the romance of lime

As a perfumista, someone who adores scent of all kinds, it was nearly inevitable that I would end up with a favorite citrus scent, the same way I have a favorite floral note (hyacinth, though lilac is an incredibly strong competitor), a favorite incense note (frankincense), a favorite amber contributor (labdanum), a favorite spice (nutmeg), etc etc. In the vast world of citrus flavors, for me lime stands alone among them.

Citruses are difficult to work with in terms of skin application, since the expeller-pressed versions of all of them (including bergamot) have the problem of causing phototoxicity. This means that if you wear citrus oils on your skin that have been expeller-pressed, you run the very real risk of developing sun sensitivities, from allergic rashes to extreme burns. I once developed a nasty rash from sweet orange oil I put in a lotion I used; I knew but had forgotten. My mistake.

Lime can be steam-distilled without causing the phototoxic effects, though, and the steam distillation still remains pretty true to the smell of the original rind. That's the more unique part; distillation usually alters the smell of the product. The chemical composition of lime includes substances such as A-pinene, B-pinene, myrcene, limonene, terpinolene, 1,8-ceneole, linalool, borneol, citral and traces of neral acetate and geranyl acetate. Brought to Europe by Moroccans, the little green fruit that became a mainstay of sailors and pirates then grew ubiquitous in any region with enough sun to support it. It was already a part of South American life, so when the colonials came, different varieties of limes were already there.

None of this backstory truly explains the sheer headiness of lime. Whether key lime, or persian lime, or kaffir lime, or any other regional limeyness that one can come up with, the sweetness and sheer mood-lifting properties of lime, combined with the chypre-esque qualities of this citrus over others, raises it to a nearly romantic status in my perfumer's mind. In its unisex yet sexy quality, lime doesn't strike me as native to Africa - but then again, it doesn't seem native to anywhere. It is a wanderer, a dreamer, a little fruit that would insinuate itself naturally into the cultural consciousness of many places without ever being equated with synthetic cleanliness, like lemon, or weird Hollywood diets, like grapefruit. Lime becomes part of British sailors' lore, part of the magic of ceviche soaked in lime and lemon juice in Peru and Ecuador, part of drinking Cuervo, part of Middle Eastern lime cake recipes, part of Tanzanian food in the form of lime pickles, part of American 7up.

I use lime essential oil all the time in my personal formulas, since my skin seems to love it to pieces. Lime, tea tree, and neroli combined make an extraordinary and lovely-smelling acne treatment, and I use lime as a fresh foil to peppermint and sage in my personal OMGSWEATY depths-of-summer scent, which I call Cloudgazing. It's a distinct tribute to lime that I can wear things that smell of it at any time of year.

Some lovely scents that include lime notes:

-Montale Aoud Lime
-Jo Malone Lime Basil Mandarin
-Jo Malone French Lime Blossom
-Ambra di Venezia
-Creed Virgin Island Water
-BBW Coconut Lime Verbena
-Burberry Brit
-OJ Isfarkand
-Malin+Goetz Lime Tonic
-Slatkin Persian Lime Blossom & Mimosa

What is your favorite citrus note?

one of my own

It's been an odd weather time for New Yorkers, with the days being either super-warm or slightly chilly, and the evenings being either slightly chilly or downright cold. In situations such as these, I discover that instead of reaching for a Holy Grail fragrance or an adventurous scent, I put on something I have made.

During the early spring warm vs. cold struggle, a lot of perfumes I adore don't stand up to the chemistry change. Apres L'Ondee smells too storm-chilled when it's cold; Tilleuls de Vent's tea smells too smoky if I get too warm. This is exactly the sort of thing that started me on making my own scents - I very specifically made fragrances to fill holes in my scent wardrobe.

What I've been wearing these days is my personal favorite, Grapefruit Bellini. I originally made this because most grapefruit scents turn ugly-sour on me after the first hour, but this one I can wear with ease. While grapefruit and peach don't seem to be the sort of notes that would welcome cold weather, the narcissus and vanilla provide a surprisingly decent anchor, while not becoming too overwhelming. Also, champagne and prosecco are considered all-weather wines, elegant yet still fun.

