For the last two years, I have practiced one annual perfume ritual: the wearing of Fendi’s Asja around Halloween. The caramelized fruit note of this discontinued fragrance reminds me of the pineapple fritters and cinnamon donuts my mother made for us when I was a teenager during the late fall. Unfortunately, my little lacquered rice-bowl mini of Asja was the only casualty of our last move. The stone tile floor of the house we left probably gave off an occasional whiff of fresh fritters for weeks. Halloween is over, but with our economies in tatters and the whole American political machine lit and shuddering like a carnival funhouse, many of us still have a case of the creeps. Who would blame us if we faced all this down with a comfort scent like Asja and, yes, maybe some of those midway mini-donuts, if we could find some? But I am here to lead you on a braver, smellier course: wear scary scents.
Of course, I must emphasize the subjective nature of fear. For example, I am terrified of balloons. (You never know when those darn things are going to pop! My heart almost stops just thinking of it happening.) The perfumes that scare me may be your treasured favourites, while your blood curdles at the thought of me cheerfully washing around in a tide of, say, Guerlain Aqua Allegoria Pamplelune. Angela has a wonderful dismissive term she uses for certain scents she dislikes: they are too “Orange Julius”. Without ever discussing this with her, I believe I know exactly what she means: the scent is sweet and oily-creamy, aiming at the natural and familiar, but falling horribly short. But perhaps you’re sucking back a Tripleberry right now and you’re wearing Anné Pliska! This does not mean we can’t be friends. We just shouldn’t sit together at the food court. (Unless you also bought one of those big baked pretzels and you’re in a splitting mood. Then I could definitely overlook our differences.) One of the glories of this niche interest we all share is that, unlike politics or say, I guess, real estate investment, perfume generally creates common ground. It matters little whether cumin gives you the willies or whether I am disturbed by your enthusiastic sampling of Tom Ford White Patchouli; if we were able to meet over beverages of our own choice, I’m sure we’d be able to bond over having this hobby, which, as my normal friend once said, “seems to involve spending a lot of disposable income on smelling like something in the dryer has just caught fire.” Whether he liked it or not, if the Grim Reaper knew much about Diptyque L’Eau Trois, we’d be able to be friends — as long as he wasn’t packing any balloons.
So, five scents that scare me:
Parfumerie Generale Cuir Venenum: I confess I have a great deal of trouble with this line. Even the Parfumerie Generale scents I like — Aomassaï and Bois de Copaïba, for example — have moments that approximate drowning in ice cream topping. Cuir Venenum reminds me of a night when a high school friend of mine ruined both a Trivial Pursuit board and one of my good pairs of shoes after overindulging in Jell-O shooters and black forest cake. It wins a spot on the list because I’m just nostalgic enough for high school that I keep the vial for re-sampling. Bois Blonde was bagged and thrown away.
Fresh Cannabis Rose: Somebody “misplaced” all the cannabis and then decided a Sephora-friendly version of Serge Lutens Borneo 1834 would be a good idea.
Comme des Garçons Odeur 71: This is one I wanted to like. But it smells metallic and smoky and oily and, well, alive. It smells like what I imagine the liquid metal T-1000 from Terminator 2 smells like — “what I imagine” because: a) T-1000 is a fictional character; and b) I have never seen the movie, as the only thing that freaks me out worse than balloons is Eddie Furlong.
CB I Hate Perfume CBMusk Reinvention: This is another one I feel badly about. I usually thoroughly enjoy Christopher Brosius’ work — how you can’t love a perfume named after a poem by the wonderful Stevie Smith is beyond me — and many people of good taste and breeding claim to find this comforting. To me it smells like sweating out fever dreams and then waking up with sour breath and greasy hair to smoke a whole pack of port-dipped cigarillos in the nude. I find this exactly as comfortable as it sounds, and fairly fascinating.
Le Labo Patchouli 24: Many smoky scents smell exactly like grilled bratwurst to me. This is a grilled bratwurst with vanilla-infused foam on top. Not even elBulli could make that work for me.
