Scentzilla!

Here are a few of my favorite product discoveries of 2006. Some have been around for quite a while, and most are (shockingly! gasp!) not even perfumes. (I’ll get a seperate best of list up for this year’s releases later on, but I wanted to play with all the other cool kids for the “favorite things” posts.)

Rubis Tweezers have to be my top product find of the year. I was formerly a true-blue Tweezerman gal, but find these just a smidge better. They grasp those fine stray eyebrow hairs well, and… they also yank out this cluster of three dark hairs, which grow on my chin with alarming regularity. I call them my Three Billy Goat Hairs Gruff. I. hate. them. so. much. I know this sort of surprise facial hair attack happens to all ladies as they get older, but I refuse to go down without a fight. The Rubis gets them right as they’re “sprouting,” so that the only other person who realizes I have chin hairs is the doppelganger who lives in my mirror. Is this all too much information? Yes, it probably is. But that’s why it’s getting my thumbs up.

Armani Code body lotion smells fanatastic. I fell in love with the Le Couvant des Minimes Orange Blosssom Body Cream earlier this year, but that’s already disappeared from the Bath and Body Works shelves, so this is a great alternative. The Code body lotion fragrance also emphasizes a predominate orange blossom note, and has a nice medium weight texture that should be suitable for all but the very driest of skin types. The aroma of the lotion is more delicate than that of the Code eau de parfum, and should be tried seperately as its own product, rather than being lumped in as an ancillary to it.

This is not one of my finds, but rather one of my husband’s product discoveries this year: Korres body wash in Cedar. The Korres body washes aren’t oriented to either men or women as a line, but Cedar has a nice deep woody and musky scent that appeals to masculine noses. It is only $11 a bottle, which also appeals to my husbands desire to be a cheapskate without actually being a cheapskate. (His beloved Pi body wash is $20, so this seems like a compartive bargain. He’s not really good at being a cheapskate, obviously, or he’d be buying the two for a dollar bars at the Dollar Tree. But don’t tell him, he thinks he’s a total bargain hunter.)

Viktor & Rolf’s Antidote: Of all the new releases this year, Hermes’ Terre d’Hermes is the single most superior fragrance. But it’s Antidote that I seem to crave the most lately. Quite simply, it is delish.

Olivia Giacobetti’s IUNX Splash Forte is something I tried as part of a blind sample swap with March. What a wretched pity the IUNX line is no more. Gone! The way the Spash Forte uses spice is ballsy, reminding of the fearlessness of vintage fragrances like Coty’s old L’Aiment. Splash Forte wears on my skin like a shower storm covering me with spiced droplets. Beautiful, and oddly refreshing. Look for it on eBay, because there is nowhere else to find it.

Acca Kappa hair brushes are vegetarian friendly, and I’m quite pleased with mine. I’m glad to recommend them to other vegs, since it can be tricky to find good products that even non-vegs approve of. (I say this as someone who’s found more boners than winners, and thus as someone who instantly suspects a crap product now anytime I see a “vegetarian” label on beauty products. It’s not to say they’re all inferior quality, but there’s a ton of them that are.)

Fresh Pomegranate Conditioning Hair Rinse is the best smelling conditioner I’ve ever used. Its fragrance is a deep, woody pomegranate, but it’s not a heavy or cloying aroma. The conditioner is best suited for hair types that only have light conditioning or detangling needs, or for folks who use a seperate silicone serum styling product. I am ashamed to admit I’m addicted, because it’s awful spendy for something I wash down the drain. Frankly, I think Fresh loads it up with crack. So there it is: it smells too good to not use every day. And it gives my hair that lovely crack sheen.

Jimmy Belasco candles are quite possibly the cleanest burning candles I’ve ever used. I am sure of that because my dog freaks out that the house is burning down if I use candles that throw off even a smidge of soot. He has yet to try to evacuate us from our home in the event of a lit Belasco candle. Seriously, even the smell from the brief flicker of birthday cake candles is enough to set him into a panicked “save the people!” mode, so I’m impressed.

Inner beauty is nice, too. So another favorite beauty find of the year is Library Thing. It’s got “thing” right in its name! So it’s a thing, yeah? Library Thing is a site where you compile entries for the books sitting on your shelves to create reading lists, which you can then compare to other memebers who also have similar lists. It is a KICK-ASS way to find new reading ideas, and it’s really fun to see how many people share your hodgepodge library of reading material. I hope I have more time to fill in my list soon, because even at only 123 books, I’ve already found some books that look promising enough to stick onto my birthday wishlist.

Here are someother blogs and sites writing about their own favorite things they discovered during 2006:

1. Proposed fragrance: Lancome’s It’s a Christmas Miracle

Reason for rejection: Prohibitive sales opportunity. Christmas miracles only happen on 34th Street.

2. Proposed fragrance: Burberry’s Red-Nosed Reindeer

Reason for rejection: Proved popular with a focus group, but as it turns out, the resource for red-nose reindeer musk is extremely limited.