It's this sort of thing that I love about perfume - I'm distinctly an amateur, yet I choose my amateur concoction more than I would expect.

garden in sunlight - Septimanie Pavillon des Fleurs

A few weekends ago I attended Sniffapalooza, and at the event I met a great number of new people as well as reconnecting happily with older friends. I sampled a number of new perfumes, but the one that caught my nose the most was Pavillon des Fleurs from Septimanie Perfumes. Septimanie (pronounced SEPT ih MAH nee) was started by a East Coast garden designer, who was inspired by the gardens she designed.

Pavillon des Fleurs starts off as a very direct jasmine, with an undercurrent of ylang and orange blossom. It is rich and syrupy, with the heady, heavy-yet-uplifting smell of real jasmine absolute, redolent with indoles. The orange blossom and ylang which support the jasmine don't come forward too much in the beginning, though I openly admit I could not initially identify the third smell as ylang-ylang. It could be that this ylang from the Comoros, which is an island country found between Madagascar and Mozambique and southeast of the Seychelles, has a particular terroir that makes it different from the ylang I know from the Philippines. It could be that my nose is just ignorant. ;) Either way, the sweetness of the ylang mixes marvelously with the faintly citrus kick of orange blossom, and all throughout the evolution of the fragrance, these components never change. They grown fainter and meld with a base of lily of the valley, but on my skin I never smell leather or iris. To me, this is a good thing, since without them the composition seems to carry the romance of sun-warmed petals, at that moment when you close your eyes to sniff.

Another interesting thing about this fragrance is that the perfumer deliberately created it so that there's very little difference in the drydown. Jeanne Weber, the founder of Septimanie, informed me that she desired that from the start - she didn't want to smell like something else three hours later. Considering this fragrance is all about a garden and how it would smell, I would have to agree with her. The flowers chosen don't change their smells over the course of a few hours; why should the scent?

However, now that I've had several applications of the scent, what I find most interesting about it is that the smell is somewhat different depending on whether you dab it from a vial or spray it on. I found that both on the blotter and on my skin, two things change. When sprayed, the ylang is slightly less sweet, and the lily of the valley tends to meld into the shadows - when you dab, the ylang is much sweeter initially, and the lily of the valley shows up after fifteen minutes as though you're sitting on a bench a few feet from a cluster of them. I definitely prefer the scent sprayed, since it comes across more subtly without sacrificing elegance or romance.

For those of you who love packaging, the square flacon has a lovely heft to it and looks quite elegant. All in all, this perfume is a gorgeous spring and summer keeper. You can order this online from aedes.com, or at Takashimaya in Manhattan.

so I have a review to write for Royal Port -

...which is a lovely scent, but I feel a bit uncomfortable posting it because I can't link to the perfumer, and know naught of him but his name and his Basenotes ID. Basenotes isn't giving me my password clearance, et cetera ad nauseum... so if anyone reading is on the basenotes.com forums and knows of James who formulates, can you tell him to give me a holler?

Thanks much, in advance.

pleasure in green - new October release from L'Artisan

I had the distinct pleasure of finding out that my favorite perfume house is releasing a new fragrance in October... and, courtesy of Sniffapalooza, I was able to sniff it today!

Eau de Liane is another Bertrand Duchaufour composition, this time inspired by travels in Panama. L'Artisan president Francois Duquesne, who was in town and hung out in the Soho store this afternoon, was terribly generous and allowed me to sniff it on a blotter. I was impressed - it's a lovely, rich, deep green scent, lush with vines, some crisp fruit notes akin to starfruit, and a distinct kelp-ish scent that reminds me of ocean minerals. The oceanic notes are not mariney - there's a certain height to the scent that reminds me a little bit of the afterscent of bleach, but doesn't have the same solventish quality.

I've written to the company for a list of notes; I was so smitten with it on the strip that I completely neglected to ask. You'll see me, Miss Purple Hair, haunting the Soho store come October, that's for sure!

this perfumista's Spring Top 5

Ah goodness, it is now officially spring in NYC! I climbed a tree tonight - sometimes I swear I will never grow up - and had my hair played with by the wind. I love the city during this season.

