Mojo, Maja, Portia, and her Magicka: a spooky tale of Airbnb and Australian perfume junkies

Source: Pinterest

I feel it behoves me to mention again! that despite all appearances to the contrary I am not dead, under a rock, AWOL or lacking in mojo. Such mojo as I have has simply been channelled into a host of domestic projects on both sides of the Channel, work, cat feeding for a friend, and the now regular thread of Airbnb guests - or 'paying guests' in more generic terms rather, as they are not necessarily on that footing. I have recently also learnt the term 'fractional renter', which perfectly describes my current long stay chap, who is here three nights a week.

But it is Airbnb itself which is the trigger for this tale...When I first decided to launch myself into this sideline because my usual work was slack, Portia of Australian Perfume Junkies was very supportive, with helpful suggestions about how to maximise the appeal of my listing through more professional-looking photographs. More of Portia anon, but for now cue the other P, whose name also ends in '-ia', as it happens. For no sooner had my fractional renter left for the week than the latest Airbnb visitor arrived, a lady in her early 70s called P from northern New South Wales. I warmed to her the moment I opened the door, despite being weary beyond anything after a three day headache and sickness bug which had only just lifted(!). And despite the fact that she turned up unannounced an hour ahead of the earliest check in time, haha, and found me looking dishevelled, Hoover in hand, cable trailing all the way up the stairs. I couldn't believe that P was in her 70s, and said I had instantly assumed she was about my age. She replied that she had instantly thought I looked the same age as her younger sister - early 50s (I don't!) - so you can tell that that exchange, however removed from reality, endeared us each to the other right off the bat. ;)

P is originally from England, but moved to Australia when she was seven, in a neat parallel to my mother, who was born in Australia, but moved to England at the age of eight. Unlike my mum, P did not stay put in her adopted country, and was visiting an old colleague from her army days, in a district the other side of town. I spent a good 20 minutes looking round the house in vain for OS or other town maps at a reasonable resolution, then trying to print out walking maps that were legible on my feeble printer, before finally giving up and saying: 'Why don't I just take you there? That would be a lot easier!', and off we went. But because I was too lazy to fire up the Satnav for a journey in my own town, and had not enlarged the Google map on my phone sufficiently to include all the street names of different sections of roads, I ended up dropping P off in Witney rather than Woodstock Road(!), meaning that the much anticipated reunion with her old chum from 40 years ago got off to a puzzling start. P was very decent about my mistake, and cheerfully walked the remaining 100 yards or so to the proper address. And we were at least still in Oxfordshire...

Some five hours later, P was back (in a cab!), had posted a letter for me and picked up a fish supper, the chips from which she kindly shared. At some point in the conversation she mentioned right out of left field that people often stop her and ask what perfume she is wearing. Which was interesting, as I had indeed clocked her perfume on the landing (going one step beyond the sillage from guests' toiletries, you will note!), and had been going to ask her about that unprompted. It was even funnier when P said she couldn't actually recall what she was wearing that day! But we went on to discuss her dozen-strong collection - or the ones she could remember...;) We are still both puzzling over what bottle of hers is in a purple box (Google images didn't come up trumps despite concerted scrolling, I should add).

Coty L'Aimant - post-decimilisation, but still old!

Of the fragrances P could remember owning - though some were running low to empty - vintage Coty L'Aimant was one, also a Spanish scent she thought was called 'Magicka', which had a lady flamenco dancer in a black and red dress on the packaging. 'Oooh', I said, 'I have some vintage L'Aimant in the cupboard under the stairs, and I do have a Spanish scent called Maja?' Cue a good hour of diving into my three plastic crates of older perfumes, mostly the bounty from my friend Clare's late MIL's collection. The L'Aimant was instantly rehomed with P, and a quick search on the Net confirmed that earlier versions of Maja did indeed have the 'magicka' lady on them, so that went to P as well, along with nostalgic bottles (for her) of Lentheric Elle and Mystique, released a couple of years apart at the turn of the 80s. I felt I had really landed on my feet to find someone who truly appreciated these 'period perfumes', which I would probably never have got out again left to my own devices.

And so to bed...The next morning we sat at the dining room table again over a cup of tea, swapping notes on places we knew in Australia - for I spent a month in NSW some 25 years ago. The stuffed koala in the guest bedroom, named after the Sydney suburb of Mosman, had not escaped P's notice. Then I was just explaining how I was once chased by a kangaroo in Jarvis Bay when there was the sound of a small thud on the hall floor. A pink package had landed....from Portia of Australian Perfume Junkies! How uncannily timely was that on all three accounts of Airbnb, Oz, and matters olfactory. I wasn't remotely expecting to hear from Portia - it was one of those out of the blue RAOKs people in the perfume community spring on one another from time to time. So before I took P to her bus stop for the next leg of her UK visit, we eagerly opened the package to reveal a dear little purse from Mongolia, and some perfume samples. The purse was a particularly apt gift, as Portia had remembered I collect them, and that they had even featured in a blog post!

