'In the midnight hour, she cried: "Myrrh, myrrh, myrrh"': Puredistance SHEIDUNA review

After eight years, I would probably describe my interest in perfume as 'mature'. That's 'mature' in the sense of being in a plateau phase - I don't mean to imply that I am any more knowledgeable about the subject of fragrance than I was when I first got into this hobby. And the recent twitchiness of my skin means that my interest has been going backwards if anything, not helped by the slew of 'nouveau niche' releases that continue to flood the market, many of them a sorry epitome of style and hiked price over substance.

But as jaded and scent-shy as I have become of late, my perfume mojo never fails to perk up at the mention of a new Puredistance release. For while the Dutch brand trades on an undeniably luxury platform, their products are developed slowly and thoughtfully, with quality ingredients and a high degree of attention to detail in every aspect of the marketing mix.

So when a sample package arrived the other day with SHEIDUNA, the latest addition to the still not overly populous Puredistance stable - I know, I know, they are still on a roll with their CAPITALISATION OF NAMES - I fell upon it with glad cries, metaphorically speaking. In the PR material for SHEIDUNA I had noted that the planned colour scheme for this scent was based around orange and red, and was pleased to see the use of 'red brown paper', if that makes sense, for the outer wrapping of the parcel.

Inside the black outer cardboard was the usual white 'padded coffin'-style coffret lined with sumptuous gold satin. The perfume itself was delivered this time in a small, refillable purse spray (as opposed to the Travalo used to present Penhaligon's Juniper Sling); of particular interest to me as a long time bottle splitter and sample maker was the inclusion of a small gold funnel to use when decanting from the full-sized test tube bottle of SHEIDUNA the company is clearly confident we will one day wish to own.

But back to our muttons. Readers, it is a very fine funnel indeed, of sturdy construction with optimum hole diameter and smooth, well finished edges. And I speak as someone who owns a whole clatter of tiny, tinny, sharp and useless funnels I got in a job lot from China. And even some of my better quality ones have such a narrow aperture that perfumes of higher viscosities sometimes refuse to pour through the blessed things at all. So, never mind the perfume, big fat tick for the funnel right off the bat!

On a side note, I have to mention that in her nice little card with the parcel, Puredistance's PR lady, Mary Gooding, wrote Sheiduna in lower case. Yes indeed! I like the idea that she kicks back from time to time and doesn't stand on capitalised ceremony.

And before getting into the perfume itself, a quick word on the name. You can readily see where Puredistance are going with SHEIDUNA: it is another of those sultry desert-inspired numbers, like Ormonde Jayne Ta'if and l'Air du Désert Marocain, for the likes of which I personally have a quite voracious appetite. And if this were a game of Countdown it would be the work of a moment to make 'SHEIK' and 'DUNE' out of the name. Okay, if you had a 'K' and an 'E' admittedly, but bear with me. (Just checked the PR material and the name was in fact invented from the words 'She', 'Sheika' and 'Dune', 'sheika' being a married woman / wife of a sheik. I didn't guess 'she' - not a high enough word score, obviously, to be on my radar, but I was in the right ball park as you can see.)

Interestingly, I read in a Basenotes comment that 'sheiduna' in Arabic means 'female devil'. I cannot find anything to corroborate this spelling in Google, though 'sheitan' comes up. From this it is surely a short hop and skip to SHEIDUNA as female dune-dwelling devil.

Then further to the Billy Idol song of the title (Rebel Yell, slightly adapted), I don't know why, but the song 'My Sharona' by The Knack popped into my head as soon as I thought of SHEIDUNA, and has remained an annoyingly persistent earworm ever since. It is possibly that song title that has made me now associate SHEIDUNA with the VW SHARAN, the Kia SEDONA, and other (not usually capitalised) SUVs of that kidney. That is after all just the sort of rugged vehicle you need when exploring the challenging terrain in question.

Source: Wikipedia

Here is the official Puredistance statement of the scent's inspiration:

"SHEIDUNA is a rich and intense Perfume inspired by the panoramic views and feel of golden sand dunes in the desert during sunset - soft female curves changing from deep gold to warm, orangey red - embodying a promise of sensual comfort and silent seduction."

I must say I had never thought of sand dunes in quite that way before, but come to think of it their globular nature does rather lend itself to such comparisons. The other key aim of the creative brief from Puredistance founder Jan Ewoud Vos was 'to create the perfume marriage between Oriental Sensuality and Parisian elegance'.

Orange and red Persian rug from Central Casting

Then I greatly enjoyed trying to decipher the notes which passed back and forth between perfumer Cécile Zarzokian and Jan Ewoud Vos during the development process. I see that Catherine Deneuve, Eva Green and Charlotte Rampling are cited as muses, and that the perfume should be sensual, veering towards sexual, without tipping over into vulgarity. Or was it supposed to tip over slightly into vulgarity? I can't quite make out the snippet which may or may not say: 'Hint of vulgarity'. So of course I had to write to Mary and ask for clarification, also of the word that on balance probably isn't 'Cabillaud', which is 'cod' in French. Mary told me that my phantom cod was in fact 'Cotillard', the surname of a French actress, singer-songwriter, environmentalist and spokesperson for Greenpeace (Wikipedia informs me).

Marion Cotillard ~ Source Wikimedia Commons (George Biard)

I didn't get any further with the vulgarity issue, mind, for Mary replied:

"I spoke with Jan Ewoud about deciphering the rest of the post card and he explained that the card is meant for feeling, not analysing. Please take the feelings and emotions you have when viewing the cards with the earliest hand-written notes and messages between Jan Ewoud and Cécile Zarokian to bring you a little closer to the development of the concept. 

I hope this proves to be an interesting endeavour for you!" 

It certainly did. I like a bit of mystery at the end of the day.

So how does SHEIDUNA smell?

Well, first up, here are the notes;

Lemon, tangerine, blackcurrant, aldehydes, Bulgarian rose essence, geranium, clove, vetyver, patchouli, amber woody incense, benzoin, myrrh, tonka bean, vanilla pods and musks

Eyeballing that list I was immediately reminded of the notes of Puredistance 1, with which there is a surprising amount of crossover.

Fresh tangerine blossom, cassis, neroli bigarade, magnolia, rose wardia, jasmine, natural mimosa, sweet amber, vetyver, white musk

Diptyque's L'Ombre dans l'Eau and Baume du Doge by Eau d'Italie also sprang to mind, with their crackling tension between (respectively) blackcurrant and orange notes - and myrrh. While the mixture of aldehydes and incense inevitably conjures up Serge Lutens' La Myrrhe.