3. Proposed fragrance: Givenchy’s Mincemeat Pi

Reason for rejection: Everybody loves pi, but no one likes mincemeat, let alone 3.14159265358979323846… ounces of it.

4. Proposed fragrance: Balmain’s AdVent Vert

Reason for rejection: Counting down the days ’til one can finally wear perfume will only annoy people.

5. Proposed fragrance: Givenchy’s How the Grivenchy Stole Christmas

Reason for rejection: On Christmas Day, the heart notes expand three sizes. Smells great, but shatters the bottle.

6. Proposed fragrance: Patou’s Joy to the World

Reason for rejection: Just like every year, the world asked for a gift receipt so it could exchange Joy for something cooler, like “Power” or “Money.”

7. Proposed fragrance: Lancome’s Treesor

Reason for rejection: Unwieldly bottle shape requires a stand to display, and those stands seem to take forever to get working straight.

8. Proposed fragrance: Chanel No. 5 Golden Rings

Reason for rejection: Five golden rings, but Nicole Kidman holds the One Ring, which was thrown back into Mount Doom and destroyed, effectively thwarting her evildoing…. for now.

9. Proposed fragrance: The Cattle are L’eau-ing

Reason for rejection: Concerns over possible lactose intolerance issues.

10. Proposed fragrance: L’Artisan’s Dzingle Bells

Reason for rejection: Complaints of mysterious “batman smells”

Bonus proposed fragrance: Thierry Mugler’s Heavenly Host Christmas Coffret

Reason for rejection: An all Angel army? Too much of even a good thing is still way too much.

The sunlight broke brightly on Danielle’s pale golden body. She felt solid, durable, yet her very essence remained transparent to anyone who looked.

She was new on the scene. Convinced she could she prove she wasn’t too soft for the ruthless perfume game, she regarded her sweet nature as an asset. Danielle swiftly sought to work her subtle charms as she entered the business.

She knew she must inspire everyone she encountered to fall madly in love with her, or the whole effort would be a waste. She wasn’t in it for passion, she was getting ahead. One by one, Danielle’s lovers would allow themselves to be seperated from their money. She’d make sure of that.

But a single person could change it all.

An individual who, in those very moments she pondered her future, might pull her close and murmur in velvet tones,

“My dear, you are lovely, like a fart cloud of roses.”

Source picture of the fragrance line from the official Danielle Steele website.

In a funny case of serendipity, Marina has written a review of Danielle today, too: Danielle at Perfume Smellin’ Things.

In a recent story for the NPR program All Things Considered, correspondent Susan Stone visited the Osmotheque, and interviewed the legendary perfumer Jean Kerleo. I had a chance to ask her some questions about that experience, her own perfume obsession, and chat up about some oldies but goodies.

What were your expectations for visiting the Osmotheque? What did you think it would be like, and how did your actual visit match up to or differ with your anticipated experience?

It was a bit more technical than I expected – more like a working research lab. The Osmotheque is technically inside ISPCA, the big perfumery school. There were lots of students milling around – we left around lunchtime, and I saw primarily young women. I was left wondering where all of them would end up working! It’s not really a museum – it’s an archive, or a conservatory.

Kerleo in his own words said,

“Our work at the Osmotheque is to preserve the evolution of perfume and perfume of the past and recent past so that students and people interested in perfume can come here, smell the perfume, and understand it.”

There are a small number of perfume bottles on display — Catherine Deneuve, Tabac Blond, Moustache, to name a few, and some framed vintage perfume ads on the walls. But it’s very quiet and simple.

Also on display is a coffret of Parfums de Rosine by Paul Poiret. The coffret was found in the cellar of Jean Patou’s factory by a worker who brought it to Kerleo. One of Poiret’s perfumers named Alméras, had moved to Jean Patou after Poiret went bankrupt in 1925. [Ed. Note: Henri Alméras was responsible for Poiret's Le Fruit Defendu, and such classics as Joy and Moment Supreme at Patou.] He stayed for 30 years, then when he left, some papers and belongings were left behind, including this amazing coffret.

Were you handled differently because you were visiting there in a journalistic capacity than a regular visitor might be? What might the average person expect to discover if they are allowed to visit?

Yes, absolutely. Primarily in that I was able to get an appointment on a day (Friday) they don’t usually invite guests. But, on the other hand, I also missed out on the special lectures they create for groups, including many more scents, and lots of raw materials to encounter. I get the impression that the level of information they provide to the public is at an extremely high and special level. In addition, I believe group tours are held in a sort of conference room, and since there were only two of us (me and my French friend/emergency translator) we were in with all the bottles and also in M. Kerleo’s office. There is also a cold storage cellar that few people see. I didn’t!

What was the most surprising or shocking thing you learned there?

I had asked Jean Kerleo how he decided which modern perfumes to archive, and was surprised that the Osmotheque gets its collection by donation. He had recently received bottles of the latest Serge Lutens while I was there.

Oh how awful! I’m quite surprised that companies don’t donate as a matter of course…. Why aren’t they more interested or invested in archiving their presumptive legacies, I wonder? Was this a source of frustration or disappointment for him, or did he seem sanguine about it all?