Inspired by a recent post on For The Love Of Perfume, I went back over all the perfumes I had, looking at all the scents I usually wear for spring. I'm a fairly scattered person when it comes to fragrance (though I tend to prefer the word "dilettante" over "scattered"), so it's difficult to narrow down a spring versus summer fragrance. For instance, I'm desperately in love with L'Artisan's Verte Violette, but would that count as a spring or a summer scent? Violets tend to be associated with spring, but the scent is so lovely I wear it all the time once the weather warms. Therefore, I can't call it a strictly spring scent. So I had to set some rules for myself:

-It has to be a fragrance I wear mostly during the timeframe of end-March to late-June.
-It has to be something I wear regularly, not just love once, swoon madly, and then put away.
-It has to be something I've actually purchased from someplace, rather than acquired as a decant.

And with that, the list assembled itself nicely.

5) Lagerfeld's Sun Moon Stars

No, I am not ashamed of this - I do love it for spring. With its musk-and-sandalwood base, it's better on me than Kenzo Flower yet still has the same powder and violet topnote nature. Definitely not as thick as a jasmine and narcissus scent would imply.

4) Fresh Sugar

Not Sugar Blossom, or Sugar Lemon, or any other old or new variety of sugar-whatsits. Fresh Sugar is stunning citrus and sugar with a faint hitch of spice. I love this stuff so much in spring that I've gone through two 1.7 oz bottles of it. Granted, my skin drinks perfume, but still...

3) elizabeth W Hyacinth

Oh, I have been hoarding this ever since I discovered that they're no longer making it. It is, literally, the best soliflore I know. Blue and green and syrup-floral and sharpgreen and... *exhales happily*

2) L'Artisan Tilleuls Au Vent

I know most people don't include room sprays in lists such as these, but I did purchase this strictly to wear as a spring scent. It's lovely and light green, with the uniqueness of greenish floral over the faintest lemon peel and pekoe notes.

1) Guerlain Apres L'Ondee

I want to wear this all the time. I want to take it out in summer and fall. But you know, it just doesn't seem right anytime else. The slightly ozonic nature, the vaguely wet-pavement smell over the violets? It truly is the best spring fragrance I own. Which is good for me, because I own a LOT of it. ;)

~ * ~ * ~

Now I'm curious - what are other people's all time favorite spring scents?

the beautiful devotee - Andy Tauer's Incense Rose

caveat: it's a long story before you get to the review. I had a hard time making my impressions contextual without it.

People all around the world seek spiritual meaning in many different ways. This is the reason why Scientology flourishes, and why Kabbalah is so popular, and why many in the Western world switch from Christianity to Buddhism or vice versa. Imposing reason and pattern on our lives is a common journey in the selfhood of so many - it's an intrinsic part of humanity's desire to make sense of the story.

Back in my early 20s, I was on the verge of losing the faith I'd assembled for myself, and was casting about for something to fill the growing unease. My roommate was, at the time, very interested in the ashram of Sathya Sai Baba. I went with her on several occasions to observe and participate in the Hindu rituals focused on this man, and while I never had any particular spiritual feelings for him, I definitely enjoyed sitting and singing with these lovely and gentle people.

During the rituals, it was common to bring flowers and fruit to place on the altar. Roses were the most common flower brought, and some of the roses were exquisitely perfumed. Also, Nag Champa incense was burned - for those who don't know, the Nag Champa incense in the blue box, which many Western people burn, is from Sai Baba's ashram. My roommate and I had a friendship with a particular woman from this group, and so would frequently sit with her. She nearly always brought blood oranges to offer, and wore rose oil of a kind that matched yet never blended with the altar flowers. She had the faintest smell of neem in her hair but never in an unpleasant way. During the singing, she would sway back and forth with her eyes closed, and I always remembered how wonderful she looked and smelled, even while sweating in the summer heat.

This olfactory image is what Incense Rose brings to me. The beautiful woman, anointed and surrounded by incense, unaware of anything else but her devotion.

The clementine and rose in this composition state themselves clearly, but are never overbearing because the notes of cedar and frankincense measure themselves out over the entire life of the fragrance like clapping hands marking time. The orris is incredibly subtle on me, and the bergamot burning I'm so used to does come across on me like that faint whiff of neem. The sweetness of the labdanum is barely detectable, but if you breathe deeply, you can smell it limning the boughs of the cedar.

Incense Rose lasts for a good 10 hours on me, and doesn't change all that much over time. However, I have to remind everyone that my skin pulls cedar out and turns bergamot into burning, so on another's skin it would develop differently.