Tried burning the stuff once but it was myrrh trouble than it was worth

In the opening to SHEIDUNA, the crystalline texture of the myrrh coupled with the amber base convey a simultaneously warm and granular feel, as befits the sandscapes which form the thematic backdrop to the scent. (Purple prose alert!!) The prickly heat effect is further reinforced by a coruscating canopy of spiced aldehydes. To my nose there is a vaguely odd aspect to the scent at this point, possibly because of the juxtaposition of fruit and the amber woody incense accord, or just the latter on its own packing a punch - I can't quite put my finger on it. The feeling of oddness varies from spray to spray - depending perhaps on how liberal I am with the application. But if you are happy to wait a little while, SHEIDUNA soon gets into more classical 'desert oriental' territory. I LOVE the drydown in particular, when the scent becomes a fuzzy caressing tingle of ambery incense. I am sorry, I have tried several versions of that sentence and they all sound a bit louche. Yes, there is a lot going on here that I cannot begin to describe, but as ever with Puredistance scents, you really can't see the join.

Puredistance display in Fortnum & Mason

SHEIDUNA is opulent and elegant and mysterious and completely its own thing: it is not simply an oriental spin on Puredistance 1 as I at first wondered - and if you like any or all of the fragrances mentioned earlier there is a good chance you will enjoy it, singular opening notwithstanding. A perfume with three separate notes that smell of vanilla already has a lot to commend it in my book.

I also tried SHEIDUNA out on the trusty sounding board that is my elderly friend - Facebook friends will recognise who I mean. She didn't want to sniff my skin itself, as she got enough of a whiff some inches away. 'It's creamy', she remarked, adding: 'It's nice', and as an afterthought: 'I wouldn't call it delicate.' Which may have been a reference to SHEIDUNA's powers of projection...or the fact that it does contain a 'hint of vulgarity' after all. ;) My elderly friend seemed to approve either way.

And as well as Rebel Yell, I am minded of a track by The Monochrome Set called Rain Check; it is a surprisingly jaunty ditty about cheating death, who is depicted as a black caped figure swinging his cane and smelling of (presumably) funereal incense:

"The scent of myrrh on your skin..."

SHEIDUNA, the scent of myrrh, and so much more.

Going the Puredistance (III!) to pin down M: a 'wild vial chase' from MI6 to E10

Source: Wikimedia Commons

About a month ago, I had an email from Puredistance, announcing a redesign of the packaging of their perfume collection.

"We also updated our box and ribbon colours to match the emotion of each fragrance in our line. We call this our 'Puredistance Family' because each fragrance truly has a different character, like a family....We encourage you to choose your favourite Puredistance, and evaluate it through the lens of the family and its DNA."

So below is the line up of the new boxes - and very pretty and nicely coordinated they are too. In the spirit of Sabine's recent PLL talk about associating colour with perfumes - which Tara documented over on Undina's blog - I must say the fawn and red combo for Opardu strikes me as an unusual choice. Opardu I see very much in the shades of Monet's lily paintings - to wit greens, blues and mauves. Then for WHITE they have gone with orange, which arguably looks classier than egg yolk yellow, while Puredistance 1 is all white. I must say that with the juice being amber coloured I would have swapped those over and given the orange ribbon to Puredistance 1, and maybe picked a more muted buttery yellow ribbon for WHITE. Then BLACK is all black, which is fair enough, while M has aptly distinguished accents of grey. The sage green for Antonia also chimes with my mental image of that scent, on account of its strong green opening.

Source: Puredistance

Now I don't suppose that any of the above commentary constitutes 'evaluating my favourite perfume through the lens of the Puredistance family', which is probably BLACK still, though I reserve the right to change my mind at any time. ;) When writing my post on the ROADS Fragrances from Ryanair (all these capitalised names, what's that ALL ABOUT?!) I was vividly reminded of the peppery opening of BLACK by something similar in Harmattan, albeit BLACK has a marked cinnamon note as I recall. But that is as far as that smattering of evaluating went.

A little while later, Puredistance sent me a sample set with all six fragrances in it, but I already have samples of each somewhere, so the gift, generous as it was, didn't make me feel any more inspired or predisposed to (re-)evaluate BLACK (review here), and I just put them in the wardrobe for reference. And then, the other day, something quite unrelated came up that prompted me to dig out my samples of M...and thereby hangs a tale, and the subject proper of this post.

Source: guideautoweb.com

I have a perfumista friend I shall call R, who is still very much at the feverish acquisition stage of the hobby - regularly cruising brand websites and T K Maxx for bargains, and messaging me periodically in a pumped up state with news of the latest deep discount she has spotted. I can totally relate to this 'trigger-happy squirrel' mindset, as I was like that for a good four(?) years maybe. Anyway, like all good perfumistas, R is keen to introduce others in her circle to the niche perfume scene, including a particular work colleague who seemed receptive to the notion of expanding his scented horizons. She was putting together a little collection for him to try and I said I would be happy to lob in a few of my own samples that were either squarely masculine or unisex at the very least. It occurred to me to send her Puredistance M, that rugged leather chypre with oriental overtones, which I must admit I never bonded with all those years ago when I first tried it. It was too birch tarry I think, and computed as a bit 'Burt Reynolds-chested' back then. Ah, but as you know, my tolerance for powerful scents of one kind and another has come on by lascivious leaps and butch bounds since then - witness my surprise rapprochement with Papillon Salome, for example. So I got out my samples, was pleasantly surprised at how relatively smooth the leather aspect of M was this time round, and randomly picked a vial to send.

MI6 HQ ~ Source: Wikipedia

Well, it turns out I picked the wrong one, for my friend reported that the vial refused to spray. Point blank refused. Didn't appear to even have a hole to speak off through which a spray could even have been coaxed. I suggested swivelling, wrenching and decanting, taking a knife to it - or a more surgically precise pin. I wondered about putting her husband T on the case, having recently clocked a Facebook post by him about his successful refurbishment of two anglepoise lamps. T seems the practical sort who could wield a pin with panache. And still, despite the best efforts of both, the M vial wouldn't yield up its secrets - though that is of course entirely in character for a perfume based on a member of the Secret Intelligence Service, MI6, in a James Bond film. As luck would have it, when presented with the samples R's colleague thought he could just catch a whiff of M even so, and liked what he smelt.