Note: image is Glow ["An Avon Sweet Honesty perfume decanter in the form of a black cat sits in front of a blown glass piece and a red Clarins Eau Dynamisante perfume bottle."] by nonky at flickr; all rights reserved and used with permission.
110 Comments
Read more about commenting at Now Smell This.
Yikes! the only one I don't love is the one I haven't sampled, Cuir Venenum (I guess I ought to, now). I guess we are scent opposites. I would still split a pretzel with you.
Erin, I'd share a pretzel with you too so long as you weren't wearing Pamplelune.
Wanted to say that your friend's take on being a perfumista — “seems to involve spending a lot of disposable income on smelling like something in the dryer has just caught fire” — made me laugh so hard I choked on my tea. How very, very true!
Great! I'll grab some mustard for dipping!
So we are Evil Fragrance Twins, are we? Then you must try Cuir Venenum. (Also that new Bond no. 9 AW Lexington Avenue – have you tried that? You're sure to love it…) Actually, I do sort of admire the Le Labo; it just got to hold the can for all super-smokies, which isn't fair.
Evil Scent Twins! Excellent. But we can both wear Pamplelune.
Um, first comes Tubéreuse criminelle, the Nazgul fragrance (big big Paris mistake under pressure in Lutens's awesome but pretty Nazgul shop).
Then, and resolutely with no love (while TC frightens me, but there still is some feeling between us…) in my words, 100% love. I bought a sample at TPC and I think it's the new one. Every review I've read talks about a delicate, unobtrusive, rosy incensey chocolatey scent… To me (but I'v smelled it on others too, to my nose it doesn't change) it's like going to a children's party, with someone who throws up on you 100% disgusting red berry candies.
“I bought a sample at TPC and I think it's the new one”. Sorry, I wasn't very clear, I think. I meant I believe it's the reformulated version, as Turin wrote in the guide.
I loved that line too. I'll need to remember it.
Narcisse Noir is Jack Nicholson in the Shining.
Mona di Orio's Oiro is Judy Garland coming at me with a coat hanger.
S100% Love is projectile ectoslime in The Exorcist.
OJ Woman is Blair Witch.
These are a few of my scariest things…
Have only just spotted your prior comment on S100%Hate. For two of us to come up with it independently as flavoured vomit is compelling evidence of the fright factor!
The only one I have tried is the Le Labo Patch and I found it interesting and peculiar- very dentist office-y- and completely unwearable. Swapped the 5ml decant away in record time…
(But the new Poivre is pretty fantastic- good thing it is across the ocean)
Oh, and I have the strange desire to put Pampleune on my MUA wishlist so I can see what the stink is about
I really like at least two of these. Your comments made me laugh out loud! Team Foam!
Just not around Robin
Hahahaha! Great, great post, E, and so happy to see you back after a long (for me at least) hiatus!
My scary scent is, um, L'Eau Trois!
But I do think we can still be friends because: a) I'm just as disturbed by balloons, and b) I'll be wearing M7 for our drink & snacks get-together 
P.S. Love the Musk Reinvention description, cracked me up big time!
Jack Nicholson in the Shining. Brilliant!
Oh, okay, I'll wear some other cheerful scent – Balkis, maybe. I loved that pie chart you made for a buying poll long ago. It would be scary to make an accurate one for myself to see how much I spent on smelling like flaming lint.
For me, it'd be Bond No 9 Chinatown & Oui, by Lancome. I want to like them, but my throat instantly siezes upon application.
We're kind of mystifying to the “normals”, aren't we?
Hilarious post – thanks for making me giggle at work!
I love Odeur 71, for the very same reasons it scares you. Always makes me think about having a coin in my mouth and sniffing nitrous oxide at the same time, when I'm wearing O71.