Many companies do donate, but I think he would always like to have more. Although keeping up with ALL the new releases every year would be exhausting, as perfume bloggers well know! Kerleo said they accept all things that are sent, and they add them to the Osmotheque’s collection. If there’s a big release and they don’t get it, they request it. He did seem sanguine about it. They have a list of the collection, and it ranges from Uninhibited by Cher to Chypre by Coty. And looking at some of the new donations listed on a recent newsletter, I see the Armani Prive line, Gaultier2, Eau pour soi by Roger & Gallet, La rose du Petit Prince, and Eau d’Iparie from L’Occitane, to name a few.

I was also surprised at how positive Kerleo was about the EU regulations on perfume. He seemed to think that perfumers could do amazing things with the ingredients available, so it should be no big problem. Then again, the Osmotheque is permitted to use banned or restricted substances in their reformulations – because they don’t sell them (and don’t seem to put them on the skin). He seemed more interested in the creativity and imagination of the perfumer than perceived limitations.

What was the most curious thing you learned?

The very first perfume they reproduced for the Osmotheque was Crepe du Chine by Millot – it was the first time they got a formula from a perfume house. I was surprised to learn that it was created by their in-house perfume — Jean Desprez — who later developed my beloved Bal a Versailles. M. Kerleo got out some Bal a Versailles special for me to smell. They don’t have the formula at the Osmotheque – the family sold the rights and the house and he said you can’t really even buy it in France. It seems funny to me that in Versailles, of all places, you can’t get Bal a Versailles. (Bal a Versailles can be found in Paris, just not everywhere or obviously…)

That is a sure travesty. Desprez made some amazing perfumes, and even all those others that escape the general public notice were heady and complex in ways that some of the more modern infamous fragrances never manage. Is he pursuing the formula from the current rights-owner? Given its importance and slow dissolve from shelves, I’d imagine it’d score high priority for them.

I honestly don’t know. The sample in the collection was given to the Osmotheque by the House of Jean Desprez, perhaps before it was sold.

You had the opportunity to smell a number of perfumes on your visit. Would you describe your favorite, and if you can, explain why it was your favorite?

That’s an easy one. Le Fruit Defendu, hands down. This is the perfume by Paul Poiret – Parfums Rosine - that scandalized WWI Paris. It’s very sweet, gourmand, foody. Not vanilla, but creamy, sort of powdery. What’s bizarre to me is that I have been getting olfactory flashbacks from it in modern perfumes. For example, Kenzo Jungle L’Elephant and Annayake Matsuri. I hate to say it, but cloying might be the best descriptor. In a good way? People hated it when it came out – they considered it too frivolous in light of the horrors of the war. Kerleo said even in 1990, when the Osmotheque opened, people thought the perfume was disgusting. Then came Angel. Now people who smell Le Fruit Defendu think it is a pleasant, modern scent. I think there is a bit of rotting corpse in there after all – Eau de CSI. I still like it.

I love your description of Fruit Defendu. It sounds like it would be mesmerizing to wear. Except I’d totally need the right outfit to go with it, you know? Like, you’d so want to be gloved and properly dressed to match. Not that I could carry off a single one of Poiret’s dresses, hee!

Me neither. I’m more of a Dior New Look kind of gal.

What, according to Kerleo, are the most requested perfumes that the Osmotheque holds?

Fougere Royal, and often Le Fruit Defendu these days.

How was the sniffing experience at the museum both similar to and different from sniffing at a shop or home trials?

You can’t put the fragrances on your skin. You can only smell them on the specific scent strips, which are dipped fresh for you. I don’t know if people ask to wear the fragrances – I didn’t. It seems a bit like asking to try on the First Ladies’ dresses at the Smithsonian.

What perfumer or house that you discussed with Jean Kerleo most intrigued you, and why?

I was really glad to be able to talk about Paul Poiret and to include him in my story. Of course, his perfume was a great way to end my story, but I also think he’s more forgotten than he should be, especially compared to Chanel. I studied the history of fashion design (very briefly) and used to read a lot about it, so some of these perfumers’ names are more known to me from clothing than fragrance.

How does the Osmotheque obtain its information on old formulas and histories? Do they get them directly from the houses? Or the perfumers themselves? Perhaps they must solicit them from the perfumer’s families or estates? Do they find this information given gladly, or must they convince the parties of their intents and aims?

Kerleo obtains original recipes from perfumers and perfume houses, and promises they will remain secret. They can study samples of scents, but it is very difficult to obtain a formula from a finished perfume. And it can take years to remake a perfume from the formula. Certainly, the crop of jasmine will not be exactly the same as in 1925. Then again, it might be just as good.

So, uh, Jacques Fath is a constant source of curiosity for me. what did you think about his Iris Gris? Did you learn anything about the legendary perfumer behind it or about Fath’s house you’d be willing to share?