Source: Puredistance

So, concerned by the recalcitrance of this sophisticated yet secretive scent, I promptly offered to post on my other vial, thinking I could maybe manage without a reference sample. The compelling need here in my view was to capitalise on R's colleague's newly awakened interest in M. Too lazy to go to the post office, I popped the vial into an ordinary envelope - without one of the mandatory ID8000 hazardous goods stickers! A week passed, and my friend and I puzzled over the non-appearance of the second sample, ironically the one with a functioning spray mechanism. And then finally R received a card from the Royal Mail saying that they were holding the item for collection, subject to the payment of the required excess postage. Oh, the shame! Not only had I risked this precious atomiser without the correct label, but I had also - in a moment of 'Pureabsentmindness' - put a normal first class stamp on instead of a 'large letter' one. I was fulsome in my apologies, while R's husband - who is semi-retired - was despatched to the sorting office the following day to retrieve the offending envelope.

Later, I received a message from R:

"T picked up the perfume - he had a 3 hour round trip cos they sent him to the wrong place. They felt sorry for him so didn't charge!"

T has a free bus pass at least ~ Source: geograph.org.uk

My reaction was a mixture of guilt for inadvertently sending my friend's husband on a wild goose chase, and amazement that the Royal Mail didn't charge him the fee for excess stampage, his flagrantly circuitous route to the sorting office notwithstanding. R assured me that it was all fine:

"Nooooooo Vanessa it's okay!! It did him good to get out of the house!"

And then suddenly the other day, I remembered Jan Ewoud Vos's creative concept for M the perfume:

"Puredistance M is about James Bond-like excitement we every now and then need to escape from boring routines and a dull life."

Well, T may not feel his schlepp round the sorting offices of East London quite counts as 'James Bond-like excitement', but his day definitely took an unexpected turn and he certainly went the distance so his wife's colleague could sniff this scent in all its back of an Aston Martin leather splendour. Many thanks are due to T and the uncharacteristically humane Royal Mail clerk who served him!


PS I happen to share the same birthday as Ian Fleming. Maybe this explains why the chairman of a stairparts company once dubbed me 'the Mata Hari of the spindle world' for my spy-like exploits on strategic research studies.

Puredistance WHITE review: honky-tonka yellows and lazy hazy daisies

'Tonka beans blogger's own'

I seem to start every review of a Puredistance scent by saying what a fan I am of the house: their friendly people, their relaxed PR style and unstuffy approach to the very concept of luxury products which is the backbone of the brand. It may not be the case anymore, but for a while there I was the only blogger to have made the trip to their offices, tucked away in a lofty converted church in Groningen, where I  (very loosely) interviewed Jan Ewoud Vos over tea and apple cake. Of the six perfumes they have launched to date, I was very taken with Puredistance 1 and the startlingly upper case BLACK, but didn't get on so well with Opardu, much to my chagrin, as everything about its concept and composition should have appealed. And it wasn't just me - two fellow bloggers have sniffed me wearing it, and pronounced it to be pleasant, but not spectacular - and not to smell of very much beyond a veil of white musk. But more of that anon....my subsequent volte-face on this wistful lilac beauty deserves a post of its own, I sense.

So nowithstanding my underwhelmed reaction to Opardu, I was very excited about the release of WHITE, the capitalised counterpart to BLACK, one infers. It is a tribute to the palpable enthusiasm and verve of the staff at Puredistance that they can still whip me into a fervour of anticipation at this semi-jaded plateau stage in my hobby. I must admit that some of that excitement is due to the exquisite way in which they present their press packs. Well, I wasn't so keen on Opardu on that score actually, as the sample vial arrived in a clunky big black lacquer box, which frankly seemed like overkill, also on the postage front. But my sample of WHITE arrived in a flattish white box, which opened to form a sort of 3D picture frame-stroke-diarama, in tones of white and gold / cornfield yellow, featuring a white silk lining - and oh joy! - an actual dried daisy!

Readers, I inspected this flower very thoroughly, and its very fragility (I accidentally dropped it twice on the floor) tends to confirm that it is REAL. That fact is worthy of upper case letters, I feel. It instantly took me back to my childhood, when I used to make collages of 'found things', as well as pressing the coloured foil wrappers of sweets between the leaves of weighty novels - or flowers (and once infamously, a roadkill lizard!) in the pages of a beloved scrapbook. The whole pack had a lovely aura of an adorable interactive educational toy-cum-ornament-cum-picture. The company had also generously enclosed a coffret of all the Puredistance scents, which is a great aide-memoire, not least because I had drained my vial of Opardu and was keen to try it again.  But I will save that story for another time, as I say...;)

Accompanying the box was a rather attractive flyer with a radiant sun design in this same buttery, muted yellow veering to old gold. It features a handwritten note from Puredistance's PR lady, plus sketches of the key ingredients in the new scent for handy identification! Who knew that vetiver looked like a shaving brush?! (Or it does when it is in a bundle, say, while patchouli looks surprisingly like vetch.) There is also an account of the inspiration behind the fragrance, and a list of its 'ingredients' (unexpectedly partly capitalised!) and their provenance, to wit:

"Rose de Mai from France, Tonka bean absolute from Venezuela, Orris absolute from Italy, Sandalwood from Mysore, Bergamot from Italy, Musk, Vetyver from Haiti and Patchouli from Indonesia."

I am not usually one for backstories - or let's say I approach them with a certain degree of caution - but I rather like the premise for WHITE. Here is an excerpt from the leaflet:

"The main idea behind the creation of Puredistance WHITE Perfume has been to create a perfume so beautiful and positive that it gives the wearer an instant flow of happiness. We asked Master Perfumer Antoine Lie (who also created Puredistance BLACK for us) to create a white and golden dream; an intimate escape from harsh reality....In this era of global negativity our aim is to give our customers a positive, mood transforming perfume. We hope WHITE will make many moments in your life a little bit more beautiful and colour your world in shades of serene white and warm gold - instead of grey. ;)"

My bedroom: fortuitously in this exact colour scheme!