I think your description of P24 (which I actually wore on Halloween and received a compliment on!) sounds a lot like Viergos et Terreros (sp?) by Etat Libre d'Orange – but with flowers added. Whitle flowers meet Hickory Farms. Big time blech.
Weirdly enough, I just realized that my original sample of L'Eau Trois went thru the washer and dryer when we lived in Calgary. Not good for the juice. Maybe that's what inspired my friend's comment!
Or maybe it was M7. Love that one in the summer.
We should start a club for balloon-phobics. Come on over! Yeah, the CBMusk situation is going to be my next Facebook profile pic
Whoo, lots of vomiting references today! Yeah, no, I'm with ya on the 100% Love: the rose goes sour on me and with the Swedish Berries note, the whole does seem a bit barfy. But then I love the SL TC…
I've tried all the versions, I believe: older ones, recent ones, 100% Love, 100% Love More… I'm afraid none of them agree with me. Like S-ex from the same line, though.
I guess I've met plenty of scents that don't float my boat… but ones that actually SCARE me? Luckily, very few. My nastiest recent experiences:
Marc Jacobs Pear Splash — nice topnotes but a vile synthetic musk ever after, which makes me want to retch. Worse than a drugstore perfume.
ELdO Delicious Closet Queen — a synthetic sweet nightmare that definitely doesn't mix well with breakfast.
I love your list! Sometimes I like to be scared by fragrance, but only if I can run and wash it off.
Racking my brain – I have HATED fragrance. But the only one I can think of offhand that scared me was Psychotrope. I still don't know why. It was like wearing the perfume version of The Shining. I never want to smell it again.
So … that pretzel … salted or cinnamon?
Oooo, Orio. Good one!
Anything tuberose scares me away. It's a scent that makes me recoil as soon as I open the bottle. Then there was the Japanese Cherry Blossom I tried in Bath & Body Works the other day. At first it was OK, then it went all vile, and I couldn't get it off no matter how much I washed!
P.S. Balloons don't bother me, it's clowns that always freaked me out…
Judy Garland, or Joan Crawford? Actually, I almost think Judy would be scarier…
Encens et Lavande, which I was SO looking forward to trying, but which smells to me like the nastiest little bar of deodorant soap in the shower of the cheapest, grungiest little motel you can imagine — probably the last thing you smell before Tony Perkins gets you.
This Halloween I wore Givenchy III, since it's dark, green and aggressive. The sort of thing Joan Crawford's corpse would wear.
Hard as I try, I can't think of a perfume that scares me. Repulse, nauseate, irritate, aggravate, bore, fascinate – all these, but not really scare. I'll join you in the balloon fear club, though. And how do you feel about pop n fresh dough? I can barely open a can of cinnamon rolls because I dread the can popping open in my hands as I peel the paper off. Or is it just me? Excellent post as always
Most recent fragrance scare: spritzing on quite a bit of Serge Lutens Arabie while shopping the fragrance counters dowtown. Suddenly, I felt like I was wearing the shirt of a guy who works 14 hours a day at the local falafel joint, who hadn't thrown the shirt in the wash since last jJuly right before the air condiitioning broke down for a month. Pee – YOO.
I thought I was over-reacting to that spicy cumin sweat pungency of the thing, until a woman behind me on the escalator actually took three steps back. Ouch!
Erin, what a fun article! (A few tears shed for the Asja on the tiles….) My own Triology of Terror:
Hmmm; in the “trickster” category, SIP Vine gave me quite a scare. I loved Black Rosette [go figure], and thought I was ready for anything that might waft my way. I blithely applied–rather freely, if not wantonly–and then got slapped and sinus appalled all at once. I'm still a bit leery of going back to figure out wtf happened. That would be modern horror movie genre; cheap effects.
In a more Hitchcockian vein, I slowly approached Kingdom, waiting a suitable courtship period before even cracking the bottle open. Putting it back, thinking I had not “developed” enough. Then, finally, and slowly and ceremoniously — hadn't Vine taught me? — spritzed once into the air, onto nothing, just to see how much would come out. Then aimed carefully, and spritzed JUST ONCE on JUST ONE SPOT. I slowly raised my arm…prepared myself mentally…approached slowly…and…WANGO. Icksnay. Held off for drydown. Same panties.