For me personally, at the moment of sniffing Iris Gris had no “wow” to it, more of a “hmm…’ But I would say the scent really awakened my INTEREST in the smell of Iris. I’ve been checking out Hermes’ Hiris in the Duty Free lately, and I have a sample of DIVINE L’Homme Coeur that has an interesting Iris note. I think Iris is a flower that makes you think (or reflect) rather than instantly feel – perhaps it’s cerebral rather than visceral. Jean Kerleo said they consider Iris Gris very good, and very famous. You either like it or you don’t. Technically speaking, he considers it good work of a perfumer because it maintains the same character consistently – what you smell is what you get from the first impression. It doesn’t change – there’s no evolution from top note to heart note to base note – he admires its stability. It was also a very expensive product to produce due to the amount of real Iris used. I just took out the scent strip and sniffed it – it reminds me of putting my cheek against cold white marble. I’m not sure if that’s in a museum or in a mortuary. It feels a bit sad. What did you think of it?

I find it a strange resolution of conflicts. The way the orange blossom top hovers over the heavy orris butter like an aural blanket should smell incongruous and unbalanced, but it works. There’s something in it, as you say, of a mortuary. The base seems so earthy yet impenetrable. But there’s humid warmth there, too - perhaps a touch of something not unlike a dank root cellar in mid-summer. Iris Gris is so highly structured. I wonder if perhaps it struck you as passionless as a result, and maybe that’s why it seemed more contemplative to you instead of eliciting a swift visceral reaction?

Hmm…passionless. That seems harsh but accurate. Like something to be admired but not touched. Very much like some film divas from the Black and White era.

I need to ask you about Coty Chypre then, (which Ms. Stone was kind enough to share a scent strip with me) if Iris Gris was just a “hmm…” moment for you! There is a quality to it which smells like an animal that pissed itself in fear. That quality comes as a fantastic shock to the modern nose. This one HAD to have struck you in the gut. Did M. Kerleo share any thoughts on it while you sniffed? Any warnings come with it, heh?

No, no warnings. I think the disturbing notes come much later with this one. I have to say having just tried my first Caron (Parfum Sacre), I found the same element in it. I described it recently (I am so sorry…) as old lady underpants. Of course lots of people love Caron, and I’m sure they would love Coty Le Chypre. It’s very important to the Osmotheque. Kerleo said that it took quite a long time and many trials to remake, as they didn’t have the exact specific amounts for the formula for this one. He said some of his friends who were a bit older and thus had more of a connection with the scents of the period (Chypre is from 1917!) were able to lend a nose, and they gave the ok. It amazes me that these wonderful aging gentlemen of perfumery have such an astonishing scent memory.

I’m not even a little familiar with so many of those very old Houbigants - what on earth did you think of Vinaigre Aromatique?

The Osmotheque has several examples of vinegars in their collection – it was used medicinally. Even very famous houses like Guerlain began by making perfumed vinegars – before perfume! According to Jean Kerleo, the first product of Pierre-Francois Pascal Guerlain, the founder of the house of Guerlain, was a vinaigre de toilette. As you can imagine, these products start out with a strong vinegar smell. But it does dissipate, leaving a more pleasant, perfumed aroma. In the case of Vinaigre Aromatic de Houbigant, the lasting smell was light citrus. These vinegars were used to purify the skin, and to ward off disease, not to mention to distract a little from all the bad odors swarming around cities in the 18th and early 19th centuries. It was sold by pharmacists, not perfumers!

What’s your take on the differences between the old Idole and the relaunched reformulation of it (if you’ve tried it?) The original was not quite so whiskey- and vanilla- sweet to me. Perhaps you have a more interesting perspective?

The old Idole de Lubin and the new Idole de Lubin could be from separate planets! The original, from 1964, was a floral green women’s’ scent. Its creator is involved in the Osmotheque. The new Idole, in its Afrodesia bottle is Trader Vic’s done classy – boozy, spicy, warm and dark. M. Kerleo talked about a number of scents that have been introduced reusing old names: Emeraude by Coty, Champs Elysee by Guerlain, Tresor by Lancome.

Partially in thanks to Luca Turin’s new book, Kerleo’s recreation of Houbigant’s Fougere Royale is perhaps their most famous to us perfume-nuts now… What lingers in your own mind about it? What did Kerleo stress to you as the most important facet of its formula and/or recreation?

Well, it is the granddaddy of men’s colognes. Though it has to take responsibility for its swaggering grandson Drakkar Noir (the male equivalent to Giorgio in my poor nose’s formative years). I love Turin’s description of it being bathroom cologne – having a secret nastiness to it. Jean Kerleo told me a nice story about recreating this. He received the formula from Antoine Javel of Houbigant, who was really skeptical that Fougere Royal could be recreated. But Kerleo wore it 50 years ago when he was a young man, and he had a perfect memory of the scent. So he remade it, and gave it to Mr. Javel, who said it was exactly the same! Kerleo said it was fantastic to have proof!

It almost shocks me how ultra modern it smells! Almost a hyper-reality version of lavender, if you will. It’s hypnotic, the smoothness deceptively hiding its dirty underpinnings. Its “secret nastiness” contrasts interestingly to the less oblique skank lurking in some other vintage fragrances. And compared to the modern aesthete of explicit “niceness,” it’s profound, really. Thanks for sharing a scent strip with me.