I like the addition of the smiley face - possibly also a reference to a certain film doing the rounds at the moment, hehe...? ;) But anyway, I like the concept - I have blogged myself recently on the subject of bad stuff in the news and the current, rather downbeat Zeitgeist - so it is a nice thought that Puredistance are seeking to yank people out of that slough of despond, and neatly bridge the gap between winter and spring with WHITE's combination of white and gold tones. For this perfume doesn't evoke simply white to me - it is richer than that. A fitting crossover scent for the chilly yet sunny days of early March we are experiencing at the moment...there are some yellow coloured flowers in gardens - daffodils, crocuses, tulips - but it could just as easily hail at any moment, and did do on Sunday! So the timing for a fragrance launch with that message - both weatherwise and in terms of counteracting negative events in the media - is spot on.

So how does WHITE smell?

Well, I have tried it three times now on consecutive days, with pretty consistent results, though I might get more or less of the floral notes poking through, like spring bulbs in our flowerbed analogy. My overriding sensation, however, is of a seamlessly blended nutty, woody, slightly peppery?, tonka-centric gourmand scent. The tonka itself has those characteristic overtones of coumarin and hay as well as vanilla, which lend it a slightly sterner, drier, more offbeat facet - possibly buttressed by the vetiver. Now I don't know what the scent of a daisy is exactly, but I imagine it might also be a bit austere and vegetal, so in that regard it is a fitting emblem to represent this scent, not least because of its teaming of these two signature colours within its own flower.

Then texturally - you know how big I am on texture ;) - WHITE is muzzy and musky - and warm in very much the style, if not the scent, of Puredistance 1. By the same token it is also quite tenacious. WHITE is 'thickish' and opaque rather than sheer, and although I did spot the odd appearance of iris, I can't say I detect rose at any stage. I should mention that my nose / skin tends to amplify anything on the tonka-heliotrope spectrum, and I see tonka as a halfway house towards heliotrope, although I may be completely wrong there. For me, tonka and heliotrope both hover around that vaguely almondy, milky foody territory, with just a hint of a bitter or anisic twist.

In terms of any other perfumes WHITE resembles, the only one that sprang to mind was PG Tonkamande, though it is a while since I sniffed that, and there is only partial crossover, notewise. On my skin, WHITE is so tonka-forward, at least initially, that it sets itself apart in that way. So overall I would say that I like WHITE quite  a lot; it does fit the brief of being warming and comforting in these troubled times. I particularly like its quieter phase about 1-2 hours in, when the coumarin-y aspect of the tonka has settled down, and the composition becomes a little sweeter and more floral (more the iris than the rose, in fairness). The feel of the scent on skin is also more silken and smooth than at the outset. This is when WHITE truly slips into its lazy, hazy, dreamy phase. And after my unexpected bonding with the later stages of MAAI, readers will not be surprised to hear that I am well up to a bit of waiting now when it comes to a perfume's development. ;) I can see myself progressively warming to WHITE, indeed. I would say that it is not an obvious perfume, but strikes me rather as something of a grower.

In the Puredistance literature, I note that the people on whom WHITE was tested 'immediately started to smile and then started to smell again, telling us WHITE filled them with happiness.' I would imagine they must be bigger fans of tonka bean than me. For that reason, I doubt that I will ever feel mad love for WHITE in its entirety, as I am not that keen on tonka bean when it's centre stage like this, and I think you really have to be to fully appreciate WHITE. But props to Puredistance for going a rather unconventional route with this latest release, nailing their white and yellow colours to the tonka mast!

Then on a whim, I googled the origin of 'Honky-tonk blues' which inspired the first part of my title. I knew it was a song, but didn't know what about. I learnt that 'honky-tonk' refers to both a style of country music and the rather rickety bars in which it was performed. 'Honky' on its own, meanwhile, appears to have been a pejorative nickname used for white people, possibly originating in Chicago's meatpacking plants. Well, we'll draw a veil over this nugget of info, as that way lies more gloom and negativity(!), except to say...how curious that 'honky' should mean white.  And of course WHITE is designed to drive away the blues, by suffusing the world in white and yellow. Of which it does a pretty good job, I'd say, all things considered.

Not the right yellow, but still ~ Source: ratemymusic.com

PS A props credit is due to Victoria Frolova of Boisdejasmin, who gave me the tonka beans when I visited Brussels in 2012. I knew they would come in handy one day!

My equally colour-coordinated bedroom wool stash!

The 'Careful Whispers' series: No 2 - Puredistance BLACK review

Back in August, Undina of Undina's Looking Glass blogged about the upcoming fragrance from Dutch luxury perfume house Puredistance - the succinctly named BLACK - which is due to be launched in November.  All we had to go on was the press release, which described BLACK (created by French perfumer Antoine Lie) as an 'understated elegant and mysteriously charming perfume inspired by the concept of BLACK; a concept that for centuries has been associated with secrets, mystery and style...The essence of the concept was to create a perfume that is close to the wearer and releases sensual and elegant scent layers in a whispering way - without shouting.'  There was additionally a clue as to its fragrance family - we were told that it would be 'more masculine and oriental' than Puredistance 1.  And then came the kicker:

'And as a consequence of the concept of BLACK, we will not reveal the ingredients of Puredistance BLACK...Envision, Smell, Feel.  Don't analyse.'

Source: Puredistance

In the comments to Undina's post, readers weighed in with predictions as to how this latest addition to the Puredistance stable might smell, and we discussed our take on the company's wish to create an aura of mystery around its new fragrance, which extended to new levels of coyness around the idea of publishing fragrance notes. I speculated about how masculine it would be:

"I clocked the ‘elegant, mysterious and whispering’ (yay!), but wondered if for 'BLACK' one should read 'butch'."

And now my sample is here - thanks, Samira!!  I was so keen to test it that I whacked it on just as I was going out the door to a meeting in Edgbaston, taking a leap of faith that its elegant whispering ways with a masculine leaning would make it appropriate as an 'office scent'.  More on how it smells in a moment...

Sexiest Jiffy bag ever!

First of all, I would like to say that I have a lot of time for Puredistance as a company.  They are one of my favourite niche houses, no question.  For the people at Puredistance have always been unstintingly friendly, appreciative and generous in their dealings with bloggers, an impression that was only reinforced when I called into their headquarters in Groningen towards the end of a long business trip in 2011. The team working for Puredistance is young, dynamic, professional, and totally enthused by their product range.  And for such a high end brand, I was struck by how completely unstuffy they were. As I recounted in my post about that visit, Jan Ewoud Vos endeared himself to me hugely when he offered me some apple cake for the road, and proceeded to wodge a big piece into one of their pristine perfume boxes with its padded satin lining!  Nor did they bat an eyelid when, in my review of Puredistance 1, I likened their packaging to a 'top of the range coffin'.