In the masochistic horror approach, I went back to Kingdom. Multiple times. Happy — ?? — to report that on my fifth try, I actually got a whiff of the rose inside.
I was trying to figure that out, too. Actually, Judy Garland kind of scares me, because we had a record of her singing “Friendship” with Johnny Mercer when I was growing up and it had lines like “If you fall in a mill and get sawed in half, I won't laugh” and “If you ever lose your teeth and you're out to dine, borrow mine”. Ew.
Actually, I'm kind of afraid of trying that Le Labo Poivre. I sometimes smell (black) pepper as stale sweat/body odour, the way most people do with cumin. (Cumin, OTOH, is just fine with me.) The Hermessence Poivre one just freaks me out – for as long as it lasts.
Dentist-officey? Like cloves?
SFLizbeth commented that Chinatown makes her throat “seize”. I have a strongly negative reaction to it as well. But my true fright 'fume was one of the Ajne organics and I don't even know which one it was. I leaned in for a whiff, liked the first impression, sniffed again and had the first athsma attack of my life! Clown faces? Balloons? Me, I have a phobia of expensive oils in handcrafted Bohemian glass bottles!
You must! Report back on your findings: sunny grapefruit or piddled-on sweat socks?
Well, clearly you are one of the people of good taste and breeding! Team Foam – I love it. I think I'd dig the tomato cookies mentioned in the elBulli article. (Who am I kidding? I'd sell organs to eat elBulli anything….)
I like both of those, but I can see both creating such a reaction in others. That new Bond, the Warhol Lexington Avenue one, doesn't give me any allergic symptoms, but my reaction went very quickly from “Hmm, top notes intriguing” to “ack” to running off down the street from Holt Renfrew, as if chased by demons.
Thanks for your thanks and glad you enjoyed it. I actually like Vierges et Toreros, but it is a weird mix: that beautiful floral note with the weird, kippered smell of new oiled boots. Odeur 71 I would love to love, would love to be cool enough to wear, but I'll have to make do with the caffeinated, inky start of Comme des Garcons 2, I guess.
Ah, the WORST sort of fright – the musky drydown fright. And in my job, I work with many Queens, loud and proud Queens, and they wouldn't be caught dead in the ELd'O, at breakfast or at any other time.
For me the scariest fragrance is Avignon in CdG's Incense series. It smells so dead and cold. It makes me gag just recalling the smell! :-{
cloves? I'm thinking novacaine….
I have done a 180 on cumin- been lovin it! And you must try the Poivre- very different than the Hermessence one.
I had the same experience with Lex. Ave. The top notes reminded me of Chinatown (which I love) but then it started to smell cheap and awful.. cute bottle, tho
Ava Luxe Madame X = SCARRRRY
1) Jicky. Reminded me so much of a dentist's office I thought I felt a twinge in a tooth, and childhood horrors rushed back.
2) Angel. I don't think I've ever had a migraine headache, but there's SO MUCH going on in that scent, such a sensory overload, that I wonder if that's what the experience is like.
I have a few samples that I have been afraid of:
Opus Oils Rollergirl – Licorice, black cherry, vanilla and vetiver – I just can't bring myself to apply it to my skin.
Same with TF Black Orchid, although I promised I would try.
I have bought samples of MPG Route de Vetiver twice. I gave the first one away and then must have gotten it confused with something else and wound up with it again. I think I'll get over my fear of this one – the last time I put a drop on I was okay, although not thrilled.
I was very afraid of Iris Silver Mist and still am a little but the fear has changed to intrigue since I got over my aversion to application.
Jicky and I definitely have a love-hate relationship. I love it but it sneers at me and says, I don't think so, beeyatch.