What’s on your sniffing list outside of vintage fragrances or older houses?

I’d like to experience all of the Comme des Garcons scents, though I don’t know if I would like to wear them all! Also, I’m hoping to smell the Thierry Mugler coffret soon. I am doing a story about the film “Perfume” and will mention the coffret in the report.

How would you describe the difference between perfume shopping in Europe versus the U.S.? Is there one? Do you feel, if there is one, that it affects how you look at perfumery? Does it affect the perfumes you find yourself wanting to smell or the houses you want to explore?

I don’t think people in Europe can really imagine the level of perfumes to be found at discounters (sometimes) for just a few dollars. I do miss that about shopping in the states. But what’s been fun for me are the lovely niche perfume stores I have visited lately in Vienna and Geneva. It’s really nice to have some knowledge about perfume, because I think many of the employees really like to engage in conversation about fragrance, but don’t always get to. And that knowledge gets you some respect even when you aren’t wearing expensive clothing. I have managed to have more-or-less intelligent conversations about perfume in three different languages in the last month! It’s really so wild. I love that perfume is more a part of the culture in Europe. I didn’t know Robert Piguet was Swiss until I was in Geneva speaking (bad French) with a lovely woman at a perfume shop in the old part of the city.

In Berlin we don’t really have one nice niche store that I have found, but I must admit I haven’t looked all over town. I love to go to Galerie Lafayette here, because they have a great selection and it’s partially unsupervised. I can’t stand SA’s jumping on me! Though some, it must be said, are charming. We also have a really unusual luxury department store which seems to have EVERY holy grail perfume – 10 Corso Como, Miller et Bertaux, Keiko Mecheri, lots of CdG. But almost all their perfumes are crammed onto trays together, so it’s hard to see what they have. They also have a huge special Malle area, but I only braved it briefly, and what I thought I would like I didn’t (Noir Epices) I talked to the SA at this store about CdG Tea – my holy grail, which I finally have promised to me from a Basenoter. I am afraid I will hate it, but it’s been a quest of mine since I started reading the blogs. We have a CdG Store which I haven’t visited yet. I don’t know how much in the way of fragrance they have, but it should be an adventure.

How long have you been “into” perfume? Meaning, how long has it been a hobby or subject of interest for you?

My most recent interest, which I would describe at more of a cultural/sociological level was in all honesty sparked by Chandler Burr’s article about Jean-Claude Ellena and his designing of special scents for Hermes in the New Yorker. And of course his book “The Emperor of Scent” is one of my favorites – I’ve returned to it several times. And after reading it last fall, I started doing research online, and reading perfume blogs! But I had in fact been collecting books and research on perfume several years ago, back while I worked on NPR’s Science Desk (from 1997-1999). I wanted to do a “science of perfume” story, but never got around to it. (It’s funny that the notion became so popular!) And I have to admit, that when I think back to my dresser in Washington, DC (where I last lived in the States), it was covered with perfume bottles! A lot of miniatures in really cute bottles and a lot of things bought unsniffed that I didn’t really enjoy as much as I enjoy trying and reading about perfumes now. I had to pack up and get rid of a lot of things when I moved to Europe, so I think I threw out a lot of things I’d like to revist. Like my Vivienne Westwood miniature set. Argh.

My mother didn’t really wear perfume (she says it smells strange on her) but she did sell Avon when I was little, so I remember their solid perfumes fondly – maybe more for the packaging than the scent! Fun to play with. But my first real perfume was Bal a Versailles. My friend’s mother wore it, and on a school trip to London, my friend and I both bought the perfume. It came in such a lovely tiny bottle, in a gold and white pouch, in a special box. Then I started finding the EdC spray in local stores – a white bottle with gold lettering and a gold cap. I wore that all the time, and my boyfriend loved it. It smelled a bit like Dr. Pepper! You can only find the EdT these days, which I don’t think is the same for me. I also wore KL (which is on sale here in Berlin – I don’t know how I feel about that!) and on occasion Opium. I went to a big “Giorgio” and “Poison” high school so those are two things I can’t bear. Certainly I also bought drugstore stuff like Exclamation and Samba, and some essential oils.

What are some of your current favorite perfumes?

Right now, I am wearing MpG Ambre Precieux – it’s a sample. I’ve been trying many different perfumes in samples, as it’s sort of more fun than committing. I have bought a couple of bottles in the last year, but the implied commitment isn’t always there! For instance L’Artisan Bois Farine, which I like but don’t always turn to. I’ve also become interested in lot of “men’s” perfumes. Someone spritzed Guerlain’s L’Homme Instant Extreme on me in Heathrow airport last Christmas, and I made a face and bought two other things, but couldn’t stop smelling my arm an hour later. I finally tracked it down, but the top notes are a little rough. I like sandalwood, spices, amber. I’m not big on most flowers. A friend sent me a tiny sample of Michael Kors (almost all had leaked out in shipping) I was blown away by it. I was shocked. I think it was a Proustian experience of some sort – maybe reminding me of Tuberoses bought with an Indian-American friend in the flower market in Los Angeles, mixed with Gardenias from the front yard of my childhood home. I don’t know if I could wear it, but I like smelling it. I just completed my first MUA swap which will include a sample of Fracas – I live in fear of it, but I want to know! Oh, also, I just got a sample of M. Micallef Gaiac. It’s spicy, woody, sweet, mouthwatering. There might be a cotton candy undertone. I think I love it.