So while I am predisposed to like the house and their perfumes, I don't get on with all of them.  M is too masculine for my taste (only to be expected, really). And the musk in Opardu was problematic on my skin, though it was an unequivocably tender and pretty scent.  And even though I was concerned that BLACK might go the same way as M, I was still unfeasibly excited to try it.

Packaging for Opardu sample - foam strips galore!, with a velvet veneer

And whereas my sample of Opardu had come in a disproportionately large and clunky box - protected by an assortment of foam strips I found so intriguingly odd that I have kept them to this day, long after the perfume vial had been drained - BLACK came in more minimalist packaging, of which I heartily approve. Moreover, the padded, bubble wrap-style envelope, was also black!!  What an inspired move!  So I was already well on the way to liking BLACK, even though I had yet to extract the vial from its size-appropriate satin baglet (see photo at top of post).

There was a flyer in the package in a black envelope, and a black business card from Jan Ewoud Vos, on the reverse of which one of his staff had written - using black fountain pen at a guess, or a high end felt tip maybe:

'Envision. Smell. Feel.  Don't analyse...', reprising the injunction of the press material.

Hold on a minute...I am a market researcher, analysing is in my D & A!  So forgive me if I cock a small snook at that injunction right off the bat...;-)  As for 'envisioning', well I'm never going to do that, am I?  I might picture in my mind's eye, or do a bit of imagining perhaps.  The only people I know of who could 'envision' without so much as a backward glance are creative types in ad agencies and government think tanks, PR execs - oh, and the odd political speech writer.

So I will kick off by describing how BLACK smells, which may involve a bit of light comparison, and some pretty wild note guessing, just for fun. Then if this post hasn't got too long by that point, I will shut my eyes and have a crack at a little visualisation...

Right, so the opening of BLACK is hotly spicy, and I was instantly reminded of Neela Vermeire's Trayee and Penhaligon's Elixir.  For the purposes of this review I am wearing all three, plus Le Labo's Poivre 23, and I can confirm that the spices in BLACK are nothing like the Le Labo scent, so I can exclude that from my inquiries - they are sharper and drier.  This piquant phase is relatively shortlived, especially compared with Trayee, and it is not long before BLACK has melded with my skin (yup, I can absolutely vouch for the staying close to the wearer part!) and embarked on its whispering phase.

How fortuitous that I had already devised this series of perfume reviews founded on the very principle of whispering...;-)

Elixir sample - also in black packaging!

There is another part of the press release which states that BLACK 'stays in the shadow, giving away - only every now and then - part of its delicate nature'.  That is also true - it really is extremely quiet after the opening salvo of spice.

So to recap, I think I am on safe ground by stating that this is some kind of woody/spicy/incense-y oriental. Eyeballing the commonalities between Elixir and Trayee - and having an almost certainly doomed punt to fill in the gaps - I would guess that the notes might include some combination of cinammon, cardamom, pepper, incense, vanilla, cedar and sandalwood - and maybe vetiver, amber or even musk to round the whole thing out, but I really haven't got a clue...;-)

I should also mention that the similarities between BLACK, Elixir and Trayee are mainly at the start - beyond that BLACK settles into a much more gauzy veil-like effect, while Trayee's hot spiciness persists all the way to the drydown - it just gets progressively softer.  I'd even say that BLACK is similar to its 'Careful Whispers' stablemate, Penhaligon's Iris Prima, specifically in that diffusive, indistinct regard, but a woody/spicy/oriental version, if that makes any sense.

Spice poster - Source: Wikimedia Commons

If there are any flowers in BLACK they are not making themselves known to me.  I note, however, that both Trayee and Elixir have jasmine in them, and I never noticed it there, so who knows? - maybe there is a smidge of jasmine in BLACK too, deftly blended into the softly spicy, thrumming base.

While - to come over all capitals myself for a moment - I ABSOLUTELY LOVE BLACK, to the point where it has just gone and pipped Puredistance 1 as my favourite of the line!, I can imagine that some people may find it a tad too quiet.  I sense there are fumeheads out there who are by no means after perfumes that 'shout' as such, but who prefer them to have a normal speaking voice, say.

And that is probably all I have to say as regards my cheeky and hopeless stab at deconstructing BLACK. So now I am going to have a crack at the envisioning bit - here goes...!

I am dressed pretty much top-to-toe in black: black boucle wool belted jacket, black jeans, black patent chunky heeled shoes, black eyeliner and lashings of black mascara, just stopping the right side of demented spider.  I am wearing my black leather bracelet I got at the Leather evening of Perfume Lovers London, and my black 'flittersniffer' earrings made from Belgian lace.  I am off to meet my friend R, who has a sleek bob of jet black hair and wears a lot of black herself.  She turns out to be wearing a black and red shift dress and black ballet pumps, and has spritzed on either Bvlgari Mon Jasmin Noir or Ralph Lauren Notorious - both glossy black carded samples I gave her, which smell fabulous and completely different on her.  We meet in the sepulchral gloom of a popular nightspot and battle our way towards the bar, nearly deafened by a cacophonous wall of sound, as it is always heaving at the weekend.  I steal a whiff of my wrist, a momentary reverie amidst the jarring Saturday night revelry.  My scent of the evening is ethereal yet warm, wistful yet comforting...I am of course wearing Puredistance BLACK.

Going The Puredistance (II): Tea And Dutch Apple Cake With Jan Ewoud Vos And His Team

To mark the occasion of my 200th post – somewhat asynchronously, as it was technically my 206th post at the time – I featured one of the perfumes that has most impressed me this year, Puredistance I. I warmed to the company in the course of our friendly email exchanges, not least because they didn’t seem to have taken offence at my comparison of the packaging to a “top of the range coffin”. Nor had they minded when, in an earlier post (which may have originally alerted them to my blog), I took a potshot at some famous Dutch traditions, such as a mass New Year’s dive in the sea and the nation's pyromaniacal relationship with fireworks.

Given the serendipity of my falling over Zsolt Zólyomi, Hungary’s lone perfumer (and stockist of Puredistance), it was perhaps not so surprising that on the last day of my last trip of the summer - 112 days and some 10,000 miles after I swore under my breath at a crocodile of children endlessly crossing the road in Belgium – the bonkers road ran out in northern Holland.... I had just one last appointment on a Friday afternoon in Veendam (not to be confused with the hunky Belgian actor of that name), and a free morning...

