"Saddle up the mare of dreams": Papillon Perfumery Epona review

Last week marked the 10th anniversary of Papillon Perfumery, the artisanal brand founded by elegant epicurean earth mother Liz Moores - whose birthday is today in fact! In that time she has released eight perfumes, and the rectangular 3 x 3 display on her website is clearly crying out to fill the bottom right hand corner with No 9. So when she announced the latest addition to the Papillon stable, Epona, set to be launched on 1st August, I was delighted by the news, not least for reasons of geometrical equilibrium. Equine equilibrium indeed, as Liz explains:

"Epona embodies the cherished memories of my bond with my beloved horse amidst the beautiful English countryside. Inspired by our intimate connection, it captures the essence of long summer days, a warm leather saddle, and the sweet meadow breath of my horse."

When I heard the name of the new perfume, I must admit that I didn't immediately twig to the connection with Liz's horse: it was rather the Spanish town of Estepona that popped into my head, which has the name "Epona" nested within it. For any grammar or maths nerds, I believe this is an example of the somewhat abstruse phenomenon known as "recursion".

Screenshot of the Papillon website!

Further searches of the word quickly revealed that Epona is a Celtic goddess, patron of mares and foals, as well as a character in the Legend of Zelda Nintendo game, and a highly engineered type of horseshoe. ;) So all in all, a very apt choice of name for the new fragrance.

Notes

Leather, Violet, "Saddle Soap Accord", Labdanum, Vetiver, Oakmoss, Petitgrain, "Horse Skin Accord"

Right off the bat you can tell that this is a perfume best appreciated by horse lovers, who will be familiar with "the rich scent of a well-worn saddle", and the saddle soap that is part of the tack cleaning ritual.

I should come right out and say that I am not a horsey person, and if anything am a little afraid of them, along with cows, sheep, and dogs - or for that matter creatures of any size that are capable of launching a surprise attack. Why, even Truffle has become alarmingly bitey of late and I have had to dial back my petting intensity after she narrowly missed a big vein. My diffidence around dobbins, as you might say, goes back to the summer of 1974, when I went pony trekking in Wales on a Scripture Union holiday (of all unlikely auspices!). Within minutes of setting off, my feisty mount cantered down a steep field and promply threw me off. Luckily I was unharmed, but I have never had the urge since to "get back in the saddle".

Source ~ WorthPoint: a plate featuring a JohnTickner drawing (1968)

Now I may not be the ideal person to relate to Epona, but I do have surprising horsey connections. My first cousin-once removed-in-law(!), John Tickner, was the cartoonist for Horse & Hound for some 20 years, and also wrote many books on the themes of country life. In a surprising twist, it turns out that Liz remembers his cartoons from when she was growing up and already a hippophile.

Then there was the old flame who held senior marketing roles in food companies, before turning his back on the gravy train and taking up painting - of race horses. He eventually became a noted equine artist. I'd never have placed a bet on that career change! And there is also the ex-girlfriend of my actual first cousin, who is a sports coach and psychologist teaching NLP techniques to riders.

But despite my own lack of affinity with horses, I was most curious to try Epona, and jumped on the sample Liz sent me as soon as it arrived.

A black pen leaked in my handbag, sorry!

On first application I get a blast of freshly mown grass mixed with a strong leather scent - of the kind you find on the more rugged end of the Spanish handbag spectrum. A friend who sniffed it on me described the smell as "rubbery", which may have been his way of describing the leather note. The arresting opening soon becomes more attenuated: the bracing dart of green disappears, giving way to a softer leather scent mixed with soap. We are definitely in Camay territory now. I found a note to myself that reads: "creamy glowing soft leather and soap". Very beautiful it is too. In the same register as Cuir de Russie, though with more soap.

I must explain that the two other people I have tried Epona on so far - an actively horsey female friend and a chap who has sat on donkeys and elephants in India, which I figured might do as well - were quite different canvases for the scent: on both of them the bright green facet was more noticeable, with longer staying power. They both liked Epona a lot, and in the case of my female friend, it was an absolute epiphany for her. She had previously avoided ALL perfume, dismissing it as "chemically" and allergy-provoking, but the second Epona landed on her skin she knew she was in the presence of luxurious and benign greatness, and was won over. Her partner is now under instructions to buy her a bottle for her birthday - a volte-face the like of which I never thought I'd see. ;)

I did!