This is a very strong, lingering scent, but it isn't fierce - it has the serenity of a voice contributing to a chorus. The volume of the voice isn't as important as the fact that it harmonizes in such a spiritual fashion with everything around it.

the flutter wars - phase 1

In order to really give everyone an idea of where my preferences lie when it comes to mascara, I thought I would show an set of visual comparisons for two of the mascaras I mentioned in my initial flutter wars post. For the first two photos, I'm posting crops from a single picture, so you can see things with the same light and exposure (no image alteration aside from slight sharpening). The last one is a separate picture, done about 15 minutes later - this one with no image alteration whatsoever.

This is my right eye, unadorned. No makeup has been placed on this eye whatsoever. I feel lucky that my lashes have a natural darkness and enough of a curl to play with, so I don't need to struggle with eyelash curlers or any such thing. Because my lashes are already reasonably thick, I don't pay attention to a mascara that promises thickening - I'm mostly interested in length or flash. Usually base coats increase thickness, so I only try them as a curiosity.

This is my left eye with two coats (well, honestly, one and a half) of MAC Pro LongLash on the top lashes. No other makeup has been applied. You can see that the lashes are both lengthened and separated, with the tiniest ball on the end of some of the lashes. It's not dramatic, but for a staple I don't particularly need dramatic. So for a score on this one, on a scale of 1 to 10 for each aspect, I give it:

Endurance - 9
Look - 7
Feel - 6
Flutter Factor - 7

I think I'll call it the ELFF score from now on, and will grade all my makeup that way. ;) Also, I am always pleased to note that the length and color still matches well with my lower lashes, which is crucial - my lower lashes are significantly longer than they seem, and so I hardly ever put anything on them. After all, I am not really interested in looking like Alex from A Clockwork Orange.


With this in mind, I'll present my right eye again, now adorned in the DuWop Lash Lacquer. This photo was taken literally a minute after application, so everyone knows what I'm actually after in a mascara.

This is a single coat of mascara and a single application of topcoat to my top lashes only. No other makeup has been applied. If you take a close look, you can see that the DuWop gives a visual illusion of changing the angle of my lash curl for my mid-lid lashes, as well as doing additional lengthening and pretty kick-ass separating, without the nearly-invisible ball that the LongLash places at the end. I like how soft and glossy they look at the ends - not like the slightly sooty look I get with LongLash. A second coat of mascara would make the lashes look quite thicker at the ends, but would still keep that elegant sweeping point that I find so appealing.

The DuWop look is what I'm after in a mascara, but sadly, in about an hour the mascara that is covering the ends of the lashes will start to flake away, shortening the look. Before 4 hours are up, it will end up looking like a low-rent version of the LongLash - which, since it's more expensive than the LongLash [$19 versus $11], makes it additionally annoying. ELFF:

Endurance - 4
Look - 9
Feel - 7
Flutter Factor - 7

~ * ~ * ~

Here are the mascaras that I'm planning on trying:

Cargo SupersEyes
Sue Devitt Microquatic Luxury Lash
Smashbox Bionic mascara (the squalene claim in the ingredients list made me nervous, but I skin-tested this without poor effect, so I'm fairly hopeful.)
YSL Faux Cils (per PerfumeShrine's suggestion!)

and on the drugstore end:

Maybelline Lash Discovery
Rimmel Extra Super Lash
Rimmel Lycra Lash Extender

any others people would suggest I look into? Nothing with any hydrogenated anything, if possible. ;)

kissing the dirt* - Nasomatto Absinth

I'll start off this post by saying that I am not a fan of vetiver. When it's one smaller component in a larger, complex composition, I feel it works extremely well: for instance, in Tauer's L'Air du Desert Marocain, Lutens' Iris Silver Mist, or Montale's Blue Amber. However, when vetiver is a major facet of the composition, well... let's just say I don't feel it. To me it smells like dirt. Not spring earth, wet wood and loam, like Iris Silver Mist does, but just... dirt.

Enter, with flourish, Nasomatto Absinth.

This is a very intriguing scent, to me. It does still smell like dirt, particularly on a blotter, but on the skin the herbs come out to give it a much cleaner aspect. It took me a while to figure out what kind of engagement in dirt would still smell so clean. Somewhat sweet but still greenish, quite fresh, very reminiscent of something I used to do as a child. Mudpies? No, it's too clean and sweetish for that. Too young; scroll forward.