Now as Veendam is 20 miles from Groningen, the European HQ of Puredistance, I contacted Rosanne Schepers - newly promoted to Manager of International Sales and Public Relations - a couple of days ahead, and asked if I could pop in and say hello. I hoped I might also be able to blag a cup of tea, Holland being one of the few European countries where you stand a fighting chance of being offered one.

On the Friday morning in question I chose to walk to their offices, tucked behind one of the many scenic canals in Groningen. I didn’t want to mow down a cyclist so close to the end of my trip, and I knew that if I persisted in driving in Dutch urban areas, it was only a matter of time before I had a handful of fatalities under my bumper and on my conscience.

At 9.30am sharp (well, sharp by my watch, which may be a couple of minutes slow), I rang the doorbell of the impressive wooden door of the Puredistance offices. These are housed in a converted church with a great vaulted celing and a wonderful air of calm. It would have made a good dance studio too, Jan Ewoud Vos observed. I asked them what denomination of church it used to be. Something “apostolic”, apparently.

Rosanne greeted me warmly and immediately offered me a cup of tea! She is one of the numerous Scandinavian blondes featured on the Puredistance website – though a couple had in fact left already, and I am pleased to report that the shade spectrum of the present team’s hair is more mixed – I was beginning to wonder whether my own hair colour might be a barrier to my visit.

After a tour of the offices and introductions to the rest of the team: Jhonathan, Alina and Kateryna - who respectively look after sales in their home countries of China, Romania and Ukraine – we took our tea and sat down at a large pine table in the main atrium and nerve centre of the fulfilment operation. Prefolded cartons were piled high on a table ready to be packed, and a ghetto blaster stood in splendid isolation in the middle of the parquet floor. Music while the team worked? Or perhaps they were going to dance after all…

Some twenty minutes into my visit, Jan Ewoud Vos arrived, bearing two types of cake to be shared amongst the staff. (As you can see in the photograph, I was given some for the road in a rather novel take-away container... :- ) ) JEV (I will use the acronym which neatly gets me out of the quandary of whether to refer to him as Mr Vos or Jan Ewoud), joined us at the head of the table, and the six of us chewed the cud for the best part of an hour about all sorts of issues relating to Puredistance, JEV's own background and the perfume market in general.



Puredistance – the only Dutch perfume?

I asked whether Puredistance was the only fragrance brand that hails from Holland, and it turns out that it is not the only one, but the only high end one. There is the mainstream men’s brand Van Gils (a new one on me), and of course fashion house Viktor & Rolf (of Flowerbomb fame – note the subliminal firework reference!)



Then there is Marlies Dekkers, the Dutch designer of a lingerie line called Undressed. Dekkers has diversified into swimwear, nightwear, sunglasses, slippers and additionally - Agent Provocateur-style - either has her own line of fragrances called "Skindressed" already, or is planning to launch it some time soon.



Lastly, JEV mentioned Ellis Faas, a cutting edge Dutch make up artist who has worked with the likes of Mario Testino, Karl Lagerfeld and Jean-Paul Gaultier, and who according to JEV remains refreshingly unfazed by the world of the rich and famous in which she now moves. I sensed that JEV – who also operates in a luxury world but has clearly not been “spoilt” by it – sees in her a kindred spirit, and they plan to collaborate, whilst taking care to retain their own individuality. They each see their own company as their "baby", which they will continue to take good care of, and in this way have a similar approach to business.

NOTE - does that sleek steel canister not remind you a little bit of the Puredistance test tube phials?

The ascent of Dutch design

We also discussed how The Netherlands is increasingly making its mark in design terms, gradually moving away from its traditional base in agriculture, fishing and industry. One look at the fabulously outlandish art museum in Groningen confirms this trend... JEV explained that Dutch design is like Scandinavian, but is a warmer, “more human version”.



He hopes that one day he and his fellow movers and shakers will “recover the fame of Dutch painters” in their chosen fields of creative endeavour – in JEV’s own case of course, through the medium of his Puredistance fragrance collection.

Jan Ewoud Vos – from tennis ace to photographer and brand entrepreneur

One of the most interesting aspects of our conversation was hearing about JEV’s early life and career. I found him charmingly unaffected and down to earth, and he seems genuinely surprised at where his career path has taken him, viewing himself as a bit of an outsider:

“For a boy with no famous connections or a wealthy background, what are the chances that he would create something legendary one day?! The banks would say the chances are zero zero zero, point zero!”

JEV showed early promise as a tennis player, still plays, and (I think) still teaches the game. He could have turned professional, but took up photography instead, before setting up Puredistance in 2002.



The inspiration behind Puredistance

I asked Jan Ewoud Vos how he came by the idea for the Puredistance venture, and he explained that its origins lay in a vision he had of a lavish society party – as he was speaking, I was picturing a decadent, modern day version of a scene from The Great Gatsby: there were lots of drunken, noisy people, who were showing off, bragging and generally swanning around in flashy designer gear and blinging jewellery.

Also at the party was a beautiful woman wearing a white dress, whose simple, natural beauty stunned those around her into silence. She was not like them, and had put “pure distance” between herself and the other revellers with their coarse exhibitionism.

This female figure is the embodiment of the Puredistance concept: understated elegance and classic beauty.



“It is more about the philosophy and the concept than selling perfume.”

However, perfume remains at the heart of this concept, as its central form of expression.

“Perfume evokes the emotions more than anything else except music. It is on the same level as that.”

A slow-burning business model

I say “slow-burning”, because it took seven years of meticulous preparations before Jan Ewoud Vos got the Puredistance collection together and ready for launch. And if the whole venture bombed, he thought to himself with endearing pragmatism, at least his daughter would get a wonderful, unique signature scent out of it as something to show for his trouble.

JEV openly admits to bucking the trend in terms of his business model, preferring to grow primarily by word of mouth and the sales efforts of a few handpicked retailers. These partners - like Zsolt Zólyomi whom I met in Budapest - are “of the faith”, offering a friendly, honest and well-informed service to customers. JEW has chosen not to advertise or use distributors (except in Russia, where there may be compelling logistical reasons for this decision).



“Find the right people, click with them, and they will tell your story because they love it and not because they’re paid.”