I don't know if I will ever get over my fear of Fracas. I may never try it again.
Thank God there is another balloonaphobic!! I'm not afraid of Pop n Fresh dough but I am afraid of champagne corks.
I do apologise, I meant Joan Crawford – I am very sleep deprived just now. I also meant Nuit Noire, not Oiro, though Oiro is pretty “put your eye out with that” too!!
Funny – my friend spilt a vial of Kyoto on the kitchen worktop at the weekend, and you just wouldn't credit how bad that still smells…
Here's another couple – L'Etat Libre Divin' Enfant. There's a marshmallow and cold tobacco accord in there, amongst other nasties. Highly barfworthy…
Then there's Unicorn Spell which is like having your eye put out by freshly creosoted planks.
Oh, salted, always! (you must have mustard with it….) Psychotrope, eh? Hrm. Haven't tried that one, but many PGs scare me. I think we share a serious fear, but I didn't mention even its name in case it brought out all the little Gremlins!
And what about Borneo? Didn't you double-bag it to throw it out?
For some odd reason, the beginning of FM Carnal Flower kind of frightens me – even though I like Tubereuse Criminellle! It's very true that I “recoil as soon as I open the [sample] bottle”, but actually my fear goes away as time as goes on and the drydown sets is. Carnal Flower is actually kind of quiet. Fracas, OTOH, always struck me as cuddly, but then I left a scent strip satuarated with it in a hot car and I nearly had to call an exorcist….
Somehow I must have missed all the horror movies with clowns in them, because they don't bother me (until they start *twisting* balloons – clear craziness). Is it the masked/made-up quality or the maniacal laughter that does it?
Ha! I laughed and then went to make absolutely sure that Anthony Perkins played Norman Bates before I answered your comment, just in case my brain was misfiring this morning, and I got Tony Perkins, American Christian politician and president of the Family Research Council! Enough to give me nightmares for weeks….
I don't particularly like Encens et Lavande, but more in a what's-all-this-fuss-about? sort of way.
It *is* sort of big-shouldered and aggressive. I wouldn't want to encounter it in the dark…..
I think I've blocked out the memory of Nuit Noire. I must have been traumatized.
Thank you. But goodness, now I'm afraid of “baking”! The can could pop open you say? I'll never think the same way about the lovely smell of my grandmom baking their crescent rolls…
I remember spraying some Kingdom on a tissue to keep working on liking it without actually spraying it on myself. I kept in on the bedside table. Some time in the middle of the night, my husband made me get up and flush the tissue down the toilet.
And you reminded me I've got to try those SIPs.
“quite a bit”?!? My heavens, woman, you're insane! Arabie is a sillage monster. I *do* love it, though. Even though it makes people back up escalators!
Avignon was on my Halloween list last year as a most appropriate fragrance for graveyard wear! I like it, though (blush)
My hubby's asthma has taught me the truth of those commercials: “When you can't breathe, nothing else matters!” Love Chinatown, but wouldn't want to be stuck in an elevator with someone wearing a lot of it….
Ah, I don't quite remember the smell of novacaine. Thanks for the rec.
Yeah, but that was HATRED. I hate that mothball smell. Psychotrophe (yes, a PG) actually had some psychological fright effect on me. I think the same thing happened to Marina once with Black March — like falling in an open grave or something. Literally frightening rather than off-putting.
Wait, what do we both hate? The Nazgul?
Angel! But again I just hate it. Chocolate cupcakes and vomit. Toddler birthday party aftermath. Lots of vomit references on here.
Those last couple lines really made me laugh! Thanks for enjoying the post. Really, you must try Dior HP. It's really not that sultry – it smells like rootbeer, delicious, delicious rootbeer. Unless you find rootbeer sultry…..
Ah, two of my favourites! Know of any good food courts around here?