*cue visual of tape fast forwarding*

It took me forever, but I finally did figure it out. When I wear this perfume, I am back to pulling Queen Anne's Lace out of the herb garden. Since Queen Anne's Lace is related to carrot the root of that plant smells like a cross between carrot and parsnip, and once I thought of how parsnips smell when you cut them out of the garden, I had Absinth's sweetness pegged. And as for the herbs, any child will tell you that sometimes, when weeding, they'll inadvertently pull one of the tomato plants or the tarragon seedlings out.

The flowers of Queen Anne's Lace themselves have a sweet, creamy yet strongly rubbery scent, and when the flower curls up into the nest boles, the plant and seeds have a particularly pungent dusty green smell. This is, I believe, what the perfumer is trying to pass off as the absinthe, but the smell of the Artemisia thujones in absinthe is far, far different. Thujones are related to camphor, and in taste are deeply bitter. There is nothing as sinus-clearing or bitter about this smell; it's definitely more playful and energetic, utterly ignoring absinthe's piercing hypnoticness.

All in all, while I can't think of this scent as an absinthe perfume, it is a fantastic rendition of vetiver that makes it accessible to even me. It's not an everyday fragrance, but without question a lovely rare unisex perfume.


* all credit goes to INXS for the title
Queen Anne's Lace photo courtesy of University of Auburn

the flutter wars - grading mascaras

I'd like to take a break from reviewing perfumes for a second (Nasomatto Absinth is next) and talk about a recent obsession of mine - the alteration of eyelashes. I've been judging my mascaras based on what I now call the "flutter factor," which is a subjective opinion on how noticeable certain expressions of mine are. As I am a nearly irrepressible flirt sometimes, the flutter factor is important to me.

Now, I'm well aware that my eyelashes, unadorned, are Just Fine. They're dark, they have natural curl, and they're a decent length. That said, when I use certain mascaras, my eyes just... pop. The length and curl accents the shape and color of my eyes so well that it completely changes my look and the impact of my expressions, and it's such an easy thing to do.

It's been fascinating because while I really love the DuWop Lash Lacquer, I've finally noticed that it changes during the day. It looks intense and marvelous when I first put it on, but after a few hours I'm back to looking - well, like myself without makeup, honestly. With Estee Lauder's More Than Mascara and MAC's Pro Longlash, I've got really lovely lashes (of two different types) that stay lovely for hours and hours... and I'm not allergic to them. Neither of them give me lashes as striking and gorgeous initially, but skin temperament and staying power are both really more important.

Keep in mind that these three were my go-tos after about a year and a half of experimentation. I've tried Blinc Kiss Me and was unimpressed - yes, the tubes were neat, but it did nothing for my lashes whatsoever. I also didn't care for Benefit BADgal, which didn't want to stay on me. I am now nearly obsessed with finding a mascara which can make my lashes look as gorgeous as the DuWop without departing like Cinderella. I'm thinking of trying Diorshow, but the ingredient list makes me nervous. Cargo Superseyes is on my must-try list, and Sue Devitt Microquatic Luxury Lash is on my skin test list, as I am not sure how I'll react to ozokerite (though I don't anticipate any problems).

If I was a smarter person, I'd do a proper test. I'd start taking photographs of my eyes, before and after each application, so I - or anyone else - could look at them with a more objective viewpoint later. I could then grade them on look, feel, endurance, and flutter factor, and come up with a cheat sheet. As it stands now, I'm too aware that the more burden I put on testing these things, the less likely I am to finish. So for now, I'll just write up each mascara as it comes up, and do a summation at the end.

Colette's powder puff - Annick Goutal's Ambre Fetiche

I had never considered myself a true amber lover, since I'm not at all a fan of the sugary-sweeter ambers, such as L'Artisan's L'Eau D'Ambre, Jalaine Amber, L'Occitane Amber etc. L'Artisan's Ambre Extreme and Montale's Blue Amber, with their more woody, burning brazier character, are the ambers I enjoy and wear regularly. I even consider Blue Amber to be close to the ever-evasive "Holy Grail" scent for me. Therefore, since I always considered myself an incense fan, I assumed that more incense-y ambers were far more my style - resinous ambers are what make my heart flutter, not the more vanilla-sweet ambers.

