Il Profvmo Nuda: A Birthday Bottle In Its (Almost) Birthday Suit!

I wasn't expecting any gifts of perfume for my birthday this week, just as I didn't expect any at Christmas. Most of my friends and family are bemused at my 70+ strong full bottle collection, and don't think I should be encouraged to acquire any more - or not until there have been significant advances in cryogenics - and they are of course right. So thank goodness for enablers, I say! My Queen of Enablers down the years has been the very generous Lovethescents, who this year sent me a nearly full bottle of Il Profvmo Nuda for my birthday.

Nuda is a fragrance I sniffed for the first time last summer with Olfactoria in Vienna, when I described it as "a 'cold cream' skin scent – like a more refined version of Clinique Simply crossed with a de-floraled Dior New Look 1947, if that makes any sense at all to anyone".

Then in April this year I came across Nuda by chance again in Stuttgart, managing to resist the half price bottle on sale in Mußler Beauty. Not long after that trip to Germany, as I was still toying with the idea of buying the bargain bottle by mail order, Lovethescents dropped me a line, urging me not to bother because Nuda was "horrible". I can't locate the original email, but that was the general gist.

I remember thinking at the time that that was an odd remark, as it was Lovethescents who had originally alerted me to this scent and who was also a big fan - or so I thought. I chose to disregard her apparent volte-face, for having tested Nuda twice myself I was pretty sure I liked it well enough. It ticks that box of an easy to wear, calming, silky soft skin scent. And now with the benefit of hindsight I can see that this was merely a cunning ruse on my friend's part to stop me buying a bottle myself, as she had presumably already snagged it for me. : - )

Yes, notwithstanding the fictitious bad press which had preceded its arrival, my "naked joy" was unalloyed as I unwrapped the parcel to find the super securely-taped bottle of Nuda inside. I have stringent wrapping standards myself, as regular readers know - Diana of Feminine Things recently paid tribute to the quality of my bubble wrapping of a large bottle of Marc Jacobs I sent her. And I have previously devoted entire posts to the subject of packing materials, including the all-important electrical tape which plays such a key role in pre-empting perfume leakage en route.

Yes, I may have high personal standards when it comes to tape, but Lovethescents exceeded them all with this impressive triangular construction in a cheery shade of yellow. It reminded me of those Unidentified Large Industrial Objects - at the more obscure end of the "abnormal load" spectrum - which are transported on equally abnormally wide vehicles, lashed securely in place with a scaffolding of radiating ropes.

Or there again, it has a bit of a look of a maypole about it, for example on young Sydney's cake below.

Photo of maypole cake from blog.craftyribbons.typepad.com, other photos my own