Love your commenting name…
Well, there's always L'Heure Bleu – I still don't think I'm over whatever that thing in it is that makes me recoil from the paper strip. Poison is a little scary too, but on a very different level – not repulsive at all, just really not my thing and, being Poison, there's such an awful lot of the not-my-thingness it's a little frightening. Can't think of anything else I find very scary, though.
That Rollergirl sounds plain edible (which could be scary, I admit.) I'm kind of with you on the Black Orchid and a lot of people have trouble with the MPGs.
Balloon-phobics unite! We must stop sudden noises everywhere…
lilydale, I vote Joan Crawford over Judy. Have you seen her in “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?”
Freakishly scary.
“To me it smells like sweating out fever dreams and then waking up with sour breath and greasy hair to smoke a whole pack of port-dipped cigarillos in the nude.”
You made me snort tea out of my nose while sitting alone in a cafe, Erin. Congratulations.
Scary scents:
Poison. My mother used to wear this in MAJOR excess when I was a child, because my father brought some back for her as a gift from America, and she had no idea how much perfume was appropriate. This perfume caused MAJOR headaches during all scented car rides. Note the use of the word MAJOR.
CK Euphoria: I actually like the way it smells, but oh man, awkward situations result from its ridiculous ubiquity. My old roommate wears this, and so does one of her old lovers. After they broke up, it was always nervewracking and weird running into the ex gf, because they smelled exactly the same. Ugh.
The room-clearing fragrances for me are:
1. Kenzo flower – the one with the poppy – instant revulsion
2. Amarige by Givenchy – sour and unpleasant
3. Hypnose by Lancome – Eau de Migraine
4. Shalimar – the original – smells like the bathroom of a fussy old lady with a bad case of candida
5. Chanel Mademoiselle – there goes a nose-clogging, throat-constrictyng python of a fragrance
Every woman may appreciate a scary fragrance for days when you need to make a powerful impression but feel under the weather. This fragrance is scary to others but bearable for you.
For me the Winkin' Witch of fragrance was Magie Noire, for many years, now it's Chanel Allure Sensuelle. I can just about put up with it and I feel a powerhouse wearing it.
'…smells like the bathroom of a fussy old lady with a bad case of candida …”
aaaaaaack!!!!!!!!! dare i ask candida in which orifice, or should i assume – ALL!?!?!??! mygoodness have you provided me with a laugh!! ; )
“Every woman may appreciate a scary fragrance for days when you need to make a powerful impression but feel under the weather. This fragrance is scary to others but bearable for you. ”
useful observation there.
It's funny, because one of my favorite scents of all time is an MPG – Secrete Datura. I have had trouble with all the others I have tried.
During our 24 year whirlwind courtship, my now husband gave me White Shoulders because he gave it to his first true love. I wasn't a perfumista then but I hated it and it didn't help that he gave it to her first. I wish I still had the bottle though!
Poison is the scariest perfume ever invented and Eternity is second, IMO. I was at a baby shower on Sunday with 35 people. Someone entered whose fragrance smelled terrible. The long row of seated beauty advisors all wrinkled up their perfectly powdered noses and asked who was wearing somethng vile. My guess is that it was either Eternity, Indecence or Chloe. I have to admit though, that because she was East Indian her dark skin could definitely carry something as deep as those three. Whenever she wafted by, we were reminded of the heavy fragrance she wore. Sad, isn't it? She must've thought she smelled wonderful.
For me, what's scary is that I really like Ghost Myst because I am a fragrance specialist for a prestige line and have access to all kinds of the finest perfumes.
Worms! Eeeewww! Me too!
Oh, yeah, I forgot about Eternity. There's a horror show in a bottle, guaranteed to send me screaming out of the room. Once I was sitting in a theater next to a woman wearing it and I felt like someone was pounding a spike into my head…
I seem to remember Divine Enfant not hanging together right. The Unicorn Spell I *do* like, though, despite hating the name, but I totally understand the creosote comment.
Yes, lurv the bottle, but like the Chinatown bottle, too, and for that one the juice is a keeper, too.
And gets bonus points for a scary name!