My thanks to Ms. Stone for sharing her thoughts, it was fun!

Coming up in the next week, I’ll finally share what I found when I cracked open a bottle of Jacques Fath’s first fragrance release, Chasuble, and after that hopefully something a little newer, too, since I’ve been trying the Les Nez fragrances off and on for the past few weeks.

All photos in this article were taken by Susan Stone, who has graciously allowed them to be published at Scentzilla. You can find more of her interesting photography, including shots of unusual subjects and street objects, at Flickr.

I’m taking a little time out from perfume stuff to share a recipe today. When digging through the cookbooks to find some holiday baking ideas, I rediscovered this little gem. Its components are artificial, highly processed… and delicious. I’m the sort of dork who serves Cool Whip rather than real whipped cream, too. Fake food tastes yummy, and sometimes you just have to say screw the gourmandise palate. *shrug* Let he who is without sin cast the first skillet.

Classy? Yeah, totally classy. Anyhow: Enjoy!

I’m not sure this was the best headline, but it seemed appropriate somehow. The latest rounds of my Made by Blog fragrance make it seem as if we’re in full gallop of something breathtaking.

To say the very least, I was thrilled with them.

You can read more about them in my letter to Laurent directly at Made by Blog. There’s still a few sets of this latest batch left at the Made by Blog store, but I’m not sure how long it’ll be before they run out.

Maryam from Maryam’s Soap Nook recently sent me a small selection of her handmade products to try, which I am more than happy to talk about. There were two products that really stood out to me:

One is her rich whipped body butter in the Ginger Cardamom scent. The fragrance is sweetly filled with fruity tones of peach, but the fruit is accompanied by a subtle spiciness. The texture is thick and creamy, with these little granule droplets that melt right into the skin. Perfect for those of us who get nasty winter skin, especially those of us who suffer from flakey elbows.

However, by far and away, I was most delighted by her Lemongrass, Lime & Ginger Shea Butter and Dead Sea Salt Glow Scrub. It’s a ginger lover’s dream. It smells of real fresh ginger slices, rather than only vaguely spicy like some “ginger” products. The scrub smoothed my skin as it exfoliated, and didn’t make it all pink and cranky looking (which unfortunately happens all to often with my sensitive skin.) Moreover, the scrub is salt based, so you don’t have to wash down the shower afterwards to keep it from getting scratched. Yes, I am lazy, but that is quite appealing, no? This stuff is awesome, and I am sticking it straight away onto my Christmas wishlist. (It fits in a stocking, “Santa,” hint hint!)

Other products from her line that she sent over included her Camellia Body Oil, a light moisturizing oil that feels silky and non-greasy, her gorgeous handcrafted soaps, and her Exfoliating Body Wash in Gardenia Peach, which was certainly nice, but I was so blown away by her gingeriffic salt scrub that I am recommending that instead!

* Internet Exporer 7 is pants. I’m not sure what the deal with it is, and thus, my apologies to those of you who are using it to browse this site. That browser, and that browser alone, makes the comments appear screwy, and I don’t know how to fix that yet. I’ll keep at it, but I am not personally impressed by IE7. Sigh. If you like the tabbing feature on it, I strenuously suggest swiching over to Firefox, which handles “div”s (a component of most sites’ style sheets) with what seems like much better stability and standards compliance to me.

* I saw this news photo of a dog fashion show, and it’s so deeply wrong. It nearly completes some full octave of awful which circles around to hideously brilliant: meet meta dog.

* Christopher Brosius of CB I Hate Perfumes has been keeping a small online journal, and I am really enjoying reading it. I suppose this is old news to everyone, but I wanted to share the link: CB Journal.

* I found this little item from the Wall Street Journal interesting… Something about it appeals not to my fragrance-obsessive self, but to that little nine year old kid still in me that used to collect stickers. (The best ones to get were of course the scratch-and-sniff ones! Second best were the “puffy” ones.) Kraft Vies for Eyes — and Noses

* Not sure how I missed this earlier, but Hugo Boss’ campaign for their Green fragrances is really kind of neat. Sure doesn’t hurt that the campaign features Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, who is ever so pretty. Lots of images and info at the DWA Client page describing it. (Via AdRants.)

* If it wasn’t alreay clear, the whole celebrity fragrance thing has once and for all definitively “jumped the shark.” BetUs.com is now posting odds on which will be the next celebrity fragrance. Sure, it LOOKS like a big spoof-up, but when even Barry Manilow has a fragrance, I can’t help but feel there’s a grain of truth to it all.

