The dirty green leather Chypres

La Nuit by Paco Rabanne (1985)I do like the Chypre style and particularly green, dirty, leathery types like La Nuit and also Bandit by Robert Piguet.La Nuit opens green, sappy and syrupy. There are loads of florals in here, but I can't identify any individual notes. The effect is almost cloying and probably the opening is too feminine for me to pull off in public. However, once the top notes fade,...

A rose by any other name

Having written about Rose 31 yesterday, I felt the urge to try two more rose-focused scents. I'm a sucker for roses - I love them both as a flower in my garden and on my skin, but although I adore the purity of a rose in nature, when it comes to perfume, I prefer a bit of a twist, a dark shadow over the brightness that this note often evokes.So first up is Rose Poivre, by the Different Company. Having browsed through some reviews, it seems there...

Le Labo Rose 31 and Oud 27

I am a relative newcomer to Le Labo. Although I have known about the line for some time, it is quite hard to access in the UK, unless you happen to be in London, where their line is carried at Liberty. I understand their flagship store has recently opened here too.I ordered some Le Labo samples from Luckyscent a while back, and two that I've tried a couple of times now are Rose 31 and Oud 27.Created by Daphne Bugey and released in 2006, Rose 31 has...

Perfume beginnings

Welcome to my blog on fragrance and perfume. As this is my first post and no one knows who the hell I am, it is unlikely that anyone is reading this, or if you are, perhaps you stumbled across it by accident.Firstly, in case anyone is wondering, I am blogging on perfume purely out of interest and love. It is self-gratification, and like a lot of bloggers, I can claim no genuine background in perfume - I certainly have no qualifications to write at...