Sadly, I love Angel, so no it's not that one.
Rootbeer?! I love rootbeer. I know that my thing about names is rather silly. I'll have to give the fragrance a fair test. Thanks for the info!
For me, it's things with lots of legs – centipedes are terrifying!
Blocked out is best. I stuck my neck under running water for 10 mins in a Paris cafe to absolutely no avail. Waiters were visibly recoiling. I deserved to go and stand in the street with all the smokers.
Shouldn't Psychotrope remind you of “Psycho”? ; – )
Yes, what on earth is up with it these days? I swear they have messed with the formula, because I get “spike through the head” now but wore it quite cheerfully 20 years ago or whenever it was. I think quite a few perfumes have been made more alarming over the years. The synthetic civet they use today has me running scared from things I also enjoyed back in the day, like Ysatis and Magie Noire. I dont' know how Amarige used to be, but the molten industrial plastic drydown is truly terrifying. A real Lady Macbeth job.
Yes, and why do they need so darn many legs, anyway?!
How about scorpions? They're so terrifyingly primitive-looking!
Poison is definitely scary when encountered on, say, an airplane. No escape
aaaah cuir venenum, not so bad, i actualy like it, much more than e.g. musc maori, bleh, that's so sweet and milky it sticks, a real horror
Thanks! Are you okay? What kind of tea? I like oolongs
Oh man, we've got Judy Garland shrieking “NO WIRE HANGERS!” and the Family Research Council guy in the Bates Motel — now I'm really getting freaked out!
I love the Asja and have two bottles of it so I won't ever run out but I am not sure what you mean about Kingdom. I haven't worn my bottle for quite some time but I never remember anything even approaching horror. For me, Secretions Magnifique is the scent that evokes horror. It smells all metallic and salty and as soon as I smell it, I feel horribly seasick. I am brought to being stuck in the middle of the ocean on a prawn trawler and this scent is an almost exact replica of the scent of the boat's bilge. UGH
Gucci Rush makes cross the street blindly, change train carriages … beyond awful. When I first smelled it on a bus, I assumed it was some pungent cleaning agent. Never thought any fragrance a person might wear could be so bad. I was wrong.
Previous contenders are Anais Anais, Poeme and, on most people, Addict. A couple more whose names elude me.
On myself I was horrified by Amarige Marriage and Absolutely Irresistible, both were very nice on paper strips.
Thanks for this thread, it can be fun writing about vile smells. Love the “cat” in the picture.
AussieBec, the first few times I tried Kingdom, ALL I got was what I figured other people were calling “cumin.” And by cumin, I'm not talking cooking in the kitchen. Total, erm, “animalic”? Or, as someone else might put it, laundry panties? Way intense…and even patience waiting for the drydown simply meant it was perhaps less intense, but still the layer over top of whatever else might be underneath.
I suppose it is unnerving to find a perfume you know in a different context. And it always unnerving to be assaulted by a perfume in a car!
Agreed – interesting observation. And I leave when encountering Hypnose, too.
Magie Noire, I love, but always think of as relatively quiet (although delightfully witchy). Perhaps I am anosmiac to some of the musks/animal notes in it.
You know, I've never tried Secretions Magnifique. It's difficult to sample around here – but I almost ordered a sample, in anticipation of writing this post, just based on how awful everybody (but LT) says it is. One of these days I'll have to try it…
Well, you were wrong about *me* – I love Rush.
One of my all time favourites. As we say around here: YMMV! I am terrified of Poeme, though, and Addict is like the olfactory equivalent of speaker feedback.
Isn't it a great pic? Thanks for commenting on it. The decanter looks like my cat. It was very generous of the photographer to let us use it – she has some fabulous photos that you can check out, if you're registered for flckr.
Ah, another PG that's too sweet for me. I think Robin likes it, though, and I want to try one of those Egg Fizzes Musc Maori reminds her of…
Maybe Rush smells good on you. Though I find that hard to believe, sorry, no offense. But I believe perfume is mainly for one's own enjoyment. So why should you care. I love to bathe in Opium and No 5. Many dont't; like them, but I couldn't care less.
