Just when I was worried spring would never arrive, we are having a gorgeous, sunny day, almost warm enough for shorts. To celebrate, I am wearing Balmain’s Vent Vert, the classic green floral fragrance created by Germaine Cellier and released in 1947. Like just about everything else, this was “reworked” to appeal to modern sensibilities; the reformulation was done by perfumer Calice Becker, and I believe the relaunch was in 1990. The notes for the new version are greens, orange blossom, lemon, lime, basil, rose, galbanum, lily of the valley, freesia, hyacinth, tagetes, ylang-ylang, violet, oakmoss, sandalwood, sage, iris, amber, and musk.
Vent Vert starts out a strong, bitter, slightly perfume-y green. After a few minutes the bitterness calms and the citrus notes and orange blossom take the stage, later still, the citrus notes are replaced by the other florals…