* Coty’s Wild Musk commercial ranks at #29 on Giant Magazine’s 50 Greatest Commericals of the ’80s. Use it before you stalk? Egads!

Upon the occasion of the infamous Neiman Marcus Christmas catalog’s listing of the collected archives of Jacques Fath, I figured a brief choppy history of the man and his house might be in order. Of course, I am sure I could do a much better job of it if anyone would like to loan me a spare $3.5 million dollars… I swear I can totally pay you back!

Jacques Fath

(September 6, 1912 - November 13, 1954)

Jacques Fath began his fashion house in a small two-roomed salon on Rue de la Boetie, presenting his first collection in 1937. He later moved in 1940 to Rue Francois Premier¹, and then in 1944 settled into a studio at 39 Avenue Pierre 1er de Serbie.

Fath took a number of young designers under his wing, though perhaps the best known of the assistants he hired were Hubert de Givenchy, Guy Laroche, and Valentino². He also drew upon the talents of shoe designer Andre Perugia³.

The Paris studio Fath operated was fortunate to remain open during the entirety of Nazi occupation during WWII. His relative occupation-era success, viewed in certain quarters as a direct result of cooperating with the Germans and kowtowing to Vichy pressures, has only recently entered the discourse in the past decade. His association with various Nazi-Vichy sympathizers and a comparatively wealthy German clientele during those years certainly tarnished his status as a designer amongst some modern critics. Much of the credit for this discussion can apparently be attributed to Vallerie Guillaume’s 1993 book Jacques Fath, which looks into the house’s history. (I am hoping someday I will get my grubby little hands on Guillaume’s book. The book is neither easy nor cheap to find in the States, but I would love to read it.) However, it is also due to a slow but growing willingness to examine the survival strategies of ALL those famous French houses, not only Fath’s.

The period of French design during Nazi control is rarely discussed widely, but merits mentioning for historical context. Parisian designers like Maggy Rouff (who some of you perfume-nuts may know by association with Paul Poiret of Parfums Rosine, who sold designs to her), Marcel Rochas, Nina Ricci and others, also somehow kept afloat. They perisisted, despite their houses being practically decimated by the time Paris was free again. This was not due to the various designers’ artistic, or in some cases moral, inflexibility. Lucien Lelong, for instance, was also affected by the Mode Martiale of WWII; He was one of the more prominent designers to have talks directly with the German textile and fashion officials⁵ in his capacity as the design community’s nominated leader. Amongst other things, Lelong successfully dissuaded them from relocating the Parisians to establish Berlin and Vienna as the premier fashion capitals, diminishing France’s preeminence in the industry. The bureaucratic Nazis micromanaged every conceivable facet of life during their take-over, and the fashion industry was granted no exceptions. Author Valerie Steele notes⁴,

“…the Vichy regime adopted a fashion discourse similar to that in Facist Italy and Nazi Germany, stressing nationalism and conservative social values. Fashion designers were encouraged to draw inspiration from regional or ‘folk’ costumes; Jacques Fath, for example, designed dresses inspired by peasant costume. Fashion magazines were also encouraged to extol the traditional Frenchwoman, as opposed to the cosmopolitan Parisienne.”

A number of German-demanded regulations were bootstrapped onto all French designers, right down to which fabrics and the lengths of those fabrics that could be used. (Hence, the shorter hemline came into vogue.) Even the dates of release for the meager Paris collections were dictated by the German government.⁵

Lelong, of course, shook off the perception that he may have been a collaborator, later being granted status as a hero (Croix de Guerre and the Legion of Honor) due to his leadership in working for France’s intrests. Perhaps in contrast, we might glance over at Coco Chanel. The Nazi sympathies of Coco Chanel are widely known, due to her literal sleeping with the enemy. Yet Chanel is one of the most recogizable names in fashion. Ask the average person about Lelong, Fath, or other contemporaries, and you will only receive an empty-eyed “who?” in response. Exemplary behavior during that time clearly hasn’t been a necessary condition for achieving renown. Opening up the whole subject for further evaluation will hopefully occur even more over the years to come: This period for designers is historically interesting, and a story that may prove interesting to readers outside of costuming and fashion study.

At war’s end, the liberated French designers celebrated with profound creative renewal, most notably in the inspiring “New Look.” Christian Dior is regularly credited with the genesis of the “New Look,” yet it is not hard to see the premonitions and seeds of this movement in Fath’s earlier designs. In fact, there was even a bit of feud between Fath and Dior. Magazines devoted coverage to it, splashing headlines such as “Dior Contre Fath” (pictured) across their feature pages. What interesting things might have eventually evolved out of this rivalry we will never know, as Fath died at the young age of 42, while Dior went on to acheive even greater heights of popularity.

Fath’s eagerness to break into the American market and his ambitious pursuit of that goal, may have also been cause for scorn amongst his Parisian peers. In 1948, the New York-based clothier Joseph Halpert contracted with Fath to design special ready-to-wear collections for sales in the American market. (One such Halpert collection is Fath’s 1950 Puritan collection, whose theme rather funnily, to me, fetishizes the “American” aesthete.) Many of the cuts of his clothing from this time emphasize a fitted form, accentuating thin waists and using lines that minimally curve with the body.

