is elegantly dark and intoxicating on me, an interesting and unique take on one of my favorite flowers, here matching the narcotic white flower with equally potent partners, such that this tuberose scent is not just attractive, but intriguing as well.

Sillage and longevity are very good.

Mnemosyne was an art video created and directed by Daphne Guinness to accompany the perfume Daphne, a Web-released "anti-ad". 

A little trivia: Mnemosyne was the Greek goddess of memory and remembrance.  Memories are the influences behind the creation of Daphne, which was born from a personal blend she made out of tuberose, incense and oud. The tuberose and cedar take her back to her mother's garden in Cadaques, Spain, the incense sparks visions of High Church rituals during childhood and the oud speaks to her sense of adventure. 

"Fragrance takes you on a journey of time. You can walk down the street and pass someone and get taken back 20 years. It's very Proustian that way."- Daphne Guinness.

Calligraphy Rose Aramis

I was attracted first by the notes, then the positive reviews it has garnered and the cherry on top would be the reasonable online prices. I bought a split from a perfume friend and it is now on my perfume wish list.

It opens tart and sweet, fresh dewy roses with green notes. This phase lasted a good 15 minutes to half hour on me before the scent shows its oriental nature, introducing sweet resins, a little dark and smoky here and a spicy, dry dustiness from the saffron.

If there is ambergris in Calligraphy Rose it's synthetic, considering how rare and expensive the real stuff is. Here it's emulating the white kind, there's no barnyard funk here, just a marine like salty sweetness that reminds me a little of Hermes' Eau des Merveilles..

The rose remains all the way through, its scent deep and intensive. The scent projects very well and the longevity is superb, it outdoes many of its more expensive competitors. I highly recommend.

Dries Van Noten par Frederic Malle

This smells like Christmas in a bottle. Well parts of Christmas anyway, like logs blazing in the fireplace (the pyromaniac in me enjoyed watching wood burning on the grate), eggnog generously laced repeatedly by forgetful grandmothers and naughty teenagers and spiced christmas pudding with its dark sugar-glazed surface. 

Spiced Eggnog Cupcake

Dries Van Noten par Frederic Malle is a delicious not quite dessert but a woody gourmand if that is feasible. The musk is present but not prominent like it is in Musc Ravageur, it's slightly powdery but the main players are the sweet spicy vanilla and the creamy sandalwood with a sweet earthy patchouli presenting itself in the drydown, all the ingredients making this not an unusual scent per se, but an interesting vanilla scent with a definite woody-oriental character.  

Eggnog Latte

Although I don't take seasons/weather into account(how could I when most of the year I spend it on this tropical city island where the weather is hot and humid or hot, humid and wet) when I choose a fragrance to wear, I would suggest that Dries Van Noten par Frederic Malle would be sublime in colder weather where the spices come out and play, rather than on a hot day where I fear the sweetness would be overdoing things and masking the scent's true character. It's perfect for cuddling on a sofa, it's as comforting as Linus' stinky blanket is to him, it's as soothing as the purring of my cat against my skin and totally disarming if wearing to work or play. 

It leaves a gossamer of a scent veil around me and( I don't usually get compliments on my scents not because I stink but well...I just don't. But I do not stink. This is however one of the scents that has garnered compliments) people ask what is that delightful/delectable/yummy smell? The sad part is that it does not last long, I don't get more than four hours each time I wear this and even then it's very much a skin scent. Still I couldn't resist this sumptuous fragrance and sprung for the 3x10ml travel sprays so that it's easier to lug around for touch ups.