And in similar vein:

“Show me your friends, and I’ll know who you are.”

It is all about growing slowly, but “beautifully”. JEV went on to compare this gradual organic growth to a series of small "Puredistance viruses" in every country, stealthily spreading and gathering momentum until they reach a critical mass.

The role of bloggers

We debated the conundrum associated with this no-advertising approach, namely that you may not reach your target market. Bloggers do a great job of raising awareness of niche brands: JEV praised the blogging community for their lyrical deconstructions of fragrances, and had a far away look in his eyes as he quoted snippets of Suzanne Keller’s review of Puredistance 1, who had perfectly captured the many facets of this scent.

"Sometimes it is the juicy tang of citrus with a brut champagne, presenting a crisp facet; other times a liqueur-like berry infuses warmth into its refreshingly cool and springlike heart; and at still other times, there is a mouthwatering greenness that takes the crispness out of the ozone, like champagne bubbles that deliquesce and become liquid."



Regrettably, however, luscious prose doesn’t necessarily translate into sales. Potential punters may not look at blogs, while the bloggers themselves cannot be counted on to buy the product about which they are enthusing. In the specific case of Puredistance, I suspect the high price tag may well be a deterrent, though I did famously shell out $225 for 15ml of an Ajne scent. And in my own particular case, the company has arguably only itself to blame for their generous gifts to me of Puredistance 1... : - )

This slow-burning strategy applies not only to sales but to new product development: there will be no further scent launches this year, though the company may add one or two more over the next couple of years. Brand extensions into other categories of luxury goods are in the pipeline but still under discussion/wraps. I said I thought silver jewellery or small leather goods might be a good fit, for example, which appears to have worked for Penhaligon’s.

Where is everything made?

The former church is the centre of operations for mail order fulfilment, but I was curious to know where the perfume itself is actually made. I learnt that the perfume oil (ie the composition) is created in London and New York, before being produced in Switzerland and France and transported to Belgium, where it is
processed to the final perfume extrait. Towards the end of last year, the company added leather holders for the scent phials to its range. These are also made in Belgium and come in four tasteful colourways.



Antonia, Jan Ewoud Vos’s mother, and me

It is well documented that the fragrance Antonia, created ten years previously by Annie Buzantian, is a retrospective tribute to JEV’s late mother. I came clean and admitted that I didn’t especially care for it – I find the opening too severely green, too unapproachable. JEV was not surprised by this revelation, and explained that Antonia is more suited to a bigger woman – both in terms of physique and personality. His mother was stylish and sophisticated, with a strong and imposing personality; she was someone you would notice when she walked into a room. Antonia dries up “sweet and soft”, however, which is meant to evoke JEV’s mother’s warm heart beneath the brittle exterior. I was told that I am too “fragile” in terms of my build to carry it off. As you may imagine, I was relieved to learn that I am physiologically unsuited to Antonia, and that my failure to succumb to its verdant charms is not due to a lack of taste on my part!



The fragrance market – “throwaway fashion scents” versus enduring classics

JEV was keen to stress that all three scents in the collection do not follow current trends, but are designed to be timeless classics. This got us onto a discussion of the state of the fragrance market and the plethora of mainstream launches, which are backed with huge advertising campaigns, only to plunge into oblivion a couple of years later like shooting stars - or fireworks, indeed!! JEV drew my attention to Chanel as an exception to this rule – its launches tend to stand the test of time. He is a big admirer of Coco Chanel and appreciates the fact that her iconic bottle design is still around in a near identical form today.



Jan Ewoud Vos’s scented cv, and the maxim of “less is more”

The discussion took an interesting turn when I asked Jan Ewoud Vos what colognes he used to wear before he founded Puredistance. It turns out that he has worn Chanel Antaeus for some 30 years, and still toggles between that and Puredistance M, wearing fragrance typically a couple of times a week. He fervently hopes Antaeus is never discontinued or altered, likening a favourite perfume to a spouse or partner:

“Fragrance is a thing you wear daily, it is around you like a partner, and you don’t like it when your partner changes!”



JEV has also worn Hermès Eau d’Orange Verte And Chanel Allure in the past, and as a teenager, sported one of the masculine scents in the Alain Delon range, hoping that it would confer upon him the smouldering French actor's seductive powers.... And I can also reveal.....drum roll....that JEV also owned a bottle of Brut around that time!

Encouraged by this mood of full disclosure, I mentioned my 70+ bottle count and my perfume fridge, and admitted that I do sometimes feel overwhelmed by the scale of my collection, and rather admired him for sticking to just a few scents. Jan Ewoud Vos pointed out that the more scents I acquire, the more each one in my collection becomes devalued and diminished in importance, and I couldn’t help but agree.



“I wouldn’t mind if someone took away all my perfumes and just gave me back half a dozen - or ten, say - to use for ever. I’d be quite relieved in fact.”

And if they did, I would be happy if Puredistance 1 was in that shortlist, for it, along with the other two scents in the range - is a triumph of style AND substance.




Photo of Puredistance offices from quwest.com, photo of Marlies Dekkers lingerie from staticlookbooks.com, photo of ellis faas make up from witoxicity.com, photo of Groningen art museum from cruising.org.uk, photo of white dress from classifieds.weddingbee.com, photo of champagne cocktails from southernliving.com, photo of Chanel bottles from pinkmsg.wordpress.com, photo of Alain Delon from rujon.blogspot.com, other photos my own or from the Puredistance website.

A Bonkers Grand Tour: My Serendipitous Sniff-In With Zsolt Zólyomi, Hungary’s Only Perfumer – Part 1

The Roja Dove Of Central Europe

Towards the end of the Bonkers Grand Tour – so called because it took in eight countries in under three weeks – I found myself in Budapest on a Monday with no appointments. Thinking this might be my one and only visit to the city, I decided to spend the day sightseeing. After four hours of pounding the tree-lined boulevards and clambering up and down the hill to the famous castle district, I was making my way back to my hotel, decidedly weary and footsore by this stage. Having recently enjoyed two days of dedicated perfume sniffing in Dresden and Vienna, perfume was not on my mind that day as I strolled through the pedestrian precinct behind the riverfront.

Suddenly, however, I spied an upmarket clothes store with what appeared to be a niche perfume boutique at one end, called Le Parfum Croisette.

“Oh, okay then”, I thought to myself. “I’ll just stick my head in quickly and see if they have anything I don’t know...”