I might have to reconsider that notion, upon smelling the development of Ambre Fetiche on me. (again, accent removed for sensitive RSS feeds.) At first, the first notes were a bit of a distraction. On a blotter there's a strong iodine smell and a distinct swabbing alcohol scent, as though they used a weird denaturing element in the SD alcohol. There's also that fun new-car leather smell, which fades relatively quickly. On me, the first blast is of almost synthetic sweetness, coupled with a Band-Aid fragrance that is the fatal flaw of certain leather accords. It runs nearly immediately into the traditional benzoin-iodine smell reminiscent of Betadine hospital wash. However, within a few minutes I was out of the hospital and something romantic yet fairly subversive was happening on my skin.

Maybe it's due to the labdanum and styrax in it; maybe it's the lightening factor of earth-powder orris. Maybe it's the deepening of the leather accord in the base; I'm not really sure. What I am sure of is that after 15 minutes, the sweetness in this blend isn't obtrusive or overpowering - the almost tacky innocence of syrup-sweet amber grows up in a hurry. The powder and leather notes mix with the labdanum, styrax, frankincense and vanilla in such a way that you know the fetish indicated is not involved in lust but in love; somewhere between incense and amber, the fragrance seeks more than a single base interaction.

After an hour on my skin, the scent turns into a laudanum-laced powder, giving impressions of being dusted on with grace before donning whatever outfit would cause the latest whispering. In further-gone days, the armor of a woman was her makeup, and even those who flouted tradition and created scandals would wear it. As I was gathering impressions, Colette came to mind instantly, for her straightforward approach to life and her almost endearing desire to be loved. The sweetness here invokes romance, not innocence.

Both on the blotter and on my skin, this is a bedroom scent without being skanky or bombshell about it. It is a sweet amber without syrup on me, indulgent without being decadent, comforting without being cozy. While it doesn't unseat my other two favorite ambers, it easily ousts a great many "scents I shall wear while courting."

photo courtesy of marcelproust.it

the getaway car - Serge Lutens' Tubereuse Criminelle

anyone who has driven with me knows how much i love the smell of gasoline. therefore, when i read over at Bois de Jasmin that the top notes were reminiscent of gasoline and menthol, i was excited. it took me three years to acquire some of this, and now that i have, there's a whole slew of impressions that go with it.

my first blast, i was expecting tuberose with a cold rubber note, laced with petrol. boy, was i disappointed. a tobacco note drenched with supersaturated tuberose greeted me, with a faint human-sweet spiciness underlying it. most people know the smell of that spiciness, though they don't usually acknowledge it: it's the smell of hair unwashed for a day - the smell of a lover's discarded shirt; the one that you treasure as their absence turns from hours into days. it's hard to get past the supersaturated tuberose, though... the initial blast gives me a faint headache.

i toughed it out, though, and after an hour and a half, underneath the mellowing tuberose there was something unusual. something metallic. something akin to - the smell of opening cans. was it combined with... was that gunpowder? sure enough, a chalky sulfurous note combined with the smell of hot cut metal, binding down the tuberose and tobacco smoke into a more complex, "it's America in midsummer, we're in the deep South, and we're loading the cannons now" kind of smell.

when you add the vivacity of the name, it has a serious Bonnie (of Clyde fame) vibe going on. on my skin, it isn't until another hour later that the smell of gasoline comes through to me, making everything into a straightforward exploration of the moll, smoking hand-rolled cigarettes in the getaway car before loading her gun, getting her heist partner out of there, shooting out the window and screeching away in a hail of police gunfire. sure, i'm overly poetic, but it really does have a 50s crime serials, smoking-blonde sense to it. when i was younger, i had a fondness for a Ms. magazine collection of old 40s-50s Wonder Woman comics. her archenemy Doctor Psycho (z-z-z-zut!) had, at one point, a gorgeous blonde ally. it is her that i think of, squinting one eye against a curling plume of cigarette smoke, when i think of the progression of this scent.

all told, this isn't the scent for me. it's too deliberately provocative; too direct in its effort to seduce and depart. but it is a gorgeous and fascinating scent, and i can understand why it is legendary and loved.

the return of Skin

while my allergies aren't completely gone, i am no longer walking around with horrid bare patches in my body's largest organ. therefore, tonight and for the next couple of days i'll be putting up reviews again!