Fath most famously sold his designs in the US at Neiman Marcus, some apparel bearing labels of both the famous store’s name and the designer’s. Neiman Marcus went so far as to bestow him with an “Award for Distinguished Service in the Field of Fashion” in appreciation. Time magazine noted of the occasion⁶:

“Couturier Jacques Fath, in Dallas to accept a fashion prize from the Neiman-Marcus store, got all dressed up in native costume (Western-style plaid shirt by Jacques Fath, glass-studded white leather belt by Neiman-Marcus, blue denim britches by Sears, Roebuck). Concluding that the U.S. square dance is ‘wonderful, wonderful,’ he announced that Paris would hear of the sport just as soon as he got home.”

His work soon became especially popular with the American women, and celebrites including Jacqueline Kennedy, Josephine Baker, and Rita Hayworth all wore his designs. He even designed Rita Hayworth’s wedding dress for the occasion of her marriage to Aly Khan in 1949. Additionally, his costume design for the Hollywood film The Red Shoes is quite well known, though he did contribute to a few others. His dress patterns through Vogue’s sewing pattern company also sold rather well to average women who enjoyed his style but couldn’t afford anything from his lines.

In 1939 he married Genevieve Boucher de la Bruyere, a celebrated “mannequin” and former secretary to Coco Chanel. The couple had one child, Philippe, born in 1943⁷. (Phillipe in turn had two children⁸, however the rights to the name have long been sold off, and I don’t believe they have any involvement with their grandfather’s house.) After Jacques died, the house briefly carried on for a few years under Mme. Fath’s direction until 1957. A number of the designs released under Genevieve’s time are as appealing as those M. Fath himself put out. The photo book Stella, about a frequent Fath mannequin named Stella Maret, demonstrates a fantastic range of designs issued in the years following M. Fath’s death. Genevieve was instrumental not only in keeping the name alive, but also in terms of creative input to her husband during his lifetime. What I find most touching about Fath’s story is not his beautiful clothing, or even his perfumes… it is this lovely woman, who had smarts behind her beauty. It is her influence which shaped many of his collections and the photography showing off his designs. She was a remarkable source of inspiration, but sometimes remained hidden behind the title of “wife.”

Fath himself was less than generous towards the female gender as a whole. He had notably declared⁹, “Women are bad fashion designers. The only role a woman should have in fashion is wearing clothes,” and “Fashion is an art and men are the artists.”

Jacques Fath was a flawed, imperfect man, but one with impeccable taste and talent. If we go rooting around into his contemporaries’ lives, I feel we’d come to much the same conclusions about them. But to whitewash is to render a subject dimensionless, and Fath deserves more than a flat treatment. And better than my pitifully edited summary, too.

The following is a complete list of perfumes made under the Jacques Fath label, some with brief olfactory information.

Perfumes released by Fath during his lifetime:

1945: Chasuble, floral woody oriental
1946: Iris Gris, floral fruity woody: perfumer Vincent Roubert
1950: Canasta, fruity chypre: not sure, but has perfumer Vincent Roubert’s fingerprints all over it
1953: Fath de Fath, floral woody and musky oriental
1953: Green Water, green aromatic citrus woody (for men): perfumer Vincent Roubert

Perfumes released under the Fath name after it was licensed to L’oreal:

1968: Fath’s Love, sparkling tuberose floral
1972: Ellipse
1977: Expression, floriental chypre

Perfumes, released and/or reforumulated & re-released, as the house experienced a revival in the 90s include:

1994: Fath de Fath, remade as fruity floriental with strong vanillic emphasis by perfumers Haarmann and Reimer¹⁰
1996: Eau de Fath¹¹
1998: Pour L’Homme (sometimes called simply “Jacques Fath”), fresh floriental (for men)
1999: Yin, fresh floriental
1999: Yang, green woody oriental (for men)

1. Elements of Fashion and Style, p.115, by G.J. Sumathi
2. Time, Feb. 5, 2003, “Is There A Future In Fashion’s Past?”
3. http://www.historyofashion.com/historyofashion/shoeperugia.html
4. Fifty Years of Fashion: New Look to Now, p.9, by Valerie Steele
5. Fashion Under the Occupation, various including appendix, by Miriam Kochan and Dominique Veillon
6. Time Magazine, 19 September, 1949, notes
7. Paris Match, 18 March, 1950
8. fashionfinds.com, site now defunct
9. Women Designers in the USA 1900 to 2000: Diversity and Difference, p. 194, by Pat Kirkham
10. New Perfume Handbook, p. 166, by Nigel Groom
11. Years of release for Eau de Fath through Yang via Basenotes.net.

UPDATE: There’s a great little short film showing off Fath clothing from 1956 on You Tube… just wonderful! For some reason I am having trouble embedding it today, so here’s a link to the You Tube page: Jacques Fath 1956