As for me, I have continued to bury my nose in my wrist in the hope of detecting the "summer meadows" salvo again, but it seems that my version of the horse has gone back into its stable, where the fresh sappy greenery has been supplanted by straw, and a sort of animalic woodiness that might be the oakmoss or the muddy tones of vetiver. Maybe that is the "horse skin accord" kicking in, which I am obviously not in a position to confirm, but I could well believe it is exactly that. Which reminds me that another waggish friend said he was surprised there was no dung in Epona, prompting me to point him in the direction of L'Artisan's Dzing!. That said, in the drydown there is an alluring stables-cum-barnyard vibe going on - no really, I mean that - which could encompass straw at least. In the far drydown the perfume recedes to a gently soapy whisper, though I thought I could smell a faint trace of vetiver on one wrist. Basically, I think Epona may prove to be another shapeshifter, and you may get a different combination of the leather / soap / fresh greenery / muddy greenery & animalic hints compared to me - or the same combination in a different order. However it reads on your skin, I am confident you will also enjoy the ride! 

In summary - and notwithstanding the fleeting nature of the juicy greenness on me - Epona has leapt to the top of my favourites list, nudging Bengale Rouge and Hera into second and third place on the winners' podium, though I still like them both as much as ever. Hera didn't go quietly as you might imagine, poking Epona's flank with her pomegranate-topped sceptre as she stepped down. As for Bengale Rouge, I guess if this were an actual race, a horse could outrun a cat after all. (Yep, 40mph to her 30mph, I have established, though Truffle may just beat her "species best" when she sees me coming at her with a worming tablet.)

Editor's note: "Saddle up the mare of dreams" is the opening line of a song by Scarlet's Well called "Mid-morning Lily Songs" (video here). I don't expect a single reader to have placed it. ;)

Perfume Lovers London Meet-Up: "An Evening Of Leather", With More Leather Scents Than You Can Crack A Whip At...

Yes, some weeks before the second meeting of the Perfume Lovers London group at the New Cavendish Club, the upcoming talk had already acquired its snigger-worthy moniker of the "Leather Event". Some of us - well, speaking for myself, anyway - were keenly anticipating an evening of leather-themed double entendres and backhanded references to whips, canes, flagellation and tight outfits involving sturdy yet stretchy fabrics. Oh, and some perfumes that smelt of leather, maybe...

Before I had even made it down to London, I got myself into character on the self-harming front: for the train gave a sudden and violent lurch as it was nearing Euston, and I fell hard against the plastic arm of a seat, badly bruising my leg. I can't say I derived the remotest sensation of pleasure from this injury, and was in my hotel room slathering arnica on a a purple area the size of a small republic when I picked up a message from Katie Puckrik. She suggested meeting up before the talk - this time at a Lebanese restaurant near the venue. In a leatherette booth (putting us in the mood for the night's theme!) we exchanged news over a plate of falafel and - in a Middle Eastern take on petits fours - dainty, bite-size morsels of baklava.

Suitably refuelled, we headed down to Marble Arch tube station to rendez-vous with Tara of Olfactorias Travels, and the three of us made our (slightly circuitous) way to the club - I persist in thinking it is in a crescent of smart townhouses set back from the main road, instead of on the corner of the next block. Third time unerring, maybe.

The event was held in the same ornate yet cosy room as in January, and Lila Das Gupta and Grant Osborne greeted everyone warmly, proffering the usual fine drop of white wine (or juice alternative for the health-conscious or anyone mad enough to drive into Central London). It was great to see Tara and Nick again, also the Candy Perfume Boy - by our reckoning, we had not met since a Basenotes event in the summer of 2008!

Lila kicked off her talk with a brief overview of the history of perfume and its link to the glove industry. The frank tone of the evening was set early on, when our host explained how leather came to be perfumed in order to mask the odour of the urine - and sometimes faeces - used in tanning.

From here it was a short hop to the fashion for gratuitously perfumed gloves: technology advances had eliminated the need for a pleasant odorant in the manufacturing process, but by now perfumed leather had become firmly associated in people's minds with luxury goods. As well as scented gloves - of which Queen Elizabeth I owned enough pairs to rival Imelda Marcos's shoe collection, apparently - Lila cited the example of Russian jewellers wrapping precious stones in perfumed leather.

To round off this first section of the talk, we were invited to smell a couple of iconic "Historical Leathers": Knize 10 and Chanel Cuir de Russie. The former reminded me of Pledge furniture polish, while others in the group got insect repellent, and Katie pronounced it to be "sharp on my nose hairs".

When the discussion turned to Cuir de Russie, the subject of castoreum came up - and out of beavers - strictly in a dietary context, I hasten to add. For not only is the leather note in Cuir de Russie derived from birch tar, but the scent also contains castoreum from Siberian beavers who ate birch bark, infusing their musky secretions with birch by the back door, as it were - or the back passage, you might even say...