Though I did smell Addict on one person who made it smell almost nice.
I spent a miserable day with Poeme on my wrist. A friend who worked in a perfumery told it was “just my sort of thing”. At the time Cool Water was my favourite (still like it), and she knew it. How she made the jump from that to Poeme still baffles me.
Initially I thought the cat was real. We have two Siamese. No access to flickr though.
The men's Cool Water, that is.
You have to try it, just to see what everyone is going on about! I have a full bottle that was given to me by a friend. I reckon it was to show me that there IS such a thing as a scrubber as I basically can wear anything without it offending me. With Kingdom, which was just discussed above, I don't remember anything about it that made me cringe but I am now dying to get my bottle and resample it to see if I can pick up on what has been said. Basically, it takes a lot to offend my nostrils and I am pretty open to most notes. The only note that I struggle with is tuberose but, the presence of tuberose in a scent doesn't mean that I won't like it. I just often find some of the tuberose scents a little overwhelming and heady. This will mean that there are days that I won't put them on but it doesn't rule out my liking them for some days.
I think my nose must be oblivious to this note or, maybe my memory is the issue! I guess not much really offends my nose. This is good when everyone you know gets you perfume as gifts, knowing my love of fragrance. This means that I don't have to just smile politely and hide the perfume away as there is a pretty good chance that, although it may not be a favourite, it will get a wear every year or two!
AussieBec, since I aim to please…would you like me to offend?, i.e., send you a samp from my bottle of Kingdom? (Methinks I can get over the loss…)
e-mail me…
I laughed when I read: “To me it smells like sweating out fever dreams and then waking up with sour breath and greasy hair to smoke a whole pack of port-dipped cigarillos in the nude.” Port-dipped and in the nude are necessary in that sentence, aren't they?
My mind is blessedly blank on the horrors I have sniffed but I don't mind balloons. Clowns should be banned.
Madame X as in the John Singer Sargent painting, I think… http://www.artchive.com/artchive/s/sargent/madame_x.jpg
The worst is Un Jardin Après la Mousson, because
a) It is a nightmare in which I am drowning, trapped in mangrove roots while praying for a sympathetic piranha to swim by and gnaw my arm off.
and
b) Jean-Claude is supposed to be my best friend and saviour, not Lord Voldemort.
Black Phonenix Alchemy Lab's Black Annis has always seemed like it would be very scary. Reviewers on their forum think so too. Now I like concept perfumes sometimes. It can be nice to smell like thunderstorms, forests, a flower bed with dirt included, but a cave scent named after a hag that eats children. Holy crap.
“Black Annis' perfume is a mixture of damp cave lichen and oak leaf with a hint of vetiver, civet and anise.”
“The blue faced hag of the British Hills. She lives in the Dane Hills, Leicestershire, in a cave called Black Annis' Bower Close, which she dug out of rock with her own iron-strong claws. Dozens of huge cats prowl the Bower with her, and it is guarded by a great pollarded oak in which she hides so that she may catch lambs and small children to eat. She carries her victims back to her cave, where she flays them alive before devouring them. She drapes their skins on her guardian oak to dry. Her skirt is fashioned from the skins of her prey, and her bed is a high-piled bed of their bones. “
Aha, interesting! Not that scary. It sounded like a name they would give an unidentified body…..
Not a lot of clown love here, is there? Glad you laughed – there *is* something funny about smoking in the nude (if you're alone anyways…)
Can't say I loved that one either. I am kind of shocked by the number of people who like it. Didn't quite make me go Evil Dead on my arm though – too bad that JCE, your dude, let you down.
Fright night scent, indeed! I can't even read that second paragraph again. BPAL actually scares me in general, with its nightmare proliferation. All those niche lines with labryrinthine websites frighten me…