As I stepped inside, I immediately spotted the Dutch Puredistance range of perfumes facing the doorway, and flashed a grin of recognition at the proprietor, who was sitting in front of the display on a bar stool. Perhaps sensing that I was no ordinary punter, he invited me to take a seat on the other stool, and we ended up chatting for the best part of an hour and a half.

And if I was no ordinary punter, the owner of Le Parfum Croisette was most definitely no ordinary owner of a perfume store. For he turned out to be none other than Hungary’s one and only perfumer, Zsolt Zólyomi. Is there a particular term for that – “solinose”, perhaps? I was lucky to catch him in the store in fact, for he has so many other scent-related projects; indeed the boutique itself is as much a showcase designed to raise public awareness of niche fragrances as it is a sales outlet - if not more so.

In the course of our chat, Zsolt gave me a quick rundown of the history of fragrance in his country, which has its roots as far back as the 14th century. For Hungary contributed the first alcohol-based perfume ever made – L’Eau de La Reine de Hongrie – an astringent cologne containing rosemary oil, which was said to have rejuvenating properties. Whether frequent dousing in her eponymous water had anything to do with it or not, Queen Elisabeth certainly lived to a ripe old age.

Then during the Communist era in the 20th century the fragrance industry in Hungary was suppressed as an elitist indulgence, and it is only now that people in Central and Eastern Europe are starting to discover fine fragrances and embrace the concept of luxury goods generally. However, Zsolt feels he has his work cut out in promoting the cause of niche perfume lines, for Hungarian people’s tastes have not evolved very far: women typically favour accessible scents – either quite sweet perfumes or fresh florals such as D & G Light Blue. They are easily swayed by advertising and tend to follow the crowd and whatever brands are “in” at the time. So not unlike everywhere else, then...!

Fired up with missionary zeal to revive Hungary's perfume traditions, Zsolt is deploying every means possible to further the cause of high end fragrance everywhere “east of Prague”, seeing himself very much as an ambassador for perfume. He plans to launch a Perfumery School for students from the CEE countries, and open the first Hungarian Perfume Museum.

Some day he would also like to create a brand of perfume that captures the essence of Hungarian culture. This may not be it, but he also fancies creating a scent with a burnt smell. "Aha", I said: "That sounds a bit like Christopher Brosius of CB I hate perfume and his Burning Leaves". Now I am not sure quite what style of burnt matter Zsolt has in mind, but he is clear that it must not smell like a particular type of Hungarian cheese which also boasts a burnt aroma, thanks to the way it is matured I think (I am afraid I can't remember the specifics!).

But meanwhile, as Hungary’s only perfumer, Zsolt already has an awful lot on his plate...

His fragrance consultancy service is wide-ranging: he creates commercial perfumes for brand owners (Rajul and Nubia, a mixable His & Hers range commissioned by Emeshel, a US "lifestyle brand" with Hungarian roots. The perfumes complement its existing line of high end jewellery, crystal and sculptures.) Zsolt also creates custom scents for private clients (including the wife of actor Roger Moore), and for use in corporate gifts (eg candles). Additionally Zsolt produces scented events aka "olfactive animations" - “from weddings to fashion shows, from theatre acts to product launches and parties, where I choose or create the best ambiance fragrance matching the event".

Another type of service is the tongue twisting “interactive olfactive animation”, where Zsolt might give a talk, and involve the audience through scented games or quizzes, or a spot of fragrance consulting or a mini-demonstration of the art of perfumery.

In addition to his roles as pundit, educator, marketeer and all-round scent evangelist, Zsolt is the author of a book on perfume: Le Parfum 2000. It was in Hungarian, but on flicking through I was reminded of Roja Dove's later work, The Essence of Perfume, with its general overview of the subject, historical approach, and illustrations of scent bottles and adverts down the ages.

I was also keen to hear the origins of Zólyomi’s love of fragrance. It turns out that he was fascinated by smells from an early age, and a year spent in Libya aged 10 fuelled his interest further. Rajul for men is inspired by the coastline of Zsolt's adopted childhood home, and blends the tangy scents of grapefruit and sea salt in a whimsically suggestive bottle.

Zsolt trained as a plant biologist originally, and later studied at the ISIPCA in Paris, the school for postgraduate studies in perfume, cosmetics and food flavouring. He qualified in 2005 and set up Le Parfum Croisette in 2009. I clocked the following ranges, with a full listing available on the store's website: Puredistance, Frapin, L’Artisan Parfumeur, Annick Goutal, Atelier Cologne, The Different Company, Juliet Has A Gun, Etro, Penhaligon’s, Reminiscence, Odin and India brand Sahlini (of which more anon).



Part 2 will cover what we actually sniffed, but there is one final amusing tale to report...

One of Zsolt's "olfactive animation" projects involved creating an ambient fragrance for the Kogart museum in Budapest. "If you are quick and walk as fast as me, you'll be there in 15 minutes", Zsolt said brightly, so after I left him I hotfooted it up the museum, only to find two buildings bearing that name, both of which had just shut.

Outside the first building a female member of staff was standing on the doorstep, possibly waiting for a lift home. In vain did I try to explain that - as per my original intention with Le Parfum Croisette itself - I just wanted to stick my head inside the door, in this case to sniff the air and satisfy my curiosity about Zsolt's ambient "scent installation". The girl spoke no English, so in the end I nipped past her and stuck my head inside the open door anyway, ostensibly to illustrate my point! The foyer didn't smell of anything.

So I headed on to the other building called Kogart, which was more or less next door. Its restaurant at least was open, and there were a couple of security guards loitering in the empty eaterie. They spoke some English and knew all about Zsolt's museum fragrance. "It's expensive stuff!" one guard remarked, "but it isn't used here in the restaurant, and the rest of the building is shut now, sorry."

Ah well, that was too bad, but my serendipitous encounter with Zsolt was more than enough excitement for the afternoon. Another reason to go back to Budapest some day... By which time, Zsolt may have come up with his own quintessential Scent of Hungary. If so, it will be 100% his own creation, and will not have been focus grouped beyond all recognition. For somewhere in our chat I mentioned in passing what I do for a living, to which came Zsolt's laughing reply: "Ha! I don't do market research."

I like him all the more for it.


Photo of Eau de la Reine de Hongrie Water label from perfumeprojects.com, photo of Rajul and Nubia perfume range from popsop.com, photo of Libyan coastline from africanews.com, other photos my own