The timing was so spooky it was truly Twilight Zone-y. I had already spoken of Portia to P during our sniffing session, and now here was a little pouch of scents from Sydney popping through the letter box right before she set off. Five minutes later, and the magicka moment would have been missed.

Perfect timing, Portia! 'Thank me'?? Thanks so much to you rather, and to P....ia, for putting an antipodean pep in my perfumed step!

An Estate Windfall - And Why Vintage Perfume Is So Much More Than Old

Source: Vintage Perfume Vault

A friend's husband lost his father recently.  I am of that age where people around me are being orphaned left and right, and many of us have not just organised funerals but cleared and sold our parents' houses.  Mine lived apart, hence the possibly surprising plural.  Tony's mother died some years ago, and his father carried on living in the marital home.   Now that he is gone, it fell to Tony to sort the place out, including his mother's effects, which his father had not touched since her death.   You can tell where this is going, can't you...?

Yes, the other day over dinner at their house, Tony whipped out a pink cloth bag containing a purse spray, plus two other tiny miniature perfumes, and announced: "Here you go - there are more where they came from, and I'll fetch the rest when I am up at the house next."  My mini-haul comprised about 4ml of Coty L'Aimant, Lucien Long Indiscret and Goya Pink Mimosa.   Well, the Goya is empty in fact, but still smells of something prettily floral.  Pink Mimosa came out in 1947, Indiscret in 1935.  My research suggests that the two minis are most likely from the 50s or 60s, but if anyone has a more exact idea I would be glad to hear it - maybe they aren't that old?  The Coty L'Aimant has a price tag of £2.25, which places it in the era of decimalisation at least ie post 1971!  It does additionally have one of those high pressure spray mechanisms that I associate with older bottles - when were they phased out, I wonder?

Shocking pink and a fierce squirter!

L'Aimant is still readily available in drugstores for very little money - you can pick up a boxed set and still have change from a tenner.  The vintage version smells classier than the current formulation - like Rive Gauche crossed with very expensive soap.  I am not really drawn to soapy perfumes, but it is a very elegant example of the genre.

The Lucien Lelong is on the face of it absolutely not my thing - one of those fierce spicy orientals - the only modern equivalent of which I can think of being EL Spellbound.  Here is Angela of NST's take on an Indiscret estate find of her own from the same era:

Civet and spice and all things (strangely) nice!

"My guess is the bottle I bought — flat, octagonal, with gold cap and rubber stopper — was from the 1950s. On skin it smelled spicy, woody, powdery, and floral and was reminiscent of Millot Crepe de Chine but with a definite clove note. Its floral heart was tight and seamlessly blended, giving the shape rather than the distinct fragrance of jasmine, ylang ylang, carnations, and other flowers I can’t suss out."

Donna of PST also reviews the vintage Indiscret:

"However, once it’s been on the skin for a while, it reveals itself to be the real thing, as the distinctive rich, spice-laced heart notes are still there, and once I got over the opening I loved it."

I have nothing to add to their descriptions really.  Indiscret reads rather severe and aloof to me (spiky, not fluffy!) - and the carnation and/or clove is too jarring for my taste, though it softens with time.  Yes, by the far drydown, it had taken on a creamy, almost dreamy aspect, with the florals still prickling with spice and mired in civet.  I should have hated it, but found myself oddly mesmerised.

More vestigial molasses than perfume

As for the Goya, the best I can say about the scent itself from the rim of the bottle is that it is an indistinct spring floral - however, I had a lot of fun with it otherwise.  I am not sure there is a word for the perfume bottle equivalent of potato printing.  If anyone can tell me what this black inky stuff is, I would be fascinated to know.

Is it a leopard?  Is it going to come off with pumice stone?

Now I can't pretend to say that sniffing these perfumes brings back memories of Dorothy, as Tony's mother was called, because it doesn't.  I never met her.  I did attend her funeral as it happens, but that was mainly in the capacity of chauffeur.  I do, however, like to imagine the 50s through furniture - I own a cabinet from that period which once belonged to the someone's granny in Bootle - I love to imagine where it has been and what it has "seen".

Must sort out those cables

In summary, I have never been especially interested in vintage scents, not least because so many seem to be of this austere oriental or chypre style, but I am not "agin" the category either - I very much sniff as I find.   I guess my newfound love of period furniture easily crosses over into an appreciation of old artefacts generally, including perfume.  Yes, my recent windfall has definitely piqued my curiosity in vintage scents,  and I await with interest to see what Tony comes back with from his next decluttering session at the family home...