Lila also explained the connection between early leather (and tobacco) scents and female emancipation / financial independence. At this point Grant - who, armed only with his iPad, did a sterling job as ever in charge of visual aids - showed us a photo of a besuited Ann Scott-James, one of Britain's first female career journalists.

In the next section of the talk ("Cheap and Cheerful Leathers"), we took part in a fun blind test, to see if we could distinguish between the bargain basement perfume, Dana English Leather, and the vastly more expensive niche offering, L T Piver Cuir. Reader, I could! I didn't really like either to be honest, but the cheapie cologne was the more tolerable of the two. Then, after we had enjoyed a couple of cheesy period TV ads, including a raunchy and sexist one for English Leather from the 60s, Lila introduced us to her special guest, petite perfumer Liz Moores, who is releasing a leather scent of her own later this year.

Liz passed around some raw materials for us to sniff which are used to create different leather effects, starting with a birch tar that smelt like creosote, quinoline (a curious hybrid word fashioned from "crinoline" and "quinine") that had a green and aromatic facet, and suederol, which sounds like the stuff cheap patchwork handbags on a market stall might be made of. It was in fact my favourite ingredient of the three, and is sprayed by Jaguar in their new cars, presumably to enhance their naturally luxurious new car smell yet further!

Next up, Lila invited us to sample some leather scents in the other categories she had devised. So following on from "Historical" and "Cheap and Cheerful", we smelt examples from "The Middle Ground" (PG Cuir d'Iris, Parfum D'Empire Cuir Ottoman), "Beautifully Blended" (EL Azuree, Mona di Orio Vanille), "Soft Suedes" (Bottega Veneta), and "Sex God" (Dior Leather Oud). So as not to overface us, Lila omitted to circulate any scents from the "Full-On" (Mona di Orio Cuir!) or "Maverick" categories (Tauer Lonestar Memories!, L'Artisan Dzing! - which comes with integral exclamation mark!). However, some of us dared to dabble in these during the milling around part of the evening after the talk proper was over.

Grant also took advantage of our gathering to announce the results of the Basenotes Reader Awards in a "pop-up ceremony", and there was much hilarity over the Creed nominations in no fewer than three categories, and Royal Oud's subsequent triumph as Best Men's Fragrance of 2011. Grant agreed with my suggestion that Creed is the Manchester United of the niche perfume world, by which I meant that it could be a lazy default choice for those who are unfamiliar with the many options out there.

Mona di Orio won two awards (Best Perfumer and Best Perfume House), and Lila read out a touching letter from Mona's business partner, saying how much it would have meant to her if she had lived to see her work receive these accolades.

As well as complimentary samples of three of the award-winning scents (Bottega Veneta, Terre d'Hermes and Royal Oud itself), we were all given a free leather bracelet to make our leather experience complete! Lila had explained at the start of the talk that thanks to its porous surface, leather is particularly good at absorbing odour molecules, and we were encouraged to spray our bracelets with our favourite leather scent of the night. This inevitably prompted paroxysms of indecision on the part of some delegates, on a scale known only to Travalo owners, who must similarly make up their minds which fragrance in their collection they love enough to commit to this monogamous receptacle.

At one point during the evening, Lila "outed" me as having expressed a reluctance to come along in the first place. This is because I am not much of a leather fan really, give or take the odd exception like Cuir de Lancome, L'Agent by L'Agent Provocateur and Sonia Rykiel Woman (though the latter two weren't featured). I can truthfully say that I didn't discover any new leather scents to love, despite being introduced to so many in this single, intensive session. I had fun trying, though!

And unexpectedly, there was also the chance to test out the winners of the Basenotes awards. I spritzed on original Angel (which decomposed on my skin before my very nose! - Katie remarked that it smelt as though I needed to take a shower), Illmasqua Freak (which smelt more like Angel on me than the real deal), and Jennifer Aniston (a clean-smelling musky jasmine, which - had I applied it more liberally - might have made me smell as though I had taken the shower Katie recommended, along similar lines to our perfumed leather from earlier : - ) ).

So, thanks are due to Lila and Grant for a whip-crackingly good night, which was lively to the point of rumbustious! We submitted our noses to a right birching from more leather variants than you can shake a stick at, and blow me if my favourite discovery of the night may turn out to be a beachy celebrity scent. And definitely would do if regular application could give me her artlessly tousled, perfectly highlighted mane.

Photo of whip from Alaskan Dude via Wikimedia Commons, photo of glove from Magnus Manske via Wikimedia Commons, photo of beaver via Wikimedia Commons, Jennifer Aniston perfume from glamfull.com, other photos (Maroush restaurant, Lila with some of the group, Katie Puckrik talking to Liz Moores, the Candy Perfume Boy sniffing his bracelet - that isn't facial hair, though you might be forgiven for thinking so - and Tara) my own.

Four Wheeled Fragrances - Beyond the Magic Tree Air Freshener

I have been much preoccupied with my car this week - a royal blue Mini One, for any fumeheads out there who are also petrolheads! On Tuesday it had an oil change and on Wednesday I renewed its insurance. I have been busy calculating my average mileage, the length of my no claims bonus, and generally immersing myself in all manner of vehicular facts and figures.

The recent discovery of ylang ylang in Cuir de Russie prompted me to sample it again yesterday. Of all the leather scents I have tried, I find it the most feminine and wearable. It conjures up visions of petal strewn leather upholstery in the back of a white Bentley - the sort often favoured as a vintage bridal car. So Cuir de Russie seemed entirely appropriate to the automotive theme of this week's "to do" list.

This also got me thinking back to a project I did last year in the car industry. The topic was actually interior paint techniques used on "driver control interfaces" - that's "knobs" and "buttons" to you and me - but in my interviews with designers at the major manufacturers I sometimes found myself shooting the breeze in a more general way.

It was on that job that I learnt of the perfume dispenser system in the Maybach Zeppelin, a snip at 406,000 euros for the entry level model. : - ) I didn't glean much about the nuts and bolts of this gizmo, but it seems to be a souped up version of the Glade plug-in air freshener, with interchangeable flacons that sit inside a sort of snow globe on the central console. The other bottles are stored in a recess in the rear seat assembly. I'm sure my respondent said you could have up to seven different scents, but if you watch this video there seem to be only three on board. As I understood it, there are "factory fit" perfumes that come with the car - wouldn't you love to know what those are! - or you can supply your own, presumably decanting them into empty flacons that fit the dispenser. I found this video - the lady starts demonstrating the perfume system at around 6 mins 40 seconds.

http://www.worldcarfans.com/109030417628/maybach-zeppelin-first-video-showcases-luxuries

If you are not in the market for a Zeppelin, the Citroen Picasso offers a dash-mounted perfume dispenser (situated just below the hazard lights). Here too you can apparently swap scents over / supply your own, but I know even less about the mecanism behind that particular system.

And for those of you who are not thinking of buying a new car any time soon, with or without in-car fragrancing appliances, there is always the new car scent from the RAC (the UK-based motoring organisation). This claims to give even the most tired interior back its "new car smell"! A spokesman for the RAC, Prakesh Patel, said that many old cars can harbour "nasty scents such as tobacco, dog, stale milk and the 'ancient whiff of kebab'".

Jokily entitled "Eau de Voiture ~ Car Perfume", and with the proceeds going to charity, the scent is described as "an alluring blend of rich leather tones and dashboard walnut (my italics) created specially for your car", giving off "the aroma of a fresh forecourt purchase".

Yes, Eau de Voiture claims to put back not just any new car smell, but that of a more luxurious model than you probably own...For these days, the only leather trim in your average car is likely to be the sporty steering wheel and gear stick cover - if that.

I have squirted some of this ingenious fragrance at my work station and would say it smells more like a "just valeted" smell, ie a fruity sweet, chemically, freshly shampooed sort of scent, but NOT a NEW car scent as such. I get no leather and no walnut dashboard - not even the merest sliver of a veneer... I don't think I am getting box fresh polyurethane or PC/ABS either. That said, I will concede that it is a heck of a lot classier than those dangly Magic Tree air fresheners beloved by taxi drivers.

The fact that Eau de Voiture misses the mark is probably just as well, for one of the reasons why people buy new cars, apart from the smug glow conferred by the latest registration plate and - for the moment at least - the financial incentive of the scrappage subsidy, is this indefinable "new car smell". A cheap bottle of scent, had it smelled more authentic, could have done serious damage to the economies of our major car-producing countries, destroying at a squirt the recent volume growth attributable to the scrappage scheme that the industry so desperately needed. It's a sobering thought.

Meanwhile, if you want to kid leather yourself that you own a new Maybach or a vintage Bentley, may I recommend applying Cuir de Russie to the pulse points on your person before dabbing it liberally on all your driver control interfaces. Then lean back, close your eyes